I found uniform flow to be highly important for high speed printing. With high speed printing you're only cooling the skin of the extruded plastic, so less is better.
Print a Benchy. Scan it. Print the scanned Benchy. Scan the printed Benchy. Print the scanned Benchy. Scan the printed Benchy. Keep going until the Benchy is unrecognizable.
I can’t believe my first comment is about the fantastic book you mentioned in your ad! I’m a pilot, and, while not really an engineer, can really appreciate the skills. That is a _fantastic_ book! I’m also humbled to say that I know people who participated in the early days of the Skunkworks.
My 9to5 is being test analyst and I can say your videos are a joy to watch. You know what to test, what to include in scope and what to leaves to chances and assumptions (coz it is impossible to cover all scenarios in a completely digestible video).
As you already have the installation for annealing, it could be very interesting to see if you can cancel the impact of cooling with annealing. It could be a good way to have both of gemometric quality and strengh performances.
Stefan, I listened to that audio book a few months ago and I was depressed when it was over. As an engineering student I felt the same as you about the technical struggles they faced. I was also very intrigued by the fact that Skunk Works had to literally invent, and fabricate, new tools and methods in order to achieve their design goals. Also, great video!
I tried to get a job as a mechanical engineer at Skunk Works. By the time they got back to me (almost a year later), I had already accepted another job. This other job with General Physics eventually sent me back to the rocket site at Edwards very close by. That was about 20 years ago. I worked there for a couple of years. The desert there is miserably hot and windy. I love your informative videos. I make parts for function and don't care how ugly they are. I will try to print with less cooling to see if I can get stronger parts.
Thank you very much for this illusive test! As 3D printing is a field of mostly hobbyists (only those share information), many sources are very contradicting. Your (and others ofc) rigor really drives good quality information spreading and clears very important questions. Much needed answers should be found for strength, since quality vision based is really well explored, but repeatable strength tests are VERY rare. Since I build mostly usable parts this is of high interest to me - Thank you very much! Keep it going!
This more or less validates everything I've observed so far when printing, but I think there's a few things worth mentioning for newer users: - More emphasis on slowing down prints/layers and tuning that. I usually slow down the print for layers below 20-30 seconds, and kick up the fan for layers below 10-15 seconds (depending on filament of course). - Super-important: Separate bridging cooling settings! Slic3r, Cura, S3D all have this (not sure why it's missing from Ideamaker, last time I checked), and I set it to full blast when bridging, which is critical on a 0.6mm nozzle! I still sometimes get artifacts as the fan takes time to spin up, but most of the time it works remarkably cleanly. - In addition, I think some slicers might offer separate overhanging cooling settings. I don't think there's an ideal implementation of it, where it would adjust the fan speed based on the overhang angle and strictly limit it to just the overhanging region, but I'm pretty sure Cura had an option for it at some point, and it's better than nothing. Overhangs tend to be where I have some trouble, even when following the 45 degree rule, simply since I can't have the slicer crank up the fan for those regions. Lastly, having visited your videos on how print temperature affects part strength, I think it would be interesting to visit a combination of the two factors and how to tune them together for different filaments, at least if there's anything new that you find. Thanks for covering the topics of 3D printed part strength. There are very few resources on it online, I had to learn most of it on my own, and it's nice to throw some proof at fellow 3D printing hobbyists that there are better ways to do things lol.
Bridging fan speed is an option in Ideamaker but I can understand how you missed it because Ideamaker's setting UI is trash. Go to advanced settings > Other > Enable Bridging Detection and then the options aren't greyed out
Very interesting facts to look at my next prints. In my opinion the issue of parts strength is important on things which design is given or you couldn't make bigger/stronger. 99% of the parts I print I created self and try to make them stronger by the design, if needed or failed by the first test. If I copy a broken part (that is not available or too expensive) and print it, I had to use all settings, including your video, to make sure the part will be able to replace the original.
I'd love to see how print temperature interacts with part cooling. My favorite PETG settings are 270C and 60% min fan speed on Mono-price I3 with the Dii duct.* This gives good overhangs and layer adhesion sufficient that the fracture surface of a hand broken test doesn't follow the layer lines. Normally this would also cause hellish stringing, but I print from a dry-box using molecular-sieve/Zeolite desiccant so my filament is SUPER dry. (* haven't calibrated the hot end, and PIDs needs tuning. often reads 255C during prints)
Always been printing sucessfully without cooling and with the lowest viable temp for layer adhesion - very nice to have seen this quantified so thank you very much for that 👍
Printing three towers when alternating layers between all towers without cooling actually still provides some cooling because until the next layer is printed on the same tower, it takes some time so it cools a bit...you should print one tower at a time to say there was no cooling...
I use Das filament petg and I am pretty satisfied. I can report that I have found small variations between types of spools. For me the transparent was the best in printing quality, layer adhesion and overall strenght. I always cool 100% when printing and used the recommended 230 and 75 degrees for temps. Thank you for your efforts and your videos. It really helps everybody that deals with a 3d printer.
Definitely how speed influences the strength. From 10mm/s to the max. Visually I find just a little difference between 30 and 75, so I'm really interested in strength.
I literally just posted this question to one of the FB groups I'm in regarding printing of an airboat hull for RC. My posit was that lower parts cooling speeds would enhance layer adhesion and in-turn assist with watertightness. Thank you for this video.
Very informative. I am new to 3D printing and will be receiving my first printer today, so am looking forward to printing. Information videos like yours is very helpful and an enjoyable learning experience. Thanks!!
Very informative video and a great way to show one of the many ways to use 3D scanning in quality control. If you use the tool deviation-label you can mark many locations on the STL file and see the exact deviation on that location. That is the tool I used in my video about my warped bed plate, for my CR10.. If you have any questions about other tools in the software or about the possibilities with the Core scanner feel free to contact me! Thank you for making great content, I’m happy to see that you have some sponsors to support the time you put in these videos 👍🏻
Thx for this comparison it get even worse if you print in a cold room (once i wasn t able to finish a print by a room- temp of 17°C with PETG it cracks while printing with fan on). Would be interesting how quality and strength comes out in a heated chamber with cooling fan which throws hotter air on the print :)
Thanks really interesting, so what we need is Cura to make an update that varies the fan speed based on overhang angle ( no overhang = no fan) to get stronger prints whilst keeping the quality high. That would give a good compromise of strength and quality.
