3d printing process

[Mldixon]

7 hours ago, Patrick Matthews said:

Maybe because I'm working in a very large scale, so it tried to leave detail

Yep, my figures are in the 18 to 30 mm range in Z axis, so I suspect that could be part of the issue. Your driver looks pretty good though.

[Patrick Matthews]

12 hours ago, Kevin-the-lubber said:

Meshmixer, also free, fixes leaky stl’s, but I assume you all know this and it somehow doesn’t do what you want.

 

Yes, this not merely a leaky STL. It's several layers of self-intersecting surface meshes (not close to a solid) wrapped around the watertight figure mesh. It would require a huge amount of manual editing in Blender or Meshmixer.
The idea of "shrink wrap" is appealing, but even that is very limited in Blender.

[Patrick Matthews]

BTW, here is the first driver print, with flaws that aren't too obvious here- mostly the faceting and the shredded collar.

Second and better one is on the printer now. 2 oz. glue bottle for scale.

 

 

Edited March 3, 2022 by Patrick Matthews

[Kevin-the-lubber]

3 hours ago, Patrick Matthews said:

It's several layers of self-intersecting surface meshes

This is partly why I haven’t yet moved on to Rhino, because it’s seems surface based rather than the easier-for-me-to-get-my-head-around F360. That’s an excellent bit of figure modelling though - how long did that take to do?

[Mldixon]

If your willing to go through the rather steep learning curve, and the higher cost, Zbrush by pixologic will import the object file from Daz export, and will resolve all the problems.  Ask me how I know.

[Patrick Matthews]

16 hours ago, Kevin-the-lubber said:

...That’s an excellent bit of figure modelling though - how long did that take to do?

I merely posed an available figure from Daz... not my sculpting work. Amazing stuff though!

[Kevin-the-lubber]

It is indeed. Daz downloaded, will play with it presently and pay attention to what you’ve all been saying on here.

[thibaultron]

Well, "I pulled the trigger" and ordered an AnyCubic 4K 3D resin printer! I have a question about ventilation for it. I know it needs to be used in a "Well ventilated area", which my shop is not. The shop is well sealed, as I have to use electric heaters, and window AC units, so I can't afford to be pulling in a lot of different temperature outside air in.

 

My question is can I put in an enclosed air system in, using outside air just to  an enclosure that is then vented back outside? Is the resin greatly affected by varying air temperatures, and humidity? I'm thinking an enclosure for the printer, a hose from outside air for the inlet, and a hose to the outside for discharge, with a 120 Volt 4" computer type fan at the discharge end to pull air through the system.

[Dr PR]

Ron,

 

I am using an Anycubic Photon mono and have been using the Anycubic Basic Grey resin. The resin does stink! I had to move the printer from my office to the laundry room.

 

However, I don't think there is a health hazard from the vapors. It just smells bad. I keep the cover on the printer while there is resin in the vat. I can also run the clothes dryer on a cool air dry cycle to pull air from the room and blow it outside. The alcohol for the wash also has a strong odor.

 

If he odor really bothers you the enclosure with a fan to circulate air in from the outside should do the trick. In theory the fan should pull air in from the outside to pressurize the enclosure, with a vent duct leading back outside. Instructions for some resins say to avoid ignition sources, so unless you have a fan approved for operation in an explosive atmosphere it would be best to have it in the intake side rather than the exhaust side. But that makes the construction of the enclosure more complicated. It would need to be air tight.

 

Most of my printing has been done in the low 60sF (~15C). At higher temperatures the chemical reactions will go faster so I might have to reduce exposure times when it gets hot this summer.

 

I recently bought the water washable Anycubic  Eco UV and the Phrozen Fast Black resins. Although they are touted as low odor, the Fast Black has an objectionable smell. I haven't tried the Eco UV resin yet.

