I have never used a 3d printer. But have done a little research.
Be great if someone could confirm my intention is sane.
I have loads of Linux experience so my plans relate to open source all the way.
First off I am brassic(poor). So looking cheap all the way. My brother and I have a tiny narrowboat we are refitting. And plan to use the printer for stuff within the boat.
Due to this printing PA6 to go in the bilge is important. (Diesel and water bad for most other plastics)
As we are both vision impaired and old. The idea is most of the electrical mountings etc will be self designed and painted to make future access quick and easy with our rapidly worsening vision.
So my plan. I am looking at a elegoo Neptune 4 pro.
Because it is cheap but great value. Uses kipper. And seems easy to modify as I grow in use. Also supports temps needed for PA6 etc.
But I will need an enclosure to work with PA 6 and a dryer.
Dryer is cheap not an issue.
But I’m thinking of a tent enclosure. Some good well insulated ones on amazon for £50 with hose to vent out smells.
Will one of these tents be suitable for keeping temperature stable while printing PA6. And can anyone offer other advice for cheap solutions to make this easy.
On a related novice front.
Gue to the vision. One of the projects is to print mounting boards for din rail fuses etc. The idea being to mix colours.
Ie flat surface faces from and back in white. The the inner support fram in a bright colour. This will mean holes to support thumb screws etc for easy low vision future maintainance. IE easy to find the pre set screw holes.
This plan means I can swap colours when printing layers so should be easy without over (for me) briced multi head printer.
But can anyone share experience with doing this with nylon. IE how dose delays in printing the layers while swapping filament t effect the linking of those layers.
As I say complete novice o the actual doing this so any advice will be helpful.
PETG is supposed to be petrochemical tolerant AFAIK, it is far easier to print and isn’t as bad wrt Air Quality (Most filaments aren’t the best to be around, PLA and PETG are nicer relative to others, ABS is nasty, nylon is really nasty, lots of fine particles and stuff if I recall, I have recirc filters on my printers and they live outside of the house)
That said, with an enclosure, a proper surface and bone dry filament, I found it to be a really nice filament to work with if you prep for it. It does have more shrinkage than ABS, I redid a lot of my hotend in PA6, was very tight in some places and a bit of a hassle to reassemble the first time, otherwise I really like it. I have an in country vendor that I usually source from, but the Glass Fibre PA6 that polymaker makes is REALLY nice to work with, found it has substantially lower warping than standard PA6, there’s also low warp varieties you can look at.
Bed:
I use a Nylon Surface from a company called BuildTak, I hate to recommend brands but seriously, their surfaces are crazy good for adhesion, maintenance is a quick wipe with alcohol and that’s it. They’re also replaceable, peel off the steel backer and reapply.
I’ve seen mention garolite sheets as a fantastic surface for nylon (I think the BuildTak surface I use is a garolite sheet with their adhesive treatment, when I replaced it last time it’s definitely some sort of fibreglass laminate so wouldn’t surprise me). They’re relatively inexpensive, a ~1.6 mm thick ~305x305mm sheet 1/16" 12"x12" is $14.50 usd on McMaster-Carr, but there’s definitely 3d printing specific sheets out there.
There’s the tried and true glue stick treatment, when I had a glass bed like a decade ago it was the only thing that consistently worked, I tried PA tape and masking tape, glue stick just works and makes it release easier, apply carefully and let it bake, if you’re not even it’ll lead to some ugly bottom surfaces, but I can live with that for functional items.
I found Nylon doesn’t like to be “squished” as much as other filaments, I have my klipper setup with a slightly higher offset on my nylon sheet because of that.
Enclosure:
If you do go Nylon, use an Enclosure period. You need heat to help with warping and you ABSOLUTELY don’t want to be breathing it in, it doesn’t smell but gives off a lot of microparticles. As I said above, I have recirculating charcoal+hepa filters on my printers. I’d highly recommend you don’t print in your living space if at all possible. I ran my bed at 100c last time, 100-110c is pretty common, I’d give it a nice long heatsoak, I tend to do at least an hour for larger prints in materials that warp.
Venting the enclosure loses you heat but actually solid for voc and particle control, don’t need to worry about that if it’s not there to worry about. Ideally I’d vent mine outside but I rent and I don’t think the landlord would be fond of me knocking holes in the wall. Getting it out of the house and having recirc filters is the next best thing I can do.
Honestly, I don’t find nylon that fussy, like anything, prepare for it and you’re good. I recommend at least having a desiccant filled drybox though, they’re easy to print or make and silica gel is cheap and reusable.