Architectural Model Printing - Design to Prevent Warping

How can I adjust my model so that it doesn’t warp during printing? I printed this part for an 1/8" scale model, and none of the wall planes are true. I am consistently having this issue.


Here’s a small model I printed a few months ago. I had the same issue, and the part has bowed more with time.

Any advice on how to prevent or reduce warping would be great. Thanks.

What are the insides of these models like?

Here’s what the Inside of that the Octagonal Tower Looks Like. The walls are 0.25" Thick.

Try making the walls substantially thinner, like 1/16". Unless they need to carry a substantial load, which seems unlikely, thinner may be better, as well as using far less material. Adding ribs to internal surfaces may also reduce warp.

I will give it a try, but in my experience, very thin planes can have a wave effect. I printed the bottom portion of the model today today. Still lots of warping. I’ll upload some photos tomorrow.

Hi,

having flat faces on this printers is tough. Remember that every layer is pulled up during peeling and therefore there is always some warping. Also factors as shrinkage, curing and others affect the print.

But what you need is to increase wall rigidity. Increasing thickness will help but that’s not the most effective method. What you need to do is increase the wall moment of inertia so you can actually have a stiffer part. So I would recommend you to have a plate 1mm thick going from the wall that is warping all the way up to the wall on the other side. If you do this, the walls will act as a flange on a H beam and the 1mm thick plate will work as the web giving you enough stiffness to build the model warpless to the eye.

Thanks for the Advice. I WIll try to make some internal cross supoorts to keep things true. The parts that came out of the printer last night were too warped to show a client.

In response to the previous post about making walls thinner. Here is a shot of the last print that I did. This model had 1/8" Walls which warped considerably. I think more than the 1/4" Walls.

Are the parts warped when first printed but warp after cleanup?

I just printed a couple of boxes with a 1 mm wall thickness and they fit perfect.
I used my ultrasonic cleaner with Bradley systems cleaner and post cured the parts with my 420 nm laser pointer while the parts were submersed in the same solution.

While the part was drying I did toss some cardboard on the inner walls to support them just in case.

IPA will warp parts if they have thin walls. I am not sure if yours were warped before cleaning.

There is warping while it prints, and also warping over time after the part is complete. I put the model into 160 Deg F water for a few minutes, and the walls became malleable. I was able to straighten out the walls somewhat.

I print small architectural models (1/285th scale) almost exclusively and I’ve great luck if I keep the wall thicknesses at about .050" and add internal support webs to keep everything nice and straight.

Another example of internal webs

It also helps to keep the support structure on there as long as possible so that it can help to keep its form

They don’t even have to be full webs. You could hollow those out to a lattice or trim them back so they are just ribs instead.