I’m quite new at this but have already figured this out. I mostly print ABS because it’s easy to get a nice finish and further refine it. But I’ve got some excellent PLA prints out with much higher temperatures than usually recommended and practically no cooling. Empirically, these are substantially stronger than cooled versions and look much better too. Good information here! I like your methodical approach.
Another awesome video. Thanks! Btw, we pronounce F-117 "F one seventeen" because of a spoken shorthand used to convey numbers over the radio. Ironically, the F designation usually indicates Fighter but the Nighthawk is an Attack aircraft, like the A-10 Warthog but, stealthy.
BAM! One amazing video after the other!! You are killing it. You answered so many of my questions already in 90m of videos using science this is superb I am out of superlative to describe how impressed I am.. I'll have to review these videos again and again because so much useful info it is mind blowing. I was also under the impression that cooling was having a huge impact on layer adhesion. Thank you so much for doing this video and getting so deep and technical about it that you answered all my questions and many more I did not even think about yet... Also, 3d scanning to conpare actual print to the model is so cool!
And, an engineer in Germany (Europe in general) has at least a 3y bachelor engineer degree. Not just "I work with something technical that involves problem solving" :)
I think this shows that if printing 'vertically' you should only ever print ONE item at a time (or multiples sequentially). Even a group of 3 let's the previous layers cool and lessens adhesion.
Greight video, thanks. I find 0% fan is best for most prints, but I have it on 20% for areas that are unsupported (bridging), support interfaces, and for very small features where the layer time would otherwise be too short. But I agree, no cooling is usually better! Edit: This also applies to TPU!
Another competent video with short and to-the-point dialogue! It is so important to note that filament from different manufacturers can behave in totally different ways. It would be interesting to see strength tests with different colours too, as I have had dramatically different results for the same part made in different colours.
I think a lot of it depends on the mass of what you're printing. For example, we don't use any cooling fan to print thin wall models such as an airplane wing, there is little mass there to retain the heat, it cools fine on it's own.
Nice video and testing! I'm wondering longer layer time could also affect the part strength, since by the time next layer comes the previous one would have cooled down right? Maybe different layer times could also be a subject to test in the future, thank you!
Skunk Works is a fantastic book! Fans of Kelly Johnson will especially like the 1st half, where Ben describes the development of the SR-71. The 2nd half is about Ben's time leading the Skunk Works after Johnson retired, and centers around the development of stealth technology.
Counterintuitivly, I think cooling fans should blow hot air at prints. The aim is to take the plastic below the glass temperature as fast as possible, but no further. The PETG result might be sure to water absorption. Water in PETG reacts during the high extrusion temps and damages the polymers. I think E3D did a blog post on this effect.
For that reason I enclosed my printer, that will also lower the electricity used. And for part cooling in some situations I designed a small tower to print on the side with changing thicknesses depending on how much time I want the part too cool before the next layer. My printer doesn't have a cooling fan ;-P
I agree with you, the optimal thing should be to have a temperature controlled chamber that sits just below the glass temperature, and let the part "cooling" fan should cool the print down to the tg fast, but no further. For this reason i actually picked up a old Stratasys printer with a temperature controlled chamber that i intend to retrofit with new open source control boards, new hotend etc to make it into a printer for high-end engineering materials.
Your no fan results are not really what I've seen in similar tests unless I'm printing way too hot. I'd like to see more options in slicers for turning off (or down) cooling only for infill and/or inner perimeters. Mostly, though, I use Colorfabb nGen with little-to-no cooling fan at 240c and get really good results.
Steph, there's much better way to improve layer adhesion than reducing cooling: print much hotter. Like crazy hot, PLA can be printed at 270°C just fine and if your hot end can handle this - it prints amazingly. Also slowing down helps a lot. Also also your DAS PETG is clearly was wet, so hydrolysis happened.
Excellent experiments Stefan. I believe using a thicker layer height when no cooling is used would reduce the deformation in your print since the nozzle will be touching the model for far less time. Also, one more thing to look into when testing for strength is the printing temprature. I noticed you used a relatively high temp especially since you were printing with 0.15mm layer height and typically for PLA I would recommend 190~195 for such a fine quality setting. I print most of my parts with minimal cooling since they are mostly functional and mechanical. Would love to see you go more in depth in this topic in the next videos!
