What kinds of filament?
So, I was wondering, what kind of filaments do you guys all use? Why? What prints the best? Why? Looks the best? Why? Examples? How much filament do you guys have?
I'm gonna start with my whole 3D printing story, as I think it can be learned from.
I first got a Monoprice Mini V2. (This little printer is actually a rather nice printer for someone who has no idea what they are doing, though honestly, it's not very good) I started with some Hatchbox PLA (Yellow). I went through about half of that spool getting the printer to not be a disaster. I found this to be a very nice filament, and I thought it printed well. (better than the "clear" sample that came with the printer) And I thought "Oh, I need to order some more filament. I want to get more than 1 color, so I'm gonna find a cheaper filament! So I ordered 5 spools of "Fox Smart". Biggest mistake ever. The "red" was more of an Orange. The black was un-printable, the only filament that printed decently, was the "clear" and the "grey" was printable, but not nearly as good as the hatchbox. So after almost a month of beating my head against the wall trying to get this stuff to print, I *GAVE UP*. I bought a spool of the similarly priced E-Sun PLA Pro (to the hatchbox). I had read good things about the PLA+ filaments, and wanted to try the cheapest once one I could find. Needless to say, so far, that E-Sun PLA Pro, is my favorite filament. It prints so wonderfully, and it's MUCH stronger than "straight" PLA.
It was about a month later, I got my Mk3, and I was able to print with the "junk" filament. I still had issues. It did not print well, but it would print! So I printed many useless things... just to waste that filament... and I still have a 25% throw it away ratio... cause the stuff is just trash. So fast forward a few weeks, and I'm starting to think. "I need more filament. I'm running low." So rather than ordering a bunch of spools of a brand I know nothing about, I decided to play it smart, I did my research, I read the reviews. I found a brand that appeared to be decent quality, and I ordered a single spool. I found it printed "decently". It's almost as good as the Hatchbox, but no-where near as good as the E-Sun PLA Pro. But the price was right. So over the next week I printed EVERYTHING with it, big things, small things, massive detail, things I wouldn't dare print with that earlier cheap junk. I got about 50% through the spool when I decided the quality was good enough, and I would order nearly their entire color lineup. 14 spools, 12PLA, 2 ABS, shipped to my door for under 160$ The colors are good, the brights are bright, the darks are dark. The colors are a touch on the opaque side, but for that price, why complain, throw an extra perimeter, and top/bottom layer on there.
The Cheap Filament I'm using right now is ZYLtech, and there is a 15% off coupon that stacks with free shipping, so you can get the PLA for 11$/spool!
The filament I want to try the most is Polyalchemy's Emerald City. I *REALLY* want to try that stuff, but I just cant bring myself to spending that much for 0.75kg. I don't care how good it is. I can't spend 40$ on that tiny amount of filament!
But the lesson of my story is. Don't buy a bunch of filament from a brand, until you have used their filament. It's a rather expensive mistake!
Hi, I'm Sean. I used to work on CNC machines.
I try to not make mistakes, but the decision is YOURS.
Please feel free to donate to my filament/maintance fund.
Re: What kinds of filament?
I'm a big fan of hatchbox myself, and like you started on the Monoprice mini V2 and now have my MK3 🙂
My only complaint is the color availability is annoying, Grey and Black hatchbox are easy enough to get, but the prices fluctuate so widely on the other colors, and many always seem to be unavailable. I've also been using hobbyking PLA for colors I couldn't reliably get the hatchbox version of, and they printed really well on my Monoprice, but I had to print a bit cooler with them than hatchbox. Typically 200~ for hatchbox (though 195 for white) and 190 for the hobbyking (185 for the yellow, it was really stringy).
I haven't printed in anything but the Prusa silver spool that came with my MK3 yet, but I'm getting close to using it all up, so I'll be testing/calibrating my various hatchbox and hobbyking colors soon 🙂
Re: What kinds of filament?
To give you a sense of what I print with, here's a photo of my workspace:
I print mostly in ABS, PLA, and TPU, with some PETG thrown in when it seems appropriate. I've experimented a little with TPE, PVA (as soluble support), and HIPS. The three printers you see are an Up! Plus, a Cetus3D, and (of course) an MK3; and the white box in the middle is a Palette+ filament splicer.