[Kevin-the-lubber]

Try the elegoo resins. Honest, I’m not on a commission nor some sort of elegoo evangelist but I had my printers running in my office for months without it becoming noticeably smelly, as the garage is unheated.I had to move them back into the garage when I started using the sirayatech as that does have a sickly sweet, slightly foul odour. IPA is also quite smelly so I’ve always done the cleanup in the garage, but the smell has become much less of an issue since I bought the anycubic wash and cure machine. And also way less messy. Though more expensive, I think, as I’m fouling a gallon of IPA at a time now rather than just small amounts as I go along, and eventually have to exchange it for clean stuff.

[Dr PR]

Kevin,

 

Thanks for the tip. Maybe I'll try an elegoo resin after I have experimented with what I have.

 

A real problem is trying to figure out the settings to use for new resins. I have the Anycubic Basic Grey settings down pat for the Photon Mono printer. Now I am experimenting with the Phrozen Fast Black, and the settings they recommend for their printers are MUCH slower that what I used for Basic Grey (it is taking four times as long to print the same objects).  But the Phrozen test object came out almost perfect using the settings recommended for one of the Phrozen printers.

 

Many of the details I am printing are very small and extremely fragile with the Basic Grey. The Fast Black resin was recommended by three very experienced users on The Ship Model Forum because it is slightly flexible when cured and much more rugged than the crystalline Basic Grey.

 

Fast Black is also water soluble and can be rinsed without using alcohol.

[Kevin-the-lubber]

I’ll have to try that Phrozen water washable. I tried the elegoo version once and didn’t like it at all, as the surface quality was quite inferior, but I spend a fortune on IPA and would love to avoid that cost. It sounds similar to the elegoo ABS-like. I get really crisp detail with this, it’s very flexible and a fair amount of the stuff I’ve printed is very thin (0.2 - 0.4mm). I settled on grey as a standard colour as everyone says it’s the best for seeing the detail before painting. That’s certainly true in comparison to the syratech fast, which I originally could only find in a kind of skin tone. I’ve thought I’ve sanded support marks out, primed, then had to sand again, which I hardly ever had to do with grey.

 

what settings do you use for the anycubic standard? I have most of a litre which I’ll want to use up if I can.

[Dr PR]

I just finished a 12 hour print with the Phrozen Fast Black. The results were awful!

 

 

 

This is the same file printed with Anycubic Basic Grey: This is right off the printer, after washing and curing. I haven't painted the part or tried to smooth the surfaces.

 

 

I used a 0.03 mm vertical step/slice height and the Chitubox Advanced settings for antialiasing and image blur. The Anycubic exposure time was 2 seconds and the Phrozen Fast Black exposure time was 2.5 seconds. The big difference was the Lift speed and Retract speed. For the Anycubic resin they are Lift Speed = 240 mm/minute and Retract Speed = 360 mm/minute. For the Phrozen Fast Black they were 60 and 150 mm/minute (the values recommended by Phrozen for their printers). These slow Lift and Retract speeds more than doubled the print time.

 

Here is another comparison:

 

The saluting guns are about half an inch long. The Basic Grey resin produced details (nuts and bolts and the breech lever) as good as the Fast Black, but without all the "jaggies".

 

Printing with thinner vertical step sizes will produce smoother surfaces. I have used 0.01 mm with some Basic Grey prints with excellent results. But Phrozen recommends a minimum of 2.5 mm for slice thickness. And if I used 0.01 mm slices it would take three times as long - 36 hours - as with 0.03 mm steps, and that is over six times as long as with the Basic Grey!

 

There may be a way to get smooth prints with the Fast Black resin. A longer exposure time might allow the anti-aliasing features to fill in the grooves in the jaggies. One fellow said he uses 4 second exposures. But even if you can get smooth surfaces with Phrozen Fast Black it may take many times longer to get equal results with Anycubic Basic Grey.

 

Needless to say, I am not impressed with the results with Phrozen Fast Black! I may try a few more experiments, but for now I am not planning to use this resin for modeling.

 

 

[Kevin-the-lubber]

As far as I can remember this is similar to my experience with elegoo's water washable. The surface finish was a bit coarse and way below what I would get with standard or abs-like so that was the end of that. I think I just used it up by adding a bit at a time to standard resin when printing test pieces. I've never altered the layer heights from factory settings but on reflection there are a few pieces which I need to print again where I may do so, just to get that extra high quality finish.