I can't inderstand all the trouble people are having with their PLA printing adhesion. I purchased a Anet ET4 2 weeks ago and from day 1 the only precautions I took were to clean the Glass which came with the printer. It also came with some special mat for the hot bed, but I purposely didn't use it. I wanted it as plain as I could and still have whatever I print sticking to the glass. If it didn't work, I'd take different steps until I found something which works. I honestly didn't think I'd hit it straight away. My very first print was a Dog, supplied by Anet. I made sure I was there as it finished and as the nozzle lifted from the print I tried to remover the dog from the glass, no way it would happen without extreme force. I allowed the bed to cool down for no more than 2 minutes and I simply lifted the dog from the glass and I heard a pleasing click as it let go. After each print and if the printer sat for any length of time, I used a 20 to 1 mixture of Metholated Spirits and tap water. I gave the bed just one spray and gave a brisk rub to the bed with a sheets of kitchen paper. You know it ready when you hear a loud squeeking as you clean the glass I then tried my luck with printing a filament guide. This proved even harder to remove and I left it to cool down for no more than a minute more. Three minutes of cooling and again click and it was free. Since then I've printed various items from tiny parts to filling the entire bed, the same story, let it coo. The glass is sparkling clean and any residue from the print is removed by the Metho. I've printed a few dozen items and today I omitted any raft or skirt and yes it still doesn't let go. I must add I had one failure. We're being overrun with Aphids, tiny black buggers which seem to like going up your nose or down your throat. They also appear to be attracted to hot PLA. The mongrels continually committed suicide by being buried under the PLA as the Nozzle passed overhead. I attempted to get one off the print and I left a fingerprint on the glass. A few minutes later the hot end tried to print a 90 degree corner tight where my fingerprint was and the extrusion followed the nozzle. Printing with yellow filament really showed up their skid marks. Black streaks through your work doesn't look the best. I'm now in the process of building a large covering for the printer from PVC piping and Perspex. It seems there isn't a retailer in Australia who wants to sell the PIpes and fittings. There are only two to choose from and although I asked for a price and told them I'd pay immediately, they've completely ignored me. So don't buy $25 Goo and expensive paraphanalia to make your pronts stick, a piece of Borosilicate glass, some Metho and water in a spray bottle and elbow grease is all you need. Temperatures were as stated for PLA, 120 and 60 degrees. Give it a try, it's cheap and it works. Good Luck
hi to get better addition just turn off the fan on the infill pattern and turn on when the extruder print the perimeter, you can do it writing a delay to turn on the fan between layers. by the way nice videos :)
Very scientifically done. However, I do differently: 1. If I only need the sizes - I use a proven pla. 2. if I need more durability and better layer adhesion - I use a proven pla or abs with fuzzy skin. 3. if I really need a sturdy part with temperature resistance, weight restriction, etc. - I use engineering plastics (there are very few of them)
You're definitely right about the Ender3/CR-10 heatbreak fan. I upgraded a CR-10 mini to an E3D v6 and when I printed a benchy when I hadn't printed the cooling fan mounting bracket yet, it was the most horrible result I ever had. I'm also thinking this may be related to the watertightness of 3D prints. I used to get some good results with small boxes, but a large-ish boat I just printed is leaking. I'm going to try cranking the temperature up and disabling the cooling fan. It will still be cooled a little bit due to creality's design. I really also want to get my own universal testing machine running. So much to test, like creep and fatigue life. My machine is based on a raspberry pi though so I still have some programming to do.
I recently got a 3d printer. Based on your Benchy that was smooth on one side and veiny on the other, that helps me understand this one print of mine. I still haven't found a good balance of layer time to cooling time and what not. Every model is going to have custom settings I guess. To a degree.
My ender 3 prints very well, except when it's printing on the far side of the fan on overhands, like what you had on your benchy. From your test and mine, it seems like I need to increase the directions of the air, but decrease the total amount of air
I agree with everything you said. when I have to print something important and quite strong I do not use the fan, I slow down the speed and I use 0,16mm layer height. in this way, I get stronger results.
Maybe printing with 100% cooling, then reheating the whole finished part afterwards to allow for better bonding, without spoiling the quality of print.
Excellent integration of the sponsored portion into the video. The SR71 print - and its relevance to the audiobook mentioned - made me watch the commercial. I usually skip ahead. Well done.
I wonder if this actually affects the strength of bigger parts because of the increased layer time. Probably the previous layer will already have cooled down so much that Fan speed doesn't make a difference. Great video👌
I usually increase print temp to increase layer adhesion. It would be interesting to test how temp affects it and if increased temp can overcome the negative effect part cooling has.
I came here because I'm testing my ender3 v2's print speed limits at 190mm/s and recently printed some brittle petg pegboard spacers with 100% cooling. After this video, i'm going to try again at 20% fan speed and verify layer adhesion.
This was interesting. i completed my Bachelor thesis on a similar topic and can to the same conclusions. When looking at a cross-section of a print under a microscope you can clearly see that at low/no cooling the material is almost completely homologous, with cooling clear boundaries between the lines of filament can be seen. I was mainly using PLA but also did some testes with PC-ABS and found that even with no cooling and a heated enclosure of 110 C the boundaries were still very clear. As expected proportionally the PC-ABS had weaker inter layer strength to the PLA. I think this is why annealing prints can make such a big difference, it allows the print to homogenise.
In my experience besides better thermal performance, annealing PLA doesn't do a lot to the mechanical properties, it especially doesn't homogenize layers or melt them together better. There is actually a video in the making on this topic.
@@CNCKitchen for PLA I would agree. In my research i found a paper describing this processfor ABS. It would be interesting to see if for materials such as ABS or PC-ABS anneling (or maybe heat treating is a better term?) could improve the inter layer bonds.
Well thought and professionally executed, with useable results, as always, thank you! Of course your results raise additional questions: 1. How much would the temperature of the heated build chamber affect the layer bounding of ABS/ASA prints? (I think ABS still is very important, because I consider the properties of ABS as suitable for everyday use objects, instead of just vanity objects). 2. Could PLA prints get even stronger by printing those in a heated chamber? 3. How far would the results from this tests change, after annealing the 0%, 20%, 40%, 60% and 100% PLA prints? With focus on the question: Could annealing compensate for the strength loss by printing with the fan on? :)
I appreciate this testing. I’ve done quite a bit of fan testing on a few different printers. I find that with PLA, I need 80% (at least) to get a nice 3D Benchy at 60mm/sec on the Prusa MK3 with PLA. With PETG, I can lower the fan speed to 40% and get good prints.
For petg, do you lower the print speed when you turn down the fan to compensate for sag? I adjusted my fan to 50 mm/s with the fan at 60% and it sagged in the middle parts of the project
1) printing in batches of 3 pylons affects the cooling of the material 2) you can use 0 fan speed but you need to lower the speed I have a CNC screw driven repurposed for printing I do not have a fan, but my max speed it 9mm/s. printing in 2mm I have no quality issues. find the speed where you can print with 0 fan speed properly and you can then enjoy the strength of the material
what if you could use a dual extrusion 3d printer and do the infill with one filament and the shell with another. The internal filament being PLA, and the external filament being PETG. Then set the slicer so walls print before infill on each layer. Then, make it so the PLA has a way higher extrusion rate than normal and higher temp to melt layers, but not too much to melt PETG. Also on the internal layers try turning off the fan? The PETG shell you would probably want to print close to normal settings, as it would be more for the asthetic, so the part doesn't deform. You would essentially be building a bowl of petg around a soup of PLA. I wonder how well it would hold up.
