Ordered by mistake a spool of ABS instead of PLA...

Ordered by mistake a spool of ABS instead of PLA… Can I use ABS on a +Printrbot Simple with no heat bed ?

In general, no.
There may be certain prints, or certain ways around not having a heated bed, but overall, you’re just going to run into frustration after frustration.

Even with a heated bed it can be frustrating.

I did the exact same thing a little bit ago. My results with it were pretty much what @Carlton_Dodd said. I had a little success with hairspray, but all in all, you’d probably get better results (and be able to avoid frustration and annoyance) by sticking with PLA or upgrading to a heated bed.

Great. Anyone want to buy or exchange a 1kg spool of ABS (black) ?

I think I have heard about people printing on a mixture of ABS and acetone. They call it abs juice. I have not tried that and I have not used that printer.

I’ve seen one person so it. Abs will stick to blue tape, but it will curl. So put a huge skirt, about 2 inches, to sacrifice.

I’ve printed abs on the cube 2 with no heated bed. You have to use a really good amount of glue and I’d suggest a raft. But it would be fun to mess with and see how good you can get it printing with a different material.

You can also print abs on a PLA raft without heat. Lay down a mm or so of PLA, then adjust your z a bit higher. Abs pops off pla pretty well, and sticks while printing due to the texture of the raft. :slight_smile:

@Andre_Courchesne1 - Great. Anyone want to buy or exchange a 1kg spool of ABS (black) ?

Where are you, Australia?

You can use a bed of CA glue as well. But that’s pricy, and the fumes while it dries!

What is the heat beed recommended temperature for ABS ? I have some 100Ohms 120v heat elements, wonder if I could place these under my aluminium plate to heat it up…

The recommended temp for abs id like 95c the simple hass a hard time getting there with a heat bed. That aluminum just pulls the heat out.

Aluminum is a great material for a heated bed. There is no such thing as “pulling the heat out”.
Generally, aiming for at least 0.5W/cm² will make a heated bed usable for ABS - so at least 50W or 60W for the Simple. One of those 100Ohm heaters would already be enough, but i’d be worried that stuff would catch on fire with that much heating power. Maybe two in series for half the power?
I use 120C for the first layer and 110C for the rest. Glue stick on aluminum.

@Joseph_Larson you do know how big the Simple is, right?

@Thomas_Sanladerer

Aluminum has a high thermal conductivity and acts as a big heat sink. While that thermal conductivity is good for an even heating surface it means that it also dissipates the heat that goes into it very well.

I am currently running a simple with heated bed and am lucky to hit 95c without insulating the bed from the environment.

@Thomas_Cox sure, but either you get a lower surface temperature when the material can’t replenish the dissipated energy fast enough (glass) or a lower core and overall more even temperature, but also higher surface temperatures and hence higher losses (aluminum).
If you want a higher temperature on the bed’s surface, you’ll have to live with higher convection losses. So, again, aluminum is a perfect material for a heated bed since you get the highest and most even surface temperature with it.

@Thomas_Sanladerer IIRC the metal simple has a 100mm cube print area so a 2" raft would leave 2mm space to print. Point taken. A 10 millimeter skirt probably be enough

@Thomas_Sanladerer @Joseph_Larson my @Printrbot Simple is a highly modified maker late 2014 model upgraded to gt2 belts with the ‘no sag mod’, a 300mm x 160mm aluminium bed and an induction probe.