While the filabot project arrives,

While the filabot project arrives, I’ve been wondering how easy it is to find filament, and if all printers are equally “filament friendly”. Any thoughts on the most versatile printers for accepting different types?

It’s trivial to find filament. (3mm certainly) but finding a source that guarantees a given minimum roundness and diameter tolerance <0.01mm can be tricky.
I still have 2x 20Kg spools in my cellar that look like wood brances.
trapped air bubbles in the range of 1-2mm, outher diameter between 2.1 and 3.8mm, nothing round, … (worse case. It was a chinese company offering them for 3d printing).

Filabot is crap, trash, kaput. Forget about it. There were people doing what the filabot is doing now, back in 2007, and getting better results.

Buy and try :slight_smile: but i did like the filament i got from https://grrf.de/

Filabot is crap, i hope not but i am afraid @ThantiK is right but still have hopes that some hardware will arrive some day. This http://www.perpetualplasticproject.com/Perpetual_Plastic_Project/Project.html has a more educational approach.

@ThantiK , I was seriously considering getting a Filabot at some point in the future. What’s crappy about it? Are there other/better/cheaper solutions to do what the filabot is doing?

Anyone seen the quality of the prototypes of the “MakiBox Ramen Pellet Extruder” yet?

@Pieter_Bos , that project looks awesome!! Could be very educational, and there’s an art museum in my area that it would be perfect in

@John_Schneider there a located in the netherlands :wink: but a art museum would be great, its a very interactive installation

@Pieter_Bos , I’m tempted to (someday, with their permission and guidance) imitate their design. The art museum I’m thinking of is very community and idea focused, I think they would love an interactive piece like this!

@John_Schneider well contact them someday :slight_smile:

Hey there @Marcus_Wolschon , @ThantiK , everyone, thanks for your help… maybe I didn’t address my question properly… what I wonder, is why some 3D printers specify they can only use ABS for instance, and other do not. Any opinions on which are the most versatile? I’ll get one within a couple months but I’d like to test it/use it with PP, PET, ABS and recycled plastic too, since we at the studio design products with those materials (and more of course but these comprise the majority)… that’s why I’m interested on Filabot as well, didn’t know it was so hated in the community!

@Giovanni_Salinas , I believe (and someone please correct me if I’m wrong) but it has a lot to do with melting temperatures. Why one printer is specified to print/not print in ABS usually has to do with whether it has a heated bed or not, due to the cooling characteristics of ABS (potentially curling/lifting/warping). Since these materials melt at different temperatures, extrusion temps and speed will have to be set differently to account for that.

@Giovanni_Salinas PLA is the most hassle-free of the plastic types and widely used. ABS can warp (badly), but gives stronger prints. A heated chamber (or high ambient temperature) helps with the warpage, a heated bed is mandatory. The other common household plastics warp even more and are not suitable for printing on today’s machines.

Thanks @Thomas_Sanladerer , @John_Schneider , got it now :wink:

@John_Schneider …filabot produced air-laden, very slow filament. Running a machine with crazy high wattage heaters for 30 minutes just to produce 1ft of filament? Yeah, I’d say that’s dead in the water. There are many other projects on thingiverse for filament extrusion that do WAY better than filabot.

@ThantiK : links for the lazy? :stuck_out_tongue:

Video for the lazy: http://youtu.be/bGpckv1LYhc?t=1m30s

You’ll see that video was posted 7 months ago. Nothing since then on the filabot except promotional material. Here is just ONE example of someone that’s surpassed the filabot, long ago: http://www.thingiverse.com/thing:30642

And here’s a video showing its output, and that it moves much faster than the filabot: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JebhbxgjBgA

The problem is, everyone knows about the filabot because this engineering student apparently is a much better marketer than he is an engineer.