Great info, thank you. I especially like your attention to detail, not just accepting the results, but proving them by using sensible thoughtful tests. Thank you :-)
Good to know that you can print PETG at 20% cooling without much loss in detail. If you need some more detail, go to 30%. You probably won't ever need to go higher than that.
A lot of people want the extra cooling for better overhang. I went with the Ductinator and get way less air. I also do my brand of PLA at 230c and also jump the bed temp up to 60c. seems to get better strength parts and a good quality PLA still bridges well anyways.
Thanks for doing these in-depth investigations! One piece of often information I often struggle to find is quantitive information about the warping properties of filaments. Given that I most often print molds for casting precise technical parts, warp is about the only material property I really care about; and not just if its low enough to stick to the bed; but if I can count on my holes having the right spacing, and if rods will turn into bananas or not. There are some filaments out there like ABS-X or some PLA variants that claim to be zero-warp. Also, some say that a heated chamber helps for PLA just like it does for ABS. But an actual in depth investigation of the matter, is something I have been unable to find. Perhaps you will find it interesting to do something along those lines in the future.
Ive never printed PLA with a fan. One trick i do is print 2 at the same time and put them at the furthest parts of the bed so that the prior object has time to cool.
At 9:45 you can start seeing the collet slipping and shortlz afterwards the test bone breaking, maybe this sudden 'slip & grab' might introduce unnecessary load and cause premature fail of the test part?
LOL.....watching the melted filament sticking to the layers as the nozzle went around the perimeter reminded me of the time I made pancakes and poured the batter in a ring of concentric circles that mixed together to form a solid pancake......the adhesion was good considering the pan was quite hot at the bottom but they came away quite easily with a thin edged metal scoop.......possibly it was the oil film.
List of usefulness. PLA Reference: 59MPa PLA 20% (Less than 20% and print is ruined): 38MPa PET-G Reference: 49MPa PET-G 20%: 26MPa Having 2 separate cooling paths is good for cooling the heatsink but not the print. 20% PET-G is perfect, 20% PLA has one side that is deformed, the side away from cooling. Less cooling usually has better layer strength. PET-G is better in this sense, slowing the print and using min. layer time helps with print quality. DasFilament PETG shouldn't be used in safety critical applications, the DasFilament wasn't mentioned in this Helpful Comment, because it was the first PETG and was scattered results proving to be unpredictable at best.
AWESOME! Not only great information but an audible book suggestion... ok dude... I'm subscribing... My 3d printer is in the shop... which is only sometimes heated so... gonna have to come up with a method of guessing.
Great test! I would like to know the optimal strength of petg when adjusting temperature as well as cooing. Maybe even flow rate. Also for 3d scanning: i suggest to make in ear headset, use 5 minute setting silicon to get a deep earmold impression, scan it, remodel for purpose and then print multi material. This is a project I'm currenty working on. Gonna print the first part in petg then finish off the actual ear plug section in ninjaflex. Struggling to make Prusaslicer work for two different filament print settings in one print though. Great work! Keep it up :) You're adding much value to the community!
Feel free to share the video on Facebook, Reddit, Twitter and other social media!
Why don't you share your videos on r/3Dprinting or elsewhere?
Shared in my V-King builders group. You have the best videos
I found uniform flow to be highly important for high speed printing. With high speed printing you're only cooling the skin of the extruded plastic, so less is better.
What kind of PETG filament do you recommend? AprintAPro does not supply filament anymore, would you still recommend DasFilament?
Das Filament is good stuff. Still use it regularly.
Print a Benchy. Scan it. Print the scanned Benchy. Scan the printed Benchy. Print the scanned Benchy. Scan the printed Benchy. Keep going until the Benchy is unrecognizable.
Then sell it as art. You will get rich 😉
th-cam.com/video/QEzhxP-pdos/w-d-xo.html Jpeg style
Basically the physical version of the "Google translate loop". :D
This is against benchies license
@_ David _ Yes. :D
Always print Benchy pointing into the wind.
open the nearest windows pointing towards the ocean!
Should I do this with ABS?
@@keithkittler188 do it
@@keithkittler188 I believe PEEKs will yield more usable strength than ABS. Unless you have back warping trouble. Then you need more focus on ABS.
Never piss from the windy side of the boat.
Video starts at 4:49 Too long ads works against advertiser.
Ads usually never influence what I buy anyway.
cgwworldministries advertising has a huge impact on sales. Sometimes it is more subconscious than we realize.
@@dylan.m8865 aren it against my privacy to alter my sunconcius mind?? -as i cant directly erase any ad from it!
Duck it’s funny that you think advertisements don’t have an effect on what you buy.
thankyou! Saved 5 mins of my life
Your videos are always really really well done both for simple watchability and indepth testing Thank you very much!
Thank you!
I can’t believe my first comment is about the fantastic book you mentioned in your ad! I’m a pilot, and, while not really an engineer, can really appreciate the skills. That is a _fantastic_ book! I’m also humbled to say that I know people who participated in the early days of the Skunkworks.
My 9to5 is being test analyst and I can say your videos are a joy to watch. You know what to test, what to include in scope and what to leaves to chances and assumptions (coz it is impossible to cover all scenarios in a completely digestible video).
As you already have the installation for annealing, it could be very interesting to see if you can cancel the impact of cooling with annealing. It could be a good way to have both of gemometric quality and strengh performances.
Have you tried annealing pla with salt or sand or something similar? If so how did you change the scale of your model before printing?
Stefan, I listened to that audio book a few months ago and I was depressed when it was over. As an engineering student I felt the same as you about the technical struggles they faced. I was also very intrigued by the fact that Skunk Works had to literally invent, and fabricate, new tools and methods in order to achieve their design goals. Also, great video!
Thats what I loved about Skunkworks.