I've been 3D printing since 2011. When I bought my first printer, the going rate for filament was about $60/KG, and a lot of the stuff for sale was by today's standards absolute garbage. I spent a lot of time back then developing tricks to get my printer to work with filaments that would vary from 1.5mm to 2mm on the same spool.
When I found a source of consistent filament in China with reasonable prices and lots of colors, I placed a bulk order of 25kg to bring my total cost (with shipping) down to a reasonable $22/kg. I still have some of that plastic today, and it still works just fine.
These days I buy most of my filament from Microcenter, because it's cheap and prints well (I know an employee who lets me load up when they run their periodic "friends and family" discounts where employees can give their employee discounts to friends and family; this brings my cost down to $10-$12/kg). I also print with Hatchbox, and I've found the Priline TPU on Amazon to be really good stuff.
But honestly, I'll try almost any brand once and I usually shop by price more than anything else. I've found that almost every filament available today is printable in some fashion, and when I'm disappointed it's usually because the color isn't quite what I'd hoped for, or the quality of the prints is subpar, not because I can't get it to work at all.
For what it's worth, I definitely have a problem. Right now I have 85 reels of filament in my inventory (of which 28 are unopened). I keep track of it on a spreadsheet. A lot of my filament is interesting stuff where I use a little here and a little there, so it takes a long time to consume a reel (for example, I have three colors of thermochromatic ABS, and a really interesting glow in the dark orange that is perfect for Haloween pumpkins). I am starting to move more towards PLA for everyday printing, but I have so much ABS and so many different colors that I'm going to be printing in ABS for a long time.
Re: What kinds of filament?
For what it's worth, I definitely have a problem. Right now I have 85 reels of filament in my inventory (of which 28 are unopened). I keep track of it on a spreadsheet. A lot of my filament is interesting stuff where I use a little here and a little there, so it takes a long time to consume a reel (for example, I have three colors of thermochromatic ABS, and a really interesting glow in the dark orange that is perfect for Haloween pumpkins). I am starting to move more towards PLA for everyday printing, but I have so much ABS and so many different colors that I'm going to be printing in ABS for a long time.
This sounds like what I want to do, regarding just amassing filament over time. As my cheaper filaments start to run out, or I need the occasional "special" colors, I want to start upgrading to a higher quality brand. (I do plan on only having 3-4 brands at a time, as it makes printing profiles easier to manage)
I'm actually watching a spool of PLA on amazon right now. (It has a "live" price that changes every day) if the price drops another 3-5$ I'll be buying it. Sorry guys I'm being secretive about this one. If someone buys it, the price goes up. 😉
Once I order it later this week, I'll post in here what it is. I have another spool from the company that I can't even print with. (too soft of a TPU, and my mk3 won't extrude it, without binding up in the gear). I blame my printer for this though, not the filament. It prints quite nice honestly... assuming the printer don't stop randomly through the print (which it does 75% of the time)
Hi, I'm Sean. I used to work on CNC machines.
I try to not make mistakes, but the decision is YOURS.
Please feel free to donate to my filament/maintance fund.
Re: What kinds of filament?
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I'm actually watching a spool of PLA on amazon right now. (It has a "live" price that changes every day) if the price drops another 3-5$ I'll be buying it. Sorry guys I'm being secretive about this one. If someone buys it, the price goes up. 😉
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When I was looking to buy some NinjaFlex a while back, I noticed that the price would drop a couple of hours after I would add the item to my cart and then remove it over and over. Maybe give it a shot?
Re: What kinds of filament?
When I was looking to buy some NinjaFlex a while back, I noticed that the price would drop a couple of hours after I would add the item to my cart and then remove it over and over. Maybe give it a shot?
Just ordered it.
2kg of Essentium Engineering grade PLA Natural color USA made. (no pigment) 31.30$ (listed at 100$ on their website)
Hi, I'm Sean. I used to work on CNC machines.
I try to not make mistakes, but the decision is YOURS.
Please feel free to donate to my filament/maintance fund.