Sorta like there is in motor oil plastic bottles. Would give a nice visual vs just shaking the cartridge and guessing how much is in there.
We often print over night and knowing the resin was at a certain level we could put in a fuller cartridge before leaving work.
Sorry if this is a repeat suggestion…
That’s a noble suggestion, but it’s not as simple as it sounds. Resin cartridges are made of a very densely-pigmented plastic to keep light out, which is essential to the resin’s shelf life.
But you can estimate how much resin a cartridge contains by weighing it. Empty resin cartridge weighs about 89 grams, while a full resin cartridge weighs between 1420 and 1450 depending on the resin formula.
So if you’ve got a resin cartridge that weighs 500 grams, it’s still got 411 grams of resin–plenty enough for most jobs. If it weighs 100 grams, it’s got only 11 grams of resin–almost empty!
The orange perspex they use for the cover blocks UV light so they could use that as the clear window.
I apologize if this has been discussed before but is there a page where the density of each type of resin is listed? I’d like to be able to correlate the weight of the cartridge to the amount of resin available in milliliters. This way I can decide if the cartridge will have enough for the next print.
I suppose it would be easy enough to figure it out with a scale and a known volume but it would be easier still if the information has already been published.
We have the “specific gravities” of each of the resins listed on the SDS sheets at the bottom of this page. We’ve also just added features in recent updates to help visualize the amount of resin left in a cartridge. The printer will warn you if it suspects there’s not enough left to complete a print.
Slightly more specific densities based on internal testing are as followed
Standard: 1.09 kg/L
Castable: 1.11 kg/L
Flexible V2: 1.04 kg/L
Tough: 1.1 kg/L
Dental: 1.12kg/L
They could introduce a feature like the electric water boiling kettle I have implements, its kinda a gauge on the side that indicates how much liquid is inside, but doesn’t actually have a window displaying the resin (i.e. letting light in).
But I have to agree with @Frew, the newish feature showing on screen and in Preform how much resin remains in the cartridge is more than sufficient IMO. If you pick up a tank off the shelf and are unsure, just pop it in the machine.
I thought that my suggested solution was the answer because I believed that the orange perspex used on the printer cover did not let UV light in. Judging by your comment and the lack of response, I assume that it is not 100% effective, which is a bit of a worry.
How much UV does the orange perspex actually block?
Although there is no direct sunlight, my printer is in a sunny room. Should I be putting a blanket over it to get longer tank resin life?
The orange cover is plenty sufficient for blocking out sunlight. We did a few tests leaving the printer in intense sunlight for a weekend and there weren’t any negative effects. Your Form 2 might appreciate a blanket when it’s cold in the Winter, but otherwise you shouldn’t need to add anything to block out light.
I think I recall the Makerjuice bottles had a less opaque stripe on the side?