I tried to get a job as a mechanical engineer at Skunk Works. By the time they got back to me (almost a year later), I had already accepted another job. This other job with General Physics eventually sent me back to the rocket site at Edwards very close by. That was about 20 years ago. I worked there for a couple of years. The desert there is miserably hot and windy. I love your informative videos.
I make parts for function and don't care how ugly they are. I will try to print with less cooling to see if I can get stronger parts.
Thank you very much for this illusive test!
As 3D printing is a field of mostly hobbyists (only those share information), many sources are very contradicting. Your (and others ofc) rigor really drives good quality information spreading and clears very important questions. Much needed answers should be found for strength, since quality vision based is really well explored, but repeatable strength tests are VERY rare.
Since I build mostly usable parts this is of high interest to me - Thank you very much! Keep it going!
3D printing on TH-cam is mostly semiemployed man children making pointless knickknacks, and one stripper.
Just getting into PETG now. All the contradictory information is rather confusing and irritating.
This more or less validates everything I've observed so far when printing, but I think there's a few things worth mentioning for newer users:
- More emphasis on slowing down prints/layers and tuning that. I usually slow down the print for layers below 20-30 seconds, and kick up the fan for layers below 10-15 seconds (depending on filament of course).
- Super-important: Separate bridging cooling settings! Slic3r, Cura, S3D all have this (not sure why it's missing from Ideamaker, last time I checked), and I set it to full blast when bridging, which is critical on a 0.6mm nozzle! I still sometimes get artifacts as the fan takes time to spin up, but most of the time it works remarkably cleanly.
- In addition, I think some slicers might offer separate overhanging cooling settings. I don't think there's an ideal implementation of it, where it would adjust the fan speed based on the overhang angle and strictly limit it to just the overhanging region, but I'm pretty sure Cura had an option for it at some point, and it's better than nothing. Overhangs tend to be where I have some trouble, even when following the 45 degree rule, simply since I can't have the slicer crank up the fan for those regions.
Lastly, having visited your videos on how print temperature affects part strength, I think it would be interesting to visit a combination of the two factors and how to tune them together for different filaments, at least if there's anything new that you find.
Thanks for covering the topics of 3D printed part strength. There are very few resources on it online, I had to learn most of it on my own, and it's nice to throw some proof at fellow 3D printing hobbyists that there are better ways to do things lol.
good comment.
Bridging fan speed is an option in Ideamaker but I can understand how you missed it because Ideamaker's setting UI is trash.
Go to advanced settings > Other > Enable Bridging Detection and then the options aren't greyed out
this is pure gold
Very interesting facts to look at my next prints. In my opinion the issue of parts strength is important on things which design is given or you couldn't make bigger/stronger. 99% of the parts I print I created self and try to make them stronger by the design, if needed or failed by the first test. If I copy a broken part (that is not available or too expensive) and print it, I had to use all settings, including your video, to make sure the part will be able to replace the original.
I'd love to see how print temperature interacts with part cooling. My favorite PETG settings are 270C and 60% min fan speed on Mono-price I3 with the Dii duct.* This gives good overhangs and layer adhesion sufficient that the fracture surface of a hand broken test doesn't follow the layer lines. Normally this would also cause hellish stringing, but I print from a dry-box using molecular-sieve/Zeolite desiccant so my filament is SUPER dry. (* haven't calibrated the hot end, and PIDs needs tuning. often reads 255C during prints)
Well, I guess that kinda confirms that my 235 degree setting was too low.
Always been printing sucessfully without cooling and with the lowest viable temp for layer adhesion - very nice to have seen this quantified so thank you very much for that 👍
Printing three towers when alternating layers between all towers without cooling actually still provides some cooling because until the next layer is printed on the same tower, it takes some time so it cools a bit...you should print one tower at a time to say there was no cooling...
Absolutely a pioneer for us in the 3d community. I thank you for the time and effort you put into your work. Thanks again and again! - Andy
I use Das filament petg and I am pretty satisfied. I can report that I have found small variations between types of spools. For me the transparent was the best in printing quality, layer adhesion and overall strenght. I always cool 100% when printing and used the recommended 230 and 75 degrees for temps. Thank you for your efforts and your videos. It really helps everybody that deals with a 3d printer.
Definitely how speed influences the strength. From 10mm/s to the max. Visually I find just a little difference between 30 and 75, so I'm really interested in strength.
I literally just posted this question to one of the FB groups I'm in regarding printing of an airboat hull for RC. My posit was that lower parts cooling speeds would enhance layer adhesion and in-turn assist with watertightness. Thank you for this video.
Very informative. I am new to 3D printing and will be receiving my first printer today, so am looking forward to printing. Information videos like yours is very helpful and an enjoyable learning experience. Thanks!!
I'm receiving mine tomorrow. Also watching videos xD
Very informative video and a great way to show one of the many ways to use 3D scanning in quality control. If you use the tool deviation-label you can mark many locations on the STL file and see the exact deviation on that location.
That is the tool I used in my video about my warped bed plate, for my CR10..
If you have any questions about other tools in the software or about the possibilities with the Core scanner feel free to contact me!
Thank you for making great content, I’m happy to see that you have some sponsors to support the time you put in these videos 👍🏻
Thx for this comparison it get even worse if you print in a cold room (once i wasn t able to finish a print by a room- temp of 17°C with PETG it cracks while printing with fan on). Would be interesting how quality and strength comes out in a heated chamber with cooling fan which throws hotter air on the print :)
Thanks really interesting, so what we need is Cura to make an update that varies the fan speed based on overhang angle ( no overhang = no fan) to get stronger prints whilst keeping the quality high. That would give a good compromise of strength and quality.
I’m quite new at this but have already figured this out. I mostly print ABS because it’s easy to get a nice finish and further refine it. But I’ve got some excellent PLA prints out with much higher temperatures than usually recommended and practically no cooling. Empirically, these are substantially stronger than cooled versions and look much better too.
Good information here! I like your methodical approach.
Another awesome video. Thanks!