 

 

[chris watton]

I too find the Anycubic standard resin the best. Elagoo resin is not so good, I get at the very least one failure per print run, which means a tank clean. I need to always use the finest (lightest) supports so they do not mark the print too much, and they are easy to remove. Anycubic resin is great for this, with Elagoo being a complete nightmare in comparison, which need medium to large supports to even stand a change of printing correctly.

[Dr PR]

I reprinted the Mk37 director shell with Phrozen Fast Black resin and got pretty good results. Apparently the original STL file was corrupted in some way, and it messed up the slicing process. After running the STL file through Microsoft's 3D Builder and repairing it the file printed mostly correctly. But there still were some very odd jaggies in some of the parts.

 

The details were very sharp - such things as nuts and bolts.

[Kevin-the-lubber]

19 hours ago, chris watton said:

Anycubic standard resin the best. Elagoo resin is not so good

How odd that we have almost opposite experiences. I do get the occasional failure, invariably supports-related but I'm able to get away with the lightest of supports on small items, though not bigger things. And I have needed to redesign some things explicitly to be able to deal with support removal and the resulting surface defects. It sounds like I should give anycubic another try. 

[thibaultron]

Got my AnyCubic 4K Mono two days ago, and bought some Elegoo resin. Have to build an enclosure for it before I can do anything with it though. My shop is not well ventilated.

[Kevin-the-lubber]

1 hour ago, thibaultron said:

My shop is not well ventilated

Neither is mine but, to be honest, it was only the smell that bothered me. One day I might build a large, heated and ventilated enclosure for the whole lot but it's a low priority. But then again, mine is in a garage so the smell doesn't bother anyone else. Different if it's indoors.

[mikegr]

I received my 4K Anycubic Mono today with water washable resin. I will be able to use it on May and write my first impressions.

[mikegr]

On 3/14/2022 at 5:56 PM, thibaultron said:

Got my AnyCubic 4K Mono two days ago, and bought some Elegoo resin. Have to build an enclosure for it before I can do anything with it though. My shop is not well ventilated.

from what i researched this model in order to save cost it not only comes with full of plastic but laos hasn't any fans so good ventilation would be required

 

On 3/14/2022 at 7:39 PM, Kevin-the-lubber said:

Neither is mine but, to be honest, it was only the smell that bothered me. One day I might build a large, heated and ventilated enclosure for the whole lot but it's a low priority. But then again, mine is in a garage so the smell doesn't bother anyone else. Different if it's indoors.

It is generally proffered  to use manufacture's resin although its not a rule.

Watched a long anycubic review on you tube, a guy had several print results by just changing lubricant on the axle

[Kevin-the-lubber]

On 4/11/2022 at 11:32 AM, mikegr said:

changing lubricant on the axle

I can believe that. After a few months I had to clean and re-grease the rails on my Mars as it was sticking so I expect there's a point beforehand where the resistance might adversely impact. I used lithium grease, which reminds me that I must buy some proper 3d lube as my saturn is probably due for some maintenance.

 

I think you can use whatever resin you wish, you just have to dial in the correct settings. One thing I'm noticing is that different brands have a different tolerance to non-ideal ambient temperatures. I have to extend the curing time for thin, runny resins compared to the thicker elegoo compounds.

[thibaultron]

Today I made a tray to set my resin printer and washing station in. After looking at a few videos, they recommended having the printer on a tray, to catch any resin spills, and thus keep it off your work bench/table. I had not considered that before. I was looking around for a suitably sized plastic tray, when I remembered an old metal tray I had laying around. The tray is a metal drip tray, sold for putting under leaky cars. This one had been used to protect my wood trailer floor, when I helped a friend pick up a used car engine.

