Month: June 2017

Introducing Job Windhorst, our new COO

As from this week the colorFabb team is reinforced with Job Windhorst, our new COO. The growth of colorFabb and the 3D printing landscape in general has been tumultuous and very, very exciting.

Job Windhorst, our new COO with added CFO responsibilities. LinkedIn

At colorFabb we have not been sitting still and the organisation grew from an idea in CEO Ruud Rouleaux’ mind with a few dedicated, but part-time, employees to a middle sized company with over 20 employees in four rollercoaster years. You can see the development of colorFabb on our timeline. No growth comes without its specific set of challenges and we are not done growing yet.

It is Job’s focus to manage this growth in a sustainable way and make sure the growth scenarios that colorFabb has envisioned can be realized. His COO job will have added CFO responsibilities as well.

Job Windhorst’s background is in finance, management and HR and his experience in this field makes him a perfect fit within colorFabb’s current team.

Says Job Windhorst: “It’s a fantastic challenge for the Colorfabb team and myself to make the next step and grow up to a fullservice organisation within the dynamic market where we operate.”

Ruud Rouleaux, CEO and founder of colorFabb adds: “With the addition of Job to the colorFabb team, the road has been cleared to start new business development and allocate the necessary time for several high profile market opportunities in terms of materials, 3D Printers and engineering services.”

In a demanding market that is always on the move, the organisation needs to be flexible and at colorFabb we know we have found the right person in Job Windhorst to manage the growth while maintaining the can-do attitude we have had from the very beginning.

We wish Job good luck in his new job!

PETG Economy

In November 2016 we launched our PLA Economy line. PLA Economy filament was the result of many requests for a more cost-conscious filament in the colorFabb portfolio. After a lot of testing we released a brand new PLA grade, available now in 5 colors and only on 2.2kg spools. Today it is time to take the next step and we proudly announce PETG Economy.

We have received a lot of requests for PETG in our portfolio and have added this under our Economy banner as from today. We initially start with 3 colors: Black, White and Red. All of these are available exclusively on 2.2kg spools. Shipping starts on Monday. You can buy PETG Economy here.

Material specifications

Material: colorFabb PETG Economy

Diameter Tolerance: ± 0.1 mm

Density: 1.28 g/cm3

Glass Transition Temperature: 70C

Full data sheets will be available as from mid June.

colorFabb Economy: Large volume, High quality, Low price

colorFabb’s Economy line is developed for users who need a lot of filament. By adding a specifically sourced PETG to our portfolio we are adding more functionality and diversity to our range of filaments.

As with PLA Economy we have extensively tested this filament in our print lab. Both in production and print lab we have adhered to the highest colorFabb quality – this is something we simply do not compromise on.

The idea behind these filaments is to keep it at a very competitive price. Retail price of PETG Economy is € 40 excluding VAT and shipping. This works out to be a little over € 18 per kg for high quality filament.

Tips, tricks and settings

At colorFabb we have a well-equipped 3D printing studio with many popular 3d printers. Our grade of Economy PETG has been tested using various 3D printers, which has resulted in the following recommended settings:

Advised 3d printing temperature:
235C-255C

Advised 3d print speed:
30 – 50 mm/s

Advised Heated bed:
70-80C

Cooling fan
75/100% fan cooling for best aesthetics, this gives best performance on overhangs and small details. For best mechanical performance try printing with the least amount of cooling needed, for optimal layer adhesion.

Attributions designs plus settings used

4040 adjustable feet / stud by Fra Elstak: https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:1887810

Printed on the Lulzbot Mini, at 0.25 mm layerheight at 235C and 70C bed temp. Cooling at 100%.

Filament duck 2.2kg spools by colorFabb: https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:1862683

Printed on the Stacker S4, at 0.25mm layerheight at 250C and 70C bed temp, 20/30% cooling.

Front head Light LED by Nicolas Garnier: https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:2085081

Printed on the Lulzbot Mini, at 0.25 mm layerheight at 235C and 70C bed temp. Cooling at 100%.

Garden Wobble Sprinkler by Chris Dalby (a.k.a. moose4621): https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:1532652

Printed on MassPortal at 0.2mm layerheight, 240C, 70C bed temp and 75% cooling.

Wavy organic bowl, cups, vase and flower pot. by PRATRIK: https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:2268356

Printed on MassPortal at 0.27mm layerheight, 240C, 70C bed temp and 75% cooling.

3d printing colorfabb filament new material petg economy

Fidget spinner assembly tool

The craze has not died yet and we still see fidget spinners everywhere. We recently made one with woodFill and copperFill. You can read the original post here.

Two weeks ago we held an open house for family and friends who were curious about our new building. We did not want to let them go home empty handed and decided to print a whole bunch of fidget spinners. The idea was to print the body of the spinners with PLA/PHA and nGen and create added weight by printing with copperFill. The copperFill parts needed to be firmly placed in the body and with over a hundred fidget spinners to be made, we decided to make a small assembly tool:

Design by colorFabb

The tool is printed on the Lulzbot Mini with corkFill and woodFill. We used a 0.38mm layer height to give it a nice coarse look.

The assembly tool is made up of a top and bottom halve, held together by two M3 screws screwing directly into the print.

A spinner can be slid in from the side and the copperFill weights (or bearings) can be positioned from above. They can then be tapped in to place with a hammer using corkFill cylinders as a driver.

woodFill was launched in November 2013 during the London 3D Print Show and was our first special filament. Other natural filled special filaments have followed, like bambooFill (which we recently discontinued) and more recently corkFill. Our woodFill has been a hit from day one due to easy processing and its fantastic looks. Added bonus is that your print room smells like a wood shop when printing with woodFill.

The Lulzbot Mini is available at colorFabb. As Lulzbot’s official reseller we ship from stock. We offer free shipping in Europe and two free spools of filament!

The LulzBot Mini was built to work out of the box, with no complicated assembly process getting in the way of you creating. Operating the Mini is the same- straightforward software, easy to read documentation and an army of LulzBot enthusiasts eager to help out people getting started. This printer is not only easy. you will still find flexible, industrial strength capacity from this machine.

Read Make Magazine’s review of the Lulzbot Mini here.

The Lulzbot Mini is now available in our webshop at € 1.573 including VAT / € 1.300 excluding VAT.

3d printing assembly colorfabb copperfill corkfill fidget spinner lulzbot ngen tool woodfill