Btw, we pronounce F-117 "F one seventeen" because of a spoken shorthand used to convey numbers over the radio. Ironically, the F designation usually indicates Fighter but the Nighthawk is an Attack aircraft, like the A-10 Warthog but, stealthy.
BAM! One amazing video after the other!! You are killing it. You answered so many of my questions already in 90m of videos using science this is superb I am out of superlative to describe how impressed I am.. I'll have to review these videos again and again because so much useful info it is mind blowing.
I was also under the impression that cooling was having a huge impact on layer adhesion. Thank you so much for doing this video and getting so deep and technical about it that you answered all my questions and many more I did not even think about yet...
Also, 3d scanning to conpare actual print to the model is so cool!
Every german be like:
"As an engineer myself..."
little known fact: in Germany you get your engineering degree when you are born
@@poweredbysalt4158 As a German myself i can confirm that.
having lived in Germany for a while I can confirm this is actually true.
Also true that they have the best engineers. It fits them :)
And, an engineer in Germany (Europe in general) has at least a 3y bachelor engineer degree. Not just "I work with something technical that involves problem solving" :)
@EasyBreadToast ok just for you :
Every asian by like :
"As a Doctor myself..."
I think this shows that if printing 'vertically' you should only ever print ONE item at a time (or multiples sequentially). Even a group of 3 let's the previous layers cool and lessens adhesion.
omg you did every test... this is why design of experiment is created to do like 10% of the work and stil have verry accurate results
Greight video, thanks. I find 0% fan is best for most prints, but I have it on 20% for areas that are unsupported (bridging), support interfaces, and for very small features where the layer time would otherwise be too short. But I agree, no cooling is usually better!
Edit: This also applies to TPU!
It's so refreshing to see somebody with an engineering background do truly valid testing on 3D printing. Great content :)
Yes Skunk works is an amazing book, even if you don't get it from audible.
Your videos are always great. Thank you for your scientific/technical approach to every topic you investigate.
Another competent video with short and to-the-point dialogue! It is so important to note that filament from different manufacturers can behave in totally different ways. It would be interesting to see strength tests with different colours too, as I have had dramatically different results for the same part made in different colours.
I think a lot of it depends on the mass of what you're printing. For example, we don't use any cooling fan to print thin wall models such as an airplane wing, there is little mass there to retain the heat, it cools fine on it's own.
You're mostly one of the last videasts with CHEP, Thomas and Angus to do technical research and provide knowledgeable videos. Thank you 💟
Nice video and testing! I'm wondering longer layer time could also affect the part strength, since by the time next layer comes the previous one would have cooled down right? Maybe different layer times could also be a subject to test in the future, thank you!
Skunk Works is a fantastic book! Fans of Kelly Johnson will especially like the 1st half, where Ben describes the development of the SR-71. The 2nd half is about Ben's time leading the Skunk Works after Johnson retired, and centers around the development of stealth technology.
Counterintuitivly, I think cooling fans should blow hot air at prints. The aim is to take the plastic below the glass temperature as fast as possible, but no further.
The PETG result might be sure to water absorption. Water in PETG reacts during the high extrusion temps and damages the polymers. I think E3D did a blog post on this effect.
For that reason I enclosed my printer, that will also lower the electricity used.
And for part cooling in some situations I designed a small tower to print on the side with changing thicknesses depending on how much time I want the part too cool before the next layer. My printer doesn't have a cooling fan ;-P
I agree with you, the optimal thing should be to have a temperature controlled chamber that sits just below the glass temperature, and let the part "cooling" fan should cool the print down to the tg fast, but no further. For this reason i actually picked up a old Stratasys printer with a temperature controlled chamber that i intend to retrofit with new open source control boards, new hotend etc to make it into a printer for high-end engineering materials.
@3:01 Audible has the biggest selection of audiobooks on the planet.
Ermmm. How do you know?
Numbers
Thats is the best audible commercial I seen. I might actually check it out this time.
Do it! Great book.
Your no fan results are not really what I've seen in similar tests unless I'm printing way too hot.
I'd like to see more options in slicers for turning off (or down) cooling only for infill and/or inner perimeters. Mostly, though, I use Colorfabb nGen with little-to-no cooling fan at 240c and get really good results.
I will surely try lowering cooling for my PETG prints. I almost exclusively print technical stuff and layer adhesion is often very critical.
Yea i Set 20% min and 50% max fan cooling
Steph, there's much better way to improve layer adhesion than reducing cooling: print much hotter.
Like crazy hot, PLA can be printed at 270°C just fine and if your hot end can handle this - it prints amazingly.
Also slowing down helps a lot.
Also also your DAS PETG is clearly was wet, so hydrolysis happened.
Excellent experiments Stefan. I believe using a thicker layer height when no cooling is used would reduce the deformation in your print since the nozzle will be touching the model for far less time. Also, one more thing to look into when testing for strength is the printing temprature. I noticed you used a relatively high temp especially since you were printing with 0.15mm layer height and typically for PLA I would recommend 190~195 for such a fine quality setting. I print most of my parts with minimal cooling since they are mostly functional and mechanical.
Would love to see you go more in depth in this topic in the next videos!
Thanks for the inf! I just saw this at the end of a 6+ day multiple print project that needs to be extremely strong.
I can't inderstand all the trouble people are having with their PLA printing adhesion. I purchased a Anet ET4 2 weeks ago and from day 1 the only precautions I took were to clean the Glass which came with the printer. It also came with some special mat for the hot bed, but I purposely didn't use it. I wanted it as plain as I could and still have whatever I print sticking to the glass. If it didn't work, I'd take different steps until I found something which works.
I honestly didn't think I'd hit it straight away. My very first print was a Dog, supplied by Anet. I made sure I was there as it finished and as the nozzle lifted from the print I tried to remover the dog from the glass, no way it would happen without extreme force. I allowed the bed to cool down for no more than 2 minutes and I simply lifted the dog from the glass and I heard a pleasing click as it let go. After each print and if the printer sat for any length of time, I used a 20 to 1 mixture of Metholated Spirits and tap water. I gave the bed just one spray and gave a brisk rub to the bed with a sheets of kitchen paper. You know it ready when you hear a loud squeeking as you clean the glass
I then tried my luck with printing a filament guide. This proved even harder to remove and I left it to cool down for no more than a minute more. Three minutes of cooling and again click and it was free. Since then I've printed various items from tiny parts to filling the entire bed, the same story, let it coo. The glass is sparkling clean and any residue from the print is removed by the Metho. I've printed a few dozen items and today I omitted any raft or skirt and yes it still doesn't let go.