 

Anyway the tray measured 25 inches X ~36 inches, which was too large for my 20 inch wide workbench. It also had some bad dents at one end, where the motor had pressed in during transport. Cutting the tray to a final length, after bending, of 19 inches long (from the 36 inch length), would leave me with a 25 inch wide by 19 inch deep tray. This was perfect for placing the printer and wash station side by side, with room to insert the USB thumb drive in the slot in the side of the printer. Why Anycubic put the power and USB slot on the side of the printer, and the wash station power switch on the back, I don’t know. Front mounts would be much better.

 

I cut the tray with a 4 inch lip, which I bent up to form a vertical back to the tray. In the near future I will fill the two back corners with caulk to seal the area I cut for clearance for bending this. I could have just left the tray intact and bent the whole end up, but in my case, this would have interfered with the brackets of the shelf above the two machines. In the next week I will cut a slot in one side of a ¾ inch square strip, and place it over the exposed cut at the back of the tray, even with filing, that edge is still sharp enough to cut me. If I do make another one (see below), I’ll make the back lip higher, right now it is level with the top of the printer base.

 

Here is a picture of the tray, as it sits right now. You can see the tab I bent up at the back. How did you bend it, you ask? I carefully flattened the outer area of the tab sides, leaving the tubular edge intact. This allowed the tab the clear the area at the bend to bottom lip area. I clamped it between two pieces of wood, and after hand bending it a little, went at the corner with a rubber mallet.

This is one of the corners that I have to caulk. You can see the area next to the tube edge that I flattened for clearance. It might not look flat, but the wrinkles you see are where the tray was bent, they are “flat”, but the edges still leave a visible mark.

I will probably buy a new tray, and fabricate another one. This one is not quite flat, due to a couple of twisted areas that I bent down as best I could. Moving the engine caused some damage that caused this. The tray is pretty good, but the weight of the machines is not great enough to press the floor tight to the table. The trays are not that expensive (at least not a couple years ago when I bought this one). And keeping the printer as close to flat on the leveled table as possible is best.

 

I’m going to run a test print tomorrow, to dial in the correct settings for my resin, and see how bad the stink is. The later will determine if I have to build a vented enclosure for the printer.

[mtaylor]

You might also look around for places that sell "used" kitchenware... especially commercial items.  They do make large pans like what you've made for bakeries, etc.  I had one some years ago I bought used.  And I'll add that lately 2nd hand stuff is pretty inexpensive as the shops that handle there have more offers of stock than customers.

[Kevin-the-lubber]

Also take a look in your local garden centre, watering trays come in all sorts of sizes. I find the thermal covers quite good for the smell as well, though in my case I use them more to keep the temperature up and the dust out.

[thibaultron]

I finally got to print something, twice, with a major visit by clutezness! The original file USB thumb drive that came with my Mono 4K did not have Anycubic’s R_E_R_F file, the Resin Exposure test file! However, on their site they have Firmware Upgrades for the printer, and that includes the file, Yea! See the bottom of this tread, for a useful tip on cleaning stuck parts off of the FEP sheet!!

 

This file prints out 8 copies of a printer “Torture Test” at various exposure levels (times). Starting at a very low time and working up in steps to a longer time for each copy. You then examine the copies to see which one/ones have the best results. From there you can try some prints of your own, varying the exposure time a little between/around the best of the times the test shows. This is a great test, but I had a couple problems with it. Firstly the file is in their latest format, which only their latest slicer software can read! Unfortunately, their latest software coughed and died on both of my computers! I found online that this is a common problem, even on computers that meet their requirements! The software does not read the computer configuration correctly! This leads to my second problem with the print, I don’t know which copy was printed at time X! The lowest exposure time is easy to determine, as it did not print completely, but what pattern they printed in I don’t know!!

 

Here is a picture of the finished print, right out of the washing station, before curing.

 

The lowest exposure time print is at the upper right, but does the pattern run right to left, then down to the second row, and repeat, or top to bottom/left to right, etc.

