Printing Lithophanes  

RE: Printing Lithophanes

I've printed a number of large lithophanes on my mk3.  I've only tried one on the SL1 but it was a large one.  I printed it right on the build plate (3mm thick lithophane) and it came out great.  I was printing with anycubic black resin at the time and just wanted to see how good a lithophane would come out.  I printed it at 0.1 layer height.

while the resin might make a difference (I'm only 30-40 prints on my SL1 so far across ~15 different resins), I doubt at that layer height it would matter.  That said, the color would make a difference of course (translucent resins I doubt would work very well).

RE: Printing Lithophanes

Did this a few months ago on the SL1. 14mins 3secs, prusa grey because I didnt have white at the time. printed flat on build plate. blew up on reddit

RE: Printing Lithophanes

This like a fossil type litho "???", elegoo green

RE: Printing Lithophanes

Do you have print settings for the lithophane?

Have you tried printing vertical and if so, any difference in quality?

I have not a resinprinter yet, but i'm thinking about getting into custom name/door tags.

Thanks

RE: Printing Lithophanes

Hey prus-38,

"Do you have print settings for the lithophane?"

This is really dependant of the specific printer and resin one uses. Some resin printers have stronger UV lights then others, meaning you'd need more or less exposure time. You need time to calibrate the resin used for a given printer. Unless you have same printer, same resin, same ambient temperature. Exposure settings for 1 printer and resin don't carry over easily to other printers and resins.

"Have you tried printing vertical and if so, any difference in quality?"

I have not tried printing lithophane's vertically because they take much longer to print vs printing horizontally. So I don't know if a vertically printed lithophane would have more detail because the time saved prevented me from even wanting to try.

"I have not a resinprinter yet, but i'm thinking about getting into custom name/door tags."

Awesome. Just keep in mind the size of typical resin printer is very small compared to a fdm printer. 

RE: Printing Lithophanes

As for the volume, most have around 120-130 wide and 150ish high so you could print a vertical sign 130x150ish for example.

What are the times for flat vs vertical 3-4mm thick print and the resin volume used?

I have a 250mm d delta and a 300mm square xy fdm and have done some lithophanes for hanging windowlamps as well as themed (easter and christmas) and i get fair results with a 0.4 nozzle but currently have .6 and .8 nozzles and they dont do details very good.

My thinking is vertical on 0.1 layers would be atleast twice as fast as 0.2 on fdm with 0.4mm nozzle. Or my thoughts could be way off and should really go make some pancakes 🙂

RE: Printing Lithophanes

"What are the times for flat vs vertical 3-4mm thick print and the resin volume used?"

Vertical = 5 hours 33 minutes
Horizontal = 18 minutes

The quality as u can see is miles ahead of fdm even printed horizontally on a sl1. Never wanted to wait the long. I'd only consider another orientation if lithophane had some other geometry. 

RE: Printing Lithophanes

That is some exquisit detail.

And at ~9ml it would cost around 0.6euro at 60euro/l resin. (0.06e/ml)

FDM at 25e/kg gives around 0.26euro for the same volume (0.025e/g)

IIt almost makes me want to pick up a Phrozen sonic mini and dive right into it...
Anycubic has an affordable cleaning/curing station.

Thanks for exploring.