Turning upside down c-stick treated print bed?
I'm often printing with various plastics including abs, pla and petg (I have a tent for a printer). All 3 require different treatment of the smooth pei bed I have:
- pla - nothing
-petg - craft glue for release
-abs - c-stick
C-stick is a commercial spray that contains some sort of acetone soluble plastic that performs a similar role as abs goo. The problem is that to remove it one has to use acetone which is not a healthy thing to use too often on a pei sheet.
So I'm trying to find out if I can have one side of the print bed permanently treated and the other side not. When I print pla or petg the treated side would be on the bottom. If this plastic is like abs it shouldn't glue itself to the bed at pla/petg bed printing temps, but I thought to ask here just in case.
The manufacturer doesn't say what is in c-stick. All they say is that it has different holding power depending on temperature (50C to 120C) and that it can be used with pla, petg and abs too.
Also the same question for craft glue.
Do you have a treated print bed you "turn upside down"? Did you have bad experience doing that? Please let me know.
RE: Turning upside down c-stick treated print bed?
Or you could use a satin sheet which at least for me has worked flawlessly with anything from PLA to TPU to PC blend. I only use glue stick or Layerneer as a separating agent for PC blend.
And to your specific question, I don't see any harm trying to use two different sides.
Formerly known on this forum as @fuchsr -- until all hell broke loose with the forum software...
RE: Turning upside down c-stick treated print bed?
Or you could use a satin sheet which at least for me has worked flawlessly with anything from PLA to TPU to PC blend. I only use glue stick or Layerneer as a separating agent for PC blend.
And to your specific question, I don't see any harm trying to use two different sides.
Thank you for the reply.
I haven't got a satin sheet(just smooth pei) and I can't buy satin one now unfortunately so I have to make do with what I have for now...
Just to clarify, you said you don't see a problem trying two different sides. Did you mean it in context of having craft glue or c-stick applied on the underside of the steel plate? Because that's my idea. I'm trying to use both sides with one side being clean and the other treated all the time. Although craft glue can be removed with water, removing and reapplying c-stick is a pain so when I would like a clean pei sheet I just would like to turn it around.
- By my observations not C-stick nor craft glue appear to be gluey while hot to anything other than hot melted plastic so theoretically it should be fine, but I don't want to find out the hard way, my steel bed plate now becomes permanently attached to the bed.
RE: Turning upside down c-stick treated print bed?
Thinking about it again, I'm not sure it's a great idea. I've never heard of c stick, so no idea how gooey it is. Glue stick I was less concerned about because it can certainly handle being on the (top side of the) sheet for extended periods of time. But now I'm wondering what might happen if some of it starts seeping into the screws on the bed and accumulates in the crevices there. Upon repeated exposure to high heat it may turn into nasty stuff. So I guess I have to take back what I said and suggest you clean glue stick off with hot water and soap. Again, c-stick, I've never heard of, so don't know.
Formerly known on this forum as @fuchsr -- until all hell broke loose with the forum software...
RE: Turning upside down c-stick treated print bed?
So yesterday I tried heating the bed heater and putting just a corner of the plate with c-stick applied underneath on it. It didn't seem to stick so I ended up printing some petg on an inverted sheet like this (with craft glue on top). It was fine.
C-stick doesn't feel guey to the touch when hot. I don't know what are the ingredients other than acetone and ether, but just feeling the little strands of white plastic residue left around the spray nozzle reminds me of burned polystyrene(very brittle, characteristic feel). So I suspect it is just dissolved polystyrene.
For others reading this let me say I had no problems after this one print (bed temp 85/80C),but I can't be sure of any potential long term consequences.