T-Rex

Our very first special filament, woodFill, remains one of the most fun materials to print with. Not only does it print easily, it also makes your printing room smell like a woodshop due to the fact that we used real wood in our unique PLA/PHA blend. One of our colleagues, Paul (he who ships all your spools in logistics) printed a large T-Rex entirely made with woodFill with awesome results:

T-Rex Design link

Paul printed the T-Rex on the Prusa i3 using the woodFill settings. The entire print measures 39cm high and is 76cm tall. It took about 150 hours to print all the parts.

Lego minifig for scale

Launched in 2013, woodFill was our first special 3D printing filament. It has been a bestseller for over 6 years and we fully understand why: the ease of printing, the authentic wood structure and the smell of wood while printing make it a fan favorite. Read more about woodFill and its origins in last year’s blog.

 

 

As said, woodFill is a great filament to print with. Very easy and it makes for great decoration, like the world map we printed recently.

woodFill color disclaimer: due to the natural origin of woodFill (wood fibres) slight color variations may occur from batch to batch. We do not chemically process or color the filament in any way and aim to maintain the original wood look of the material.

 

woodFill is available now and ships daily from stock on spools containing 600 and 1800 grams. Click here to head directly to our webshop.

B25j Mitchell model plane

We have posted about model planes and drones before and know the model plane and drone communities are avid 3D printers. We saw a great model of a B25j Mitchell plane on Facebook recently and asked the maker, Coen Loos, for more information. He was kind enough to share some more details.

Printed by Coen Loos / design by 3DLabprint / all images by Coen Loos

Coen works at a school and got in touch with 3D printing there. He has been an avid 3D printer ever since 2015 and specifically focusses on model planes. He mainly uses designs by 3DLabPrint, specialist in 3D printable plane models. Coen was the first one using 3D printing with his local model plane club and people were skeptic at first… until he flew his printed plane!

The classic North American Mitchell B25j was mostly printed on the Prusa i3 Mk3 and made with our PLA Economy filament. Coen says: “colorFabb is my prefered brand due to its good service, reliable filament and perfect printing results.” Always glad to read that! Some smaller items were printed with nGen and Ninjaflex filament on the Ultimaker 2+.

The print settings for the main parts on the Prusa were:

  • Layer height 0.25mm
  • Nozzle temp 230c
  • Bed 55C
  • No cooling fan
  • Single perimeter of 0.42mm

Coen has chosen PLA due to its reliability but sees the need for more specific filaments. For that reason we sent him spools of our LW-PLA and varioShore TPU for further testing and we look forward to the results of that!

You can find this and many other plane models available for purchase at the 3DLabPrint website.

The results are amazing and Coen is planning on the maiden flight soon and we’re sure we’ll update you on that! Thanks for sharing, Coen!

 

About PLA Economy

PLA Economy is available on 2.2kg, 4.5kg and 8kg spools only. It is very well suited for the maker who needs quality filament at an affordable price. It is a perfect material for large volume and small series production, made with the guaranteed colorFabb quality that we are known for.

PLA Economy is now available in six of the most popular colors. ColorFabb PLA Economy is not a standard PLA. It has been modified for better layer adhesion and flow properties to get better performance over other basic PLA filaments. Because it’s made with the same processing technology used for other premium colorFabb products, this PLA Economy will be just as reliable.

Stan Lee

Excelsior! With Avengers: Endgame finally being released this week, it is only fitting that we honor the man who started most, if not all of it: Mr Stan Lee. One of our colleagues printed this very nice bust with PLA Economy.

Design by Geoffro / Patreon Link

Printed on the Prusa Mk3 with standard PLA settings it is a fitting tribute of the creator of so many beloved Marvel heroes who passed away too soon and too young last year. His work in comics and the subsequent MCU movies cannot be valued enough.

This Stan Lee bust already has found a place in one of our colleague’s living room – a true fan!

