Hey
I saw that on kickstarter : http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1809448130/3d-refiner-by-3dprintsexpresscom?ref=card
I am wondering if some kind of solvent could work with the resin used to print ?
First of all, you will be amazed how much smoother your parts look when printed with the Form1 compared with existing FDM methods. So you will probably not find smoothing necessary at all.
That said, there are a number of options for finishing a part.
One simple way to smooth your part a bit is to rub the part with some force after it has been immersed in isopropanol for 10 minutes. This can create a smoothened mat finish to your part. Alternatively, you can use an acrylic-based spray to ‘fill’ in any microscopic gaps to give your part a glossy shine.
Thanks for the answer but I had some print done with a 16 microns precision on an objet printer and I still had to sand paper the print.
Since there is a lack of photos from the beta tester it s hard to judge but I am pretty sure the stepping on the print is quite visible and I was just wondering if some one was try different way to smooth the print.
Rubbing the piece is something I would try but on a delicate and small piece it may not be possible.
Can we see a macro picture of the model printed at 16 microns and the roughness you’re talking about?
I will do a picture tonight but I moslty sand the piece so you can’t the the layers, I should be able to find an area less sanded.
But the point for me is to not sand the piece and use maybe a chemical to smooth the piece uni formally and reach small area that I could not do by hand.
Here is the photos of the print
It was printed by Moddler with an Objet Eden500V
http://www.moddler.com/index.php
It cost me 125$.
I sand it with a fine sand paper but not enough, kind of afraid to loose details
I printed it before at another place and found the details not showing enough in compare of what I had on screen so I pushed the details more and preview it in less shiny material to be more accurate. But some details would be impossible to smooth by hand, that is why I am looking into the solvent idea.
The other solution would be to mold it and cast it in wax to smooth it with an alcohol torch but casting small objects are difficult and time consuming.
Justin if I am correct you plan to do small miniature for miniature games how do you plan to duplicate them ?
Well… glad I didn’t get the Objet Eden500V! From what I’ve seen so far the Form 1 doesn’t have these lines. I really need to see it with my own eyes to confirm though.
How to replicate? Just print it again…
Wouldn’t the solvent approach tend to blur out the details ?
@Justin good for you if you managed to to save around 200K-300k$ by not buying an Eden500V.
So here is a photo showing that a printed surface is not smooth :
http://bunniefoo.com/form1/f1td-print-detail-right.jpg
Source: http://www.bunniestudios.com/blog/?p=3110
So to get back to the solvent yes it will blur some details, hopefully the bad one if the time spent in the solvent is not too long.
As for duplicating due to the price of the resin in compare of regular 2 part resin it will depend of how many time you need to duplicate a piece.
I believe that for fine detail prints like characters, head … you will have to spend some time cleaning it up by hand ( sanding, patching, sculpting by hand)
That… is very bad news for me, if the Form 1 still leaves that sort of lines. I will have to resort to traditional resin/metal casting… which is a total pain in the ass. I am so disappointed.
…hopefully he printed that at a low resolution. Maybe the high resolution doesn’t have such evident lines. You saw the owl print in the other thread, right?
@Justin You have a good point that example could have been printed in 100 microns. I need to look at the howl picture again. The yoda photos from formlabs tweeter was very impressive so will see but i am planning to make mold down the road. I would not mind some info about how the resin miniature are cast ( what material and if they use centrifugal casting) i will need to dig more in some forums for that. I did bigger mold before but I had a hard time when I tried smaller pieces. I am thinking about investing in a de-gasing chamber and a pressure pot to help reduce the air bubble during casting.
I don’t have the space to do resin/metal casting but there are companies that I might have to hire out to do so. I am still hopeful that the Form 1 can produce what we need. Juts need to see better pictures of products printed at 25 microns.
But in all honesty, looking at the part he printed, there would be no need to print such a broad, flat surface at 25 microns.
Here’s hoping!