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3D Resin Printer Diary


Brian..

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That's a very useful video. I've had a couple of failures and it's clear that the orientation of the print and the positioning supports are the big issues. Flat, thin parts are particularly prone to warping. It will take a while to work out what's going on.

 

My Talking Robot battery door is printing as I speak. 

 

 

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4 hours ago, robothut said:

 

Brian here is a guy that just resin printed this mini in clear then dipped in a clear coat. check it out.

 

Wow! Great detail and the clear resin looks pretty nice indeed. I’ve had the thought in the past that it would be cool to do clear replica bodies of vintage robots with accurate mechanics inside so that the workings would be be visible. I wonder if this resin would be clear enough for such an application?

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That's impressive, John. Most so-called clear resin prints are cloudy or yellowish. True clear resins cost the earth. 

 

Are you going over to the dark side, John? The resin doesn't smell at all. It's a little messy but I've managed to keep things under control, and I am by nature  a disorganised worker.  The scare stories about the resin are overdone, but it pays to keep it off yourself. The printer is a little noisy, but that's just a cheap fan problem. The resin is fairly inexpensive and is far stronger than I thought. The only downside is the small size of the print bed, but that will rapidly improve. The Elegoo Mars has hit the ground running. It's nothing special, but the low price makes it impossible to ignore. Once the Chinese get the scent of a massive market there's no stopping them 

 

Robert from XL5 is for the most part a simple build - a series of repeated tubes and disks. If this clarity is really achievable then I'm up for it.   Domes, portholes and screens all become achievable. 

 

One interesting and slightly alarming event happened yesterday. I took delivery of an ultrasonic cleaning bath. When I ran it for a few minutes it switched on the bloody gas fire!!!!!!

 

I have a remote control gas fire and my wife noticed that the darn thing was belting out heat at full strength. My wife blamed me, I blamed her, then I assumed someone had put their ass on the remote control unit. Eventually I thought - ultrasonic cleaner. Sure enough, I was able to repeat the gas lighting phenomenon. It will come in handy when we lose the remote again.  The cleaner is now banned from downstairs. 

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There must be a master OFF switch for the gas fire that you can use when you run the ultrasonic cleaner.

I had been looking into resin printing for about 1 year, but the low price of the Eleegoo Mars was over and gone by the time the first you tube vids hit, at least here in the USA. I do not feel its worth the normal price. So I will wait for the next "new one" to come out and try again to get the intro low price. I really do not have a use for it, but love playing with the tech. I still have my 30 plus years experience in silicon mold making and resin casting and can whip out resin parts so much faster than the printer can but it would be nice to go direct from 3d cad to finished part. Also 1 year ago resin was not so low cost, it was about 3 times more back then, so it is nice to see the price coming down. yes they tried to scare off every one with the smell and fume problems with our 3d filament printers back in the day as well. And yes some filaments do stink like ABS but it was all over blown.

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Nice job Brian, funny about the gas fire. John hope your printer comes down in price. Will check Salk Lake City for you. Carrry on gentlemen.

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I have heard that many of the owners of resin printers that us the LCD screen design , see the LCD as a consumable as they do fail over time due to the UV light. Here I copied some text from one youtube that sums it up, but just about every you tube guy I follow that has been using these resin printers with the LCD screens for the last 1 too 2 years has said the same thing. I think its a small price to pay for the quality. Its like when Grandpa was with us and building his robots using his lazer cutter and the lenses had to be replaced all the time and the laser tube every now and then. These tools have a cost to operate.

 

The lcd screen (like the FEP film)can be considered a consumable - it will only last that long (many many hours but not indefinitely, long exposure times speed up the inevitable degradation)under bombardment of the UV-light anyway. Might be surprising but thats the cost of doing business and the printer being that cheap. this is common for ALL lcd based 3d printers. replacement lcds are available at about 30bucks.

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That looks interesting, John. There are concerns about the safety of the regular resin, and this may be an improvement. The colour is horrible but I paint everything, so that's not a concern.

 

I'm having great fun with the Elegoo Mars - just one failed print, and that was my fault. An entire head just seemed to vanish. I leave the resin in the machine, and don't have to drain it every time I use it. I tried one large piece - the full size head of the Mechanical Man and the result was stunning, easily the best I've seen from a printer. I hollowed it out but by that I mean that I hollowed out an already hollow head! So I was left with a light double-walled structure with 1mm thick walls. This saved a ton of resin and the part still seems structurally strong. In terms of resolution it far outperforms the reference prints I have from an Ultimaker 3, a $3000 machine. 

 

I can't wait for a bigger build volume at a comparable price point. It looks like the game changer that we've been waiting for. 

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