Ah, the summer… When everybody and everything slows down, wisely, to a much calmer pace. With the current temperatures we see the need to take extra care of our lawns as well. And we wouldn’t be colorFabb if 3D printing couldn’t be fit in there somewhere. One of our engineers needed a G1 thread extender for his garden watering system and designed one himself:

Design by Jos Deelen, Team colorFabb

The thread extender was printed on the Ultimaker 3, using a 0.12mm layer height, 3 perimeters and 95% infill. The material of choice is our very first copolyester colorFabb_XT. The color for this print is Light Green – grassy and fresh.

We launched colorFabb_XT almost 4 years ago at the London 3D Print Show together with Eastman Chemical Company. Eastman is our material partner for co-polyesters. colorFabb_XT is made with Amphora AM1800 and has a unique formulation for 3D Printing that features excellent properties: High strength and very high toughness, odor neutral processing, high Tg / improved temperature resistance, styrene free formulation, FDA food contact compliance and BPA (Bisphenol A ) free formulation. It will allow the user to produce 3D printed functional products in a safe way and is ideally suited for prints like the thread extender.

colorFabb_XT is available in 14 colors, including clear.

Our range of Amphora based co-polyesters are perfectly suited for a project like this. In 2014 colorFabb teamed up with Eastman Chemical Company to develop unique grades of co-polyesters suited for 3D printing. Eastman Amphora™ 3D polymer are a low-odor, styrene-free choice that is uniquely suited for 3D printing applications. With Amphora, items can be created that are more functional, more durable, more efficient, and attractive.

So far we have launched four grades, starting with colorFabb_XT in 2014. Late 2015 we follow this up with nGen, our next Generation general purpose filament and a drop in replacement for PLA. A wide processing window and perfect reliability make this filament a very popular one in our portfolio.

A little over a year ago we followed that up with colorFabb_HT, a high-temperature resistant filament that allows for functional engineering projects that need lasting parts. colorFabb_HT is enabled by Eastman Tritan™ copolyester technology.

At last year’s TCT Show in Birmingham we introduced nGen_FLEX to the market, a flexible filament with a Shora A hardness of 95 allowing for functional and flexible parts to be printed.

More information can be found in the blog we wrote about co-polyesters last summer.