Printing ABS ESD filament
Posted: Thu Nov 09, 2017 4:16 pm
Hello all,
I am associated with a certain company that utilizes ABS ESD (Electro-Static Dissipative) filament. This material allows electrical current to dissipate through the 3D part and properly be grounded. However, we have found that this material also needs to have different FFF settings (S3D) in order for filament to flow properly.
In addition, and thus leading to my questions, our M2 V4 REV E machine has been experiencing problems with the extruder clogging.
After reading many forums and asking MakerGear technicians, I have come up empty on many topics. Also, these problems have recently been occurring and were not problems previously. We have also replaced numerous parts within the last few months including, V4 filament drive, motor mount, and wiring harnesses. In just over a 1.5 years, the printer has logged about 11,000 hours.
To describe the sequences of this clogging, the printer will print about 1/4"-1" of a part before the clogging occurs. After cleaning the extruder and passing about 100mm of new filament through the V4 hot end, we attempt to print a completely different part as well as implement a different spool of filament. After the troubleshooting and cleaning, we have still experienced the same clogging issues.
We are currently printing at 250C, bed temp at 120C, nozzle diameter of .35mm, extrusion width of .4mm, and extrusion multiplier of .85. Utilizing different processes, our sparse settings are a primary layer height of .3mm, 4 solid top and bottom layers, 50% first layer height, 100% layer width, and 50% layer speed. On the solid process, everything is congruent for layers except the primary layer height is .15mm.
The recommended printing temperature can be found here https://www.3dxtech.com/content/ESD_ABS ... t_v2.1.pdf
After calculating the thermal conductivity rate to which plastic filament is extruding, the temperature should be around 248C in order to meet our demanded speed.
The only other bit of information that I think would be applicable to the extruder clogging is the machines speed. For solid, the printing speed is 1200mm/min, outline underspeed 25%, solid infill underspeed, 35%, and support structure underspeed is 18000mm/min. For sparse, the speeds are the same however the outline underspeed and solid infill underspeed are at 40% and the support structure is at 80%. Realizing that this speed is the maximum allowed speed that the MakerGear M2 allows, the justification lies with longer prints only account for lost money.
To summarize, has anyone had experience with this kind of ABS ESD filament? Has anyone experienced clogging due to retraction settings? Does anyone have suggestions to prevent clogging?
I am associated with a certain company that utilizes ABS ESD (Electro-Static Dissipative) filament. This material allows electrical current to dissipate through the 3D part and properly be grounded. However, we have found that this material also needs to have different FFF settings (S3D) in order for filament to flow properly.
In addition, and thus leading to my questions, our M2 V4 REV E machine has been experiencing problems with the extruder clogging.
After reading many forums and asking MakerGear technicians, I have come up empty on many topics. Also, these problems have recently been occurring and were not problems previously. We have also replaced numerous parts within the last few months including, V4 filament drive, motor mount, and wiring harnesses. In just over a 1.5 years, the printer has logged about 11,000 hours.
To describe the sequences of this clogging, the printer will print about 1/4"-1" of a part before the clogging occurs. After cleaning the extruder and passing about 100mm of new filament through the V4 hot end, we attempt to print a completely different part as well as implement a different spool of filament. After the troubleshooting and cleaning, we have still experienced the same clogging issues.
We are currently printing at 250C, bed temp at 120C, nozzle diameter of .35mm, extrusion width of .4mm, and extrusion multiplier of .85. Utilizing different processes, our sparse settings are a primary layer height of .3mm, 4 solid top and bottom layers, 50% first layer height, 100% layer width, and 50% layer speed. On the solid process, everything is congruent for layers except the primary layer height is .15mm.
The recommended printing temperature can be found here https://www.3dxtech.com/content/ESD_ABS ... t_v2.1.pdf
After calculating the thermal conductivity rate to which plastic filament is extruding, the temperature should be around 248C in order to meet our demanded speed.
The only other bit of information that I think would be applicable to the extruder clogging is the machines speed. For solid, the printing speed is 1200mm/min, outline underspeed 25%, solid infill underspeed, 35%, and support structure underspeed is 18000mm/min. For sparse, the speeds are the same however the outline underspeed and solid infill underspeed are at 40% and the support structure is at 80%. Realizing that this speed is the maximum allowed speed that the MakerGear M2 allows, the justification lies with longer prints only account for lost money.
To summarize, has anyone had experience with this kind of ABS ESD filament? Has anyone experienced clogging due to retraction settings? Does anyone have suggestions to prevent clogging?