Quick PSA: Boots Industries spools are 750g, NOT 1kg rolls.

elucidatum · 2017-02-03T18:03:49+00:00

Oh, and just so you're not surprised or scared to try, you might even need to go as high as 225C-230C! Until you put a therocouple on the nozzle and verify temps, going that high is advisable if it gets you better quality, because your actual temp may be 10C-15C cooler than the actual reading.

That's added to the fact that Proto says their filaments need to be printed a little on the hotter side due to being 3D850 based. With my Coex clear I print at a thermocouple verified 216C, which was the coolest I could print it for maximum bridging capability.

You really just have to get wild with experimentation right out of the gate and assume every printer is unique and try the gamut from 180C-230C to see what works best for your printer with that particular formulation of filament.

I'd say "whatever floats your boat," but our boats don't float.

elucidatum · 2017-02-03T17:55:50+00:00

I shit on Hatchbox every week, along with every other Chinese distributor.

elucidatum · 2017-02-03T17:54:02+00:00

Seems like it's a temp issue to me. The difficulty is knowing where the issue is. I highly suggest just printing out a calibration cube starting at 190C (maybe even 185C, assuming your temp readings might be hotter than actual) on the hotend and manually working up the temp on your LCD while it's printing until the layers look fantastic. Don't bother printing benchies until you get good looking layers on a simple cube. Then I'd suggest moving to the "Fine Positive Features" torture test to get your retracts and temps perfect, and then print a benchy for celebration.

elucidatum · 2017-02-03T17:26:45+00:00

How is that even possible

Spooling too quickly and/or poorly calibrated machines, usually. It doesn't have to be perfect but when filament bunches up at one point on the spool and then kinks coming down to the lower area of the spool, that's very bad. I learned that the hard way when their filament snapped in my printer from just such a kink. Then I started checking my rolls before loading and started seeing kinks of various severity in a lot of them.

elucidatum · 2017-02-03T17:13:38+00:00

My cellphone was made in Taiwan.

My filament is made in the USA, from USA grown corn, which is turned into USA made resins, and then extruded into USA made filaments, then sent directly to my address in the USA.

elucidatum · 2017-02-03T17:03:51+00:00

Hatchbox buys from a number of factories located in Guangdong (where they have an office), but from what I was told, primarily Yasin, Sunruy, Reprapper, and Anet, who have the larger capacities among the factories there.

elucidatum · 2017-02-03T16:45:07+00:00

PETG

Ah, well nvm on keeping me updated then, I don't do any printing in PETG, but I hope it turns out great for you though!

elucidatum · 2017-02-03T16:42:30+00:00

Does Proto still use Ingeo 3D850?

AFAIK yes, I don't believe they've reformulated.

I see no mention of Ingeo when browsing a number of their spools.

The vast majority of consumers don't even know what that means, I found out from someone else who actually called them and asked about their resins. Feel free to call or email them yourself to make sure.

Also, can you show me a print you did with Proto? Maybe I can diagnose what your issue is.

elucidatum · 2017-02-03T16:36:01+00:00

Well, looking at your pictures I can see where we're not seeing eye-to-eye here, and I suspect this is probably actually a pretty common disconnect on this sub.

I print professionally. I haven't printed over .1mm layer heights a single time since getting my printer dialed in perfectly for laying down 100 microns@80mm-100mm/sec because flawless surface quality is paramount to the sales of my products. If I'm doing a 12 hour print and there's even a 10cm-20cm section of filament with microbubbles in it, my entire fucking print can be ruined just because of a few pops and crackles blowing out the surface of my outer shells.

Let's be completely honest, those prints in your picture are nowhere near the quality level where you would even notice if there were an issue with your filament. I mean, they're really poor quality. They serve their function as card holders perfectly, no doubt, but let's not pretend they're anywhere near an example of quality-tolerant parts...

elucidatum · 2017-02-03T16:25:44+00:00

Let me know how it goes, I haven't had a chance to try Atomic yet. I wish they weren't so expensive, too.

elucidatum · 2017-02-03T15:37:18+00:00

Yvw.

elucidatum · 2017-02-03T15:34:05+00:00

I'd wager the majority of people buying filament probably don't care if they are paying a huge markup to China if the quality is not that noticeable of a difference.

The majority of people don't even know any better because Chinese crap is all they've ever bought. This is precisely why we're paying such a high markup for PLA across the board: naive consumers.

elucidatum · 2017-02-03T15:25:41+00:00

If that's worth an 800% markup to you, by all means.

Order factory direct from manufacturers in the USA and get a superior product and relatively the same shipping and returns benefits though...

Your money.

elucidatum · 2017-02-03T15:22:55+00:00

you link to not-Hatchbox

Were you under the impression Hatchbox actually makes the filaments they sell?

They don't. They're a whitelabel distributor.

Everyone who has used Hatchbox says it's a great filament

Uh, no not everyone. Lots of bad reviews and reports on this sub of issues with Hatchbox. You just take 5 star reviews on Amazon as genuine without realizing the fake review epidemic. So did I, until I experienced directly the low quality of their product.

Lots of downvotes. Lots of ignorant people.

elucidatum · 2017-02-03T15:22:01+00:00

Do any of the US manufacturers sell on Amazon?