 

This is the second print, the first one I forgot to tighten down the resin tray bolts all the way, and it was popping up each time the print lifted for the next layer. When I lifted the cover, the interlock kicked in and the print stopped. Not a big problem, I thought, until I could not get it to restart! I had to clean off the build plate and start over. As it turned out some of the first print stuck to the FEP sheet, and may have effected that second print.

 

This is a photo of the parts after I removed them from the build plate, and cured them. Important Note: The first copy is missing, as will be explained at the bottom of this thread.Not knowing exactly what was being printed, I damaged some of the details, during handling. You can see I broke off some of the fat cylinders on thin stacks, at the bottom of the prints. I was hoping that the copies might be individually numbered, but no luck.

 

After finding out what copy is printed at what exposure, I’ll redo this test.

 

Now to the self-imposed disaster! While draining the resin from the tray, back into the bottle, I noticed the partial prints stuck to the FEP sheet, and while reaching for the plastic spatula to remove it, I knocked over the bottle! 2/3rds of my resin, all over the workbench and floor! My metal tray caught a lot of it, but not all! I spent the next two hours cleaning up the mess, while working through my entire supply of paper towels and gloves! My workshop floor is bare wood, so I still have some resin soaked into it. I cleaned it up as best I could, and left a fluorescent desk light shining on it, hoping the UV from the lamp will cure the resin still in the wood.

 

Some lessons learned from this:

1.       From now on, I’m only going to do one step at a time. Waiting to finish filtering the resin, and sealing the bottle, could have been done before I worried about the stuff on the FEP sheet.

2.       I need to start really working on cleaning out the shop, so I can move the workbenches, and put down the vinyl floor, bad hip or no.

3.       I need a larger supply of towels and gloves.

4.       I need to clean out the shop, even if it hurts to get rid of some of the useful stuff.

5.      If I have a selection of almost identical parts, number them after curing so I don’t mix them up while comparing them!

6.       I need to further research the final curing times needed for my resin. I understand that over-curing them, can cause multiple problems, while under-curing is a Bad thing!

7.       Don’t repeat this stupid mistake!

8.       Did I mention, not knocking over the bottle again? Yes, sorry!

9.       Get a proper organics filter mask, not the blue paper ones they supply. While there was almost no odor from the spilled resin, why take chances.

10.   I need to get a smaller sieve type container to put small parts in while washing, the Wash and Cure supplied basket has holes that small parts would fall through.

11.       Seal the seam between the sides and top of the printer base, with Capton(SP) tape. Some resin dripped into this seam, when I was pouring it into the resin tray.

 

The Anycubic Wash and Cure 2.0 worked perfectly. I washed the parts while still on the build plate, so that I could keep track of them, and then removed the dried clean parts to the Curing Turntable in order.

 

Anycubic specifically states that the washing tub Must be cleaned out after a session, not leaving the dirty cleaning solution in it. I was looking for clear sealable containers, to put it in, until I looked at one of my empty 1 gallon milk bottles, light bulb time! Three free 1 gallon containers now procured! Yes, I drink a lot of milk!

 

You put the used solution in the clear container, and leave it out in the sun. After a week or so, the now cured resin particles sink to the bottom. And you can drain off the clear solution at the top. No, you can’t just cure the resin in the solution in the curing station, you end up with a resin sponge welded into it. Thank you, YouTube, for the video on that Fail! The slow curing and settling in the closed container, is what is needed.

 

There are expensive ways to more quickly clean the solution, but I’m not doing the printing as a business.

 

For cleaning the parts on the plate, a full gallon is needed, but if you can place them loosely in the basket, you only need to add enough to cover the parts. I will have to come up with some sort of apparatus to force solution through the interior of hollow parts, perhaps a large ear type squeeze bulb.

 

Overall, I see that I will be able to print the parts I need to build and upgrade my models.

 

A big “Thank You” to my son, who 3D filament printed me a custom funnel that fits the top of the resin bottle, when filtering the resin back in!! It fits inside the bottle top, as well as outside the threads for the cap, so the funnel is perfectly stable, unless you stupidly knock the whole thing over!