I must add I had one failure. We're being overrun with Aphids, tiny black buggers which seem to like going up your nose or down your throat. They also appear to be attracted to hot PLA. The mongrels continually committed suicide by being buried under the PLA as the Nozzle passed overhead. I attempted to get one off the print and I left a fingerprint on the glass. A few minutes later the hot end tried to print a 90 degree corner tight where my fingerprint was and the extrusion followed the nozzle. Printing with yellow filament really showed up their skid marks. Black streaks through your work doesn't look the best. I'm now in the process of building a large covering for the printer from PVC piping and Perspex. It seems there isn't a retailer in Australia who wants to sell the PIpes and fittings. There are only two to choose from and although I asked for a price and told them I'd pay immediately, they've completely ignored me.
So don't buy $25 Goo and expensive paraphanalia to make your pronts stick, a piece of Borosilicate glass, some Metho and water in a spray bottle and elbow grease is all you need. Temperatures were as stated for PLA, 120 and 60 degrees. Give it a try, it's cheap and it works. Good Luck
hi to get better addition just turn off the fan on the infill pattern and turn on when the extruder print the perimeter, you can do it writing a delay to turn on the fan between layers.
by the way nice videos :)
what a video. thank you for getting to the point about almost EVERY question I have about cooling. PLEASE keep it up and never leave my feed!:)
Summary 14:25
Very scientifically done.
However, I do differently:
1. If I only need the sizes - I use a proven pla.
2. if I need more durability and better layer adhesion - I use a proven pla or abs with fuzzy skin.
3. if I really need a sturdy part with temperature resistance, weight restriction, etc. - I use engineering plastics (there are very few of them)
You're definitely right about the Ender3/CR-10 heatbreak fan. I upgraded a CR-10 mini to an E3D v6 and when I printed a benchy when I hadn't printed the cooling fan mounting bracket yet, it was the most horrible result I ever had.
I'm also thinking this may be related to the watertightness of 3D prints. I used to get some good results with small boxes, but a large-ish boat I just printed is leaking. I'm going to try cranking the temperature up and disabling the cooling fan. It will still be cooled a little bit due to creality's design.
I really also want to get my own universal testing machine running. So much to test, like creep and fatigue life. My machine is based on a raspberry pi though so I still have some programming to do.
Very nice! Independently testing all the major parameters is a great idea. Looking forward to the rest of this series. Thanks Stefan!
use the scanner to check the linearity of your tension test rig and then see about accounting for its misalignment or physically adjusting it
if the fault in the test is present and constant in all the tests then the tests are valid
I recently got a 3d printer. Based on your Benchy that was smooth on one side and veiny on the other, that helps me understand this one print of mine. I still haven't found a good balance of layer time to cooling time and what not. Every model is going to have custom settings I guess. To a degree.
Thank you Stefan for your professional researches ! As a beginner in 3d printing field I need the information you provide on your channel.
My ender 3 prints very well, except when it's printing on the far side of the fan on overhands, like what you had on your benchy. From your test and mine, it seems like I need to increase the directions of the air, but decrease the total amount of air
I always enjoy watching these tests, you know your doing well when Amazon says hi!!
I agree with everything you said. when I have to print something important and quite strong I do not use the fan, I slow down the speed and I use 0,16mm layer height. in this way, I get stronger results.
Phenomenal video as usual. I’ve probably watched it a dozen times.
Great video and as a fellow Engineer I appreciate the testing approach and data layout.
Maybe printing with 100% cooling, then reheating the whole finished part afterwards to allow for better bonding, without spoiling the quality of print.
DUDE have you even watched his other videos?
this has been covered COMPLETELY!
Hey Stefan,
Deine Videos sind echt der Hammer!
Konnte dadurch meine Produkte wirklich um einiges optimieren.
Vielen Dank!
These videos are ridiculously useful.
Best 3D printing channel so far
Excellent integration of the sponsored portion into the video. The SR71 print - and its relevance to the audiobook mentioned - made me watch the commercial. I usually skip ahead. Well done.
Happy to hear that and a seriously a very good book!
I wonder if this actually affects the strength of bigger parts because of the increased layer time.
Probably the previous layer will already have cooled down so much that Fan speed doesn't make a difference.
Great video👌
I usually increase print temp to increase layer adhesion. It would be interesting to test how temp affects it and if increased temp can overcome the negative effect part cooling has.
Yess brah, your vids are so well tested mate
I came here because I'm testing my ender3 v2's print speed limits at 190mm/s and recently printed some brittle petg pegboard spacers with 100% cooling. After this video, i'm going to try again at 20% fan speed and verify layer adhesion.
This was interesting. i completed my Bachelor thesis on a similar topic and can to the same conclusions. When looking at a cross-section of a print under a microscope you can clearly see that at low/no cooling the material is almost completely homologous, with cooling clear boundaries between the lines of filament can be seen.
I was mainly using PLA but also did some testes with PC-ABS and found that even with no cooling and a heated enclosure of 110 C the boundaries were still very clear. As expected proportionally the PC-ABS had weaker inter layer strength to the PLA. I think this is why annealing prints can make such a big difference, it allows the print to homogenise.
In my experience besides better thermal performance, annealing PLA doesn't do a lot to the mechanical properties, it especially doesn't homogenize layers or melt them together better. There is actually a video in the making on this topic.
@@CNCKitchen for PLA I would agree. In my research i found a paper describing this processfor ABS. It would be interesting to see if for materials such as ABS or PC-ABS anneling (or maybe heat treating is a better term?) could improve the inter layer bonds.
damn...excellent use of Gom equipment and software to make the thesis. amazing work.
Great technical video. Love your stuff keep it up!
Great video. Thank you for educating the 3D printing community.
Well thought and professionally executed, with useable results, as always, thank you!
Of course your results raise additional questions:
1. How much would the temperature of the heated build chamber affect the layer bounding of ABS/ASA prints? (I think ABS still is very important, because I consider the properties of ABS as suitable for everyday use objects, instead of just vanity objects).
2. Could PLA prints get even stronger by printing those in a heated chamber?
3. How far would the results from this tests change, after annealing the 0%, 20%, 40%, 60% and 100% PLA prints? With focus on the question: Could annealing compensate for the strength loss by printing with the fan on?
:)
Nophead - I bought the Mendel 90 from him. Thanks for giving props to him.
The Mendel90 was also my first printer. Great machine.
I appreciate this testing. I’ve done quite a bit of fan testing on a few different printers. I find that with PLA, I need 80% (at least) to get a nice 3D Benchy at 60mm/sec on the Prusa MK3 with PLA. With PETG, I can lower the fan speed to 40% and get good prints.
For petg, do you lower the print speed when you turn down the fan to compensate for sag? I adjusted my fan to 50 mm/s with the fan at 60% and it sagged in the middle parts of the project
@@tradertom4843 It depends on the size of the model -- larger parts tend to need a bit more cooling, especially if there are bridges, or holes.
1) printing in batches of 3 pylons affects the cooling of the material
2) you can use 0 fan speed but you need to lower the speed
I have a CNC screw driven repurposed for printing I do not have a fan, but my max speed it 9mm/s. printing in 2mm I have no quality issues. find the speed where you can print with 0 fan speed properly and you can then enjoy the strength of the material
what if you could use a dual extrusion 3d printer and do the infill with one filament and the shell with another. The internal filament being PLA, and the external filament being PETG. Then set the slicer so walls print before infill on each layer. Then, make it so the PLA has a way higher extrusion rate than normal and higher temp to melt layers, but not too much to melt PETG. Also on the internal layers try turning off the fan?
The PETG shell you would probably want to print close to normal settings, as it would be more for the asthetic, so the part doesn't deform. You would essentially be building a bowl of petg around a soup of PLA. I wonder how well it would hold up.
OMG, Johnny 5 got a job as a 3D scanner! Congrats on the new job, Johnny!
"Number 5 is alive."
Great info, thank you. I especially like your attention to detail, not just accepting the results, but proving them by using sensible thoughtful tests. Thank you :-)
Think you for doing your show you are saving me hundreds of dollars and thousands of hours.
Good to know that you can print PETG at 20% cooling without much loss in detail. If you need some more detail, go to 30%. You probably won't ever need to go higher than that.
A lot of people want the extra cooling for better overhang. I went with the Ductinator and get way less air. I also do my brand of PLA at 230c and also jump the bed temp up to 60c. seems to get better strength parts and a good quality PLA still bridges well anyways.
Thanks for doing these in-depth investigations! One piece of often information I often struggle to find is quantitive information about the warping properties of filaments.
Given that I most often print molds for casting precise technical parts, warp is about the only material property I really care about; and not just if its low enough to stick to the bed; but if I can count on my holes having the right spacing, and if rods will turn into bananas or not.
There are some filaments out there like ABS-X or some PLA variants that claim to be zero-warp. Also, some say that a heated chamber helps for PLA just like it does for ABS. But an actual in depth investigation of the matter, is something I have been unable to find. Perhaps you will find it interesting to do something along those lines in the future.
thanks for this. cooling vs adhesion was my first thought the first time i saw an fdm printing.
Ive never printed PLA with a fan. One trick i do is print 2 at the same time and put them at the furthest parts of the bed so that the prior object has time to cool.
Thank you Stefan, this video is cool and helpful! I love how your engineering comes out in your videos!
At 9:45 you can start seeing the collet slipping and shortlz afterwards the test bone breaking, maybe this sudden 'slip & grab' might introduce unnecessary load and cause premature fail of the test part?
LOL.....watching the melted filament sticking to the layers as the nozzle went around the perimeter reminded me of the time I made pancakes and poured the batter in a ring of concentric circles that mixed together to form a solid pancake......the adhesion was good considering the pan was quite hot at the bottom but they came away quite easily with a thin edged metal scoop.......possibly it was the oil film.
I really like how thorough you are
List of usefulness.
PLA Reference: 59MPa
PLA 20% (Less than 20% and print is ruined): 38MPa
PET-G Reference: 49MPa
PET-G 20%: 26MPa
Having 2 separate cooling paths is good for cooling the heatsink but not the print.
20% PET-G is perfect, 20% PLA has one side that is deformed, the side away from cooling.
Less cooling usually has better layer strength. PET-G is better in this sense, slowing the print and using min. layer time helps with print quality. DasFilament PETG shouldn't be used in safety critical applications, the DasFilament wasn't mentioned in this Helpful Comment, because it was the first PETG and was scattered results proving to be unpredictable at best.
Perhaps you could do your own video with your own stress gauges.
Very well done!
That B roll though...subtle and well done.
AWESOME! Not only great information but an audible book suggestion... ok dude... I'm subscribing... My 3d printer is in the shop... which is only sometimes heated so... gonna have to come up with a method of guessing.
What an excellent video Stefan!! Thanks for doing this kind of tests and sharing your results.
14:23 literally skip 15 minutes of your life
you are the real hero
king
I thought the rest of the video was interesting but ok
Impatient ass
Great test! I would like to know the optimal strength of petg when adjusting temperature as well as cooing. Maybe even flow rate.
Also for 3d scanning: i suggest to make in ear headset, use 5 minute setting silicon to get a deep earmold impression, scan it, remodel for purpose and then print multi material. This is a project I'm currenty working on. Gonna print the first part in petg then finish off the actual ear plug section in ninjaflex. Struggling to make Prusaslicer work for two different filament print settings in one print though.
Great work! Keep it up :) You're adding much value to the community!