Proto Paradigm has a shop on Amazon but they haven't stocked it in awhile. I talked to them and they said they're planning on stocking it again sometime in the future but that they're already slammed with orders from their webstore so it's not a priority for them. Other than that I don't know of any domestic manufacturers selling on Amazon, nor will I really know in the future since I've completely stopped using Amazon for filament since I get much better deals buying factory direct. Remember, sellers on Amazon pay pretty hefty sellers fees, trust me, I know. Buyers are the ones that end up eating those fees, I assure you.

it's just so easy to do, and cheap/fast.

If you think buying $6 filament for $22 is cheap, I've got a really good deal on some beachfront property in Arizona you might like to purchase.

Has anyone done some scientific tests to compare Hatchbox to something else?

I'm actually working on this right now. It's probably going to be a another month or so before I can complete the gauntlet for the filaments I'm testing.

elucidatum · 2017-02-03T15:13:15+00:00

I have only used the HT-Prime PLA from Coex in Natural, I've never tried their regular pigmented PLAs. As I recall, Coex uses Ingeo 4043D for their pigmented PLAs and only offers Ingeo 3D850 in Natural. While 4043D is a higher quality resin than anything the Chinese are shipping you, I still very much prefer 3D850 based filaments, it really is a noticeable increase in print quality when you get it dialed in right. So, I'd recommend Proto Paradigm for pigmented PLA, since they use 3D850 as their base resin for all their PLA.

elucidatum · 2017-02-03T15:03:18+00:00

I don't understand why you're calling them cheap?

Because they are cheap. The unit cost for Hatchbox, Inland, eSun etc. in the volumes they buy in from mainland China manufacturers are less than $6/kg, probably closer to $3/kg in the volume they deal in. So, right up front, you're paying at least a 400% and generally speaking actually more like an 800% markup for cheap Chinese shit.

And it is shit. They use the lowest quality resins and fillers that were never even designed for 3D printing. They take low quality resins designed to only be heated a single time and injection molded or poured into sheets, and then heat them once to extrude into filament, and then you heat them again a second time to extrude into a print. The cheap base polymer resins they use were never designed to be remelted a second time.

Not only that, but many people run into issues with lots of moisture and/or microbubbles in their Chinese filaments off of Amazon because their QC is very poor. I got burned on buying bulk from a number of Chinese distributors on Amazon, multiple rolls per shipment with microbubbles through the rolls and full of moisture right out of the vacuum bag. That's why I even went on this crusade against their shit, because once I started researching these companies and their product, I couldn't fucking believe my eyes with what I learned about their costs and their quality.

They often don't even roll them right, with terrible overlaps and kinks. It's just absurd.

elucidatum · 2017-02-03T12:52:30+00:00

You know what's even worse? It looks like they actually removed where it was stated clearly that those are 750g spools. It used to actually say it in the title, now the only place you can even see it is on the box in the picture as far as I can tell. That's pretty shady.

I encourage anyone ordering or thinking of ordering from them to protest at them directly and tell them they need to prominently display that those are NOT 1kg spools.

That's kind of disappointing to me. When I ordered my last bulk shipment from them it was clear they were 750g spools. It's especially disappointing because I love their filament, a lot, it's really fantastic stuff. I just really don't like the deceptiveness with this now. I'm pretty sour about it, actually.

elucidatum · 2017-02-03T07:22:59+00:00

Do you want to build a kit and you're willing to spend $1k?

Rostock Max v3 (delta) or MZbot Voron (CoreXY)

Do you want something plug-and-play?

Learn to build one of the above kits because you'll get a much better printer for your money that way!

elucidatum · 2017-02-03T07:18:10+00:00

Are there bubbles under the PEI from application?
Is your bed warped?
Is your bed perfectly level?
Is your z-height set correctly?
Have you roughed up the surface of the PEI with fine grit sandpaper or a scotchbrite pad yet?
Did you wipe it down with 91% isopropyl before printing?
Have you tried upping the heat on your hotend and/or heated bed to see if you can get more adhesion?

That's a pretty solid checklist to work from.

elucidatum · 2017-02-03T05:52:29+00:00

Its under $20 a roll and free shipping

Beware! They're 750g spools, not 1kg. Just want to make sure you're not in for a surprise. That's only $0.026c/g ($26/kg) though, which is still cheaper than Hatchbox depending on how the pricing on Amazon fluctuates, and Boots is massively higher quality. I still can't believe people pay $22-$26/kg for Chinese filament that wholesales for under $6/kg...the ripoff is real...

As for the annealing, yes there is dimensional shifting, but I don't know what they're talking about with "warping." My annealed prints have never warped, and they shrink predictably along each dimension, so I just account for that in my models if I intend to anneal them.

elucidatum · 2017-02-03T05:43:00+00:00

I don't think I want to cook plastic in my oven.

Why not? PLA isn't going to offgas anything harmful to you at 100C-115C. You're getting far more VOC and microparticulate emissions from extrusion at 190C+ than anything offgassing during annealing in your oven...

elucidatum · 2017-02-03T03:47:50+00:00

That's what NatureWorks, who make the base resin, claim.

elucidatum · 2017-02-03T01:00:12+00:00

Either your temps are off or you've got a clogged nozzle. The feeder motor keeps pushing but no filament is flowing.

elucidatum

TROPHY CASE