About the filament

PLA Economy offers a great value for your money. One spool consists of 2.2kg of filament for a dirt cheap price of a little over € 35 (ex VAT and shipping). It is a different grade than our range of PLA/PHA, but we guarantee the same colorFabb quality. Our filaments are readily available from our webshop. You can use the standard PLA settings if your printer has these pre-defined and these should work fine.

It is the perfect filament to make your fan memorabilia.

You can also opt for the PLA Economy Value Pack: order four spools as a value pack and receive an immediate 10% discount!

Buy PLA Economy  Buy PLA Economy Value Pack

PLA Economy is very well suited for the maker who needs quality at an affordable price. It is a perfect filament for large volume and small series production, made with the guaranteed colorFabb quality that we are known for. It has been one of colorFabb’s most popular filaments ever since launching 3 years ago.

Deadpool

Deadpool, aka The Merc with the Mouth, has been a fan favorite for years and one of our colleagues has printed the iconic Marvel character recently:

Design: https://www.myminifactory.com/object/3d-print-deadpool-bust-remastered-supportless-edition-81435

Designed by David Östman, this Deadpool bust was printed with PLA Economy Black on the Prusa i3 MK3 with standard PLA settings. The design is the second, improved design by Östman.

PLA Economy offers a great value for your money. One spool consists of 2.2kg of filament for a dirt cheap price of a little over € 35 (ex VAT and shipping). It is a different grade than our range of PLA/PHA, but we guarantee the same colorFabb quality. Our filaments are readily available from our webshop. You can use the standard PLA settings if your printer has these pre-defined and these should work fine.

It is the perfect filament to make your fan memorabilia.

You can also opt for the PLA Economy Value Pack: order four spools as a value pack and receive an immediate 10% discount!

Buy PLA Economy       Buy PLA Economy Value Pack

PLA Economy is very well suited for the maker who needs quality at an affordable price. It is a perfect filament for large volume and small series production, made with the guaranteed colorFabb quality that we are known for. It has been one of colorFabb’s most popular filaments ever since launching 3 years ago.

Presents

It’s less than three weeks before Christmas and this is the first of several Christmas themed prints we will post. Today we feature nGen_LUX, our high quality and luxurious looking filament. We printed presents, but let’s be honest: the filament is a present of itself.

Design: https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:2704360

These presents were printed with all nGen_LUX colors we have: Regal Violet, Nature Green, Diamond Black, Star Yellow and Champagne Gold. We used both the Prusa i3 MK2s and Ultimaker 2+. Layer height is 0.2mm and infill 10%. We used at 0.4mm nozzle on both printers and set the print speed at 40mm/s.

nGen_LUX is ideally suited to make presents and give to a loved one. Especially during the holidays when your prints need a little extra something to stand out under the Christmas tree (we printed that one as well, but that’s for a later blog).

 

nGen_LUX is a unique development based on our best selling co-polyester nGen, made with Eastman Amphora AM3300 3d Polymer. The excellent clarity of the base AM3300 makes this material uniquely suited for the extremely rare pigment used in nGen_LUX. It is our new standard in how a 3D printed object can look. It is the filament for the users who wants to bring something extraordinary their work. It is the filament that needs to give that added value.

At colorFabb we are always looking to meet our customer’s needs and offer filaments with added value. The aesthetics of nGen_LUX allow for a new step in production and prototyping, especially for cosmetics, packaging, interior parts, electronics housings and many more applications.

The “Lux” not only stands for luxurious – which is definitely the look of the prints – but also refers to the unit of illumination used worldwide. And light is what makes this filament truly special. The material uses diffuse reflection to scatter light in all directions. For the eye it’s nearly impossible to spot layering, even at 0.2mm layerheight. nGen_LUX allows users to print visually appealing models without the need of post processing. nGen_LUX features all the characteristics of our regular nGen: good chemical stability, elevated temperature resistance (85C) and thus allows users to