 

Here is the used solution in the milk jug, with the plastic coffee jug I used for spot cleaning parts, the build plate and the resin tray. As the print was small, the solution is pretty clean, but it will be even cleaner when I reuse it.

 

 

The Mono 4K printing area is sealed during printing, with no “Smell Dissipating Fan” as used on some printers, forcing the fumes out, so I may not need a vented enclosure. Having some sort of extraction fan would not be a bad idea, though. I may also invest in one of those charcoal fans that fit inside the print case.

 

Now, to the problem of the parts stuck to the FEP sheet. I tried a plastic spatula, and my fingernails, and only accomplished scoring and dinging the FEP surface. Then I remembered a video I watched, on how to solve this problem. I poured enough resin in the tray to cover the bottom, and placed the failed number one print into the tray, at a corner opposite the stuck on parts. Then I used the exposure test, for when you are visually checking that all the “spots” are illuminated on the LCD screen, to expose the whole resin area, for about a minute or two. This created a solid raft in the tray, that also fused the stuck parts and the sacrificial print together . I drained the uncured resin back into the bottle. By lifting the print, the whole thing (raft and stuck parts, pulled off cleanly, with no further damage to the FEP! Here is a use for some of those old support structures you have left over! Sorry no photo of this, as my last pair of gloves were covered in resin, while cleaning up the mess I’d made.

 

The first two items I will be trying to print are a skirt for a passenger diesel locomotive (fits between the two trucks to make the loco look more streamlined)(two prints per loco), and an oil bunker to convert a steam locomotive from coal fired to oil fired. This model includes both tender tool boxes, the hatch covers, a new sand dome for the loco, and the loco crew water bottle that mounts on the front of the tender. The holes in the sides of the bunker, are there to clear the existing portions of the tender shell coal bunker. The bottoms of the holes are cut out after printing.

 

Edited May 6, 2022 by thibaultron

[Kevin-the-lubber]

I suspect most of us make almost all of these mistakes early on, I certainly did! I hadn’t thought of adding a scrap print when cleaning the FEP, that’s a good idea. Elegoo’s have a ‘tank clean’ function that prints a thin raft across the whole FEP for removing failed prints and I now always use this rather than trying to pop them off by hand. It also saves having to drain and clean the tank.

 

I don’t change the IPA after each print session, that would become way too expensive but also way too annoying. I keep using it until the prints are starting to have a residue on their surface, then for a while I rinse them in a smaller tub of clean IPA, and then eventually I replace the dirty IPA. I tried both filtering and sunlight cleaning, neither were very successful. At some point I’ll probably buy another washing tank and do a two stage clean, first wash while dirty, second to remove any fine residue.

[Dr PR]

Kevin,

 

I have used the sunlight technique to clean the IPA (and water for water washable resins). I have also just put the container in my light box and zapped it for an hour or so. You have to use a clear glass container that passes UV light (many plastics do not). It worked even here in Oregon where it is mostly cloudy from November to May. It takes a while (a week), but the resin cures into a soupy suspension. I pour it through a coffee filter to recover the alcohol (I use denatured (95%) ethanol camp fuel - it's cheaper by the gallon than 95% IPA).

 

I have two wash baths. The first has been used before to wash prints, and the second is fresher alcohol. Like you, after  the first bath becomes cloudy I put it out to cure, switch the second bath for the first, and start a new clean second bath.

[Kevin-the-lubber]

There could be two things that I did wrong when I tried to clean the IPA. First, I used clear plastic bottles, second maybe I left it too late. One 2l bottle turned into an almost solid object. The others just didn’t work, I still had very cloudy IPA even after several weeks, with a lot of sludge in the bottom. I also tried filtering it through a double layer of coffee filter papers. Took ages. I’ll have to try again with glass, and also try using the wash and cure as described. I’d like to do it as much as anything because it feels bad to be putting this in the trash in a liquid state.

[thibaultron]

After asking about the exposure test on the Anycubic Facebook page, the parts have a number printed under one of the overhanging pieces. Now I need to print a new set, and take more care removing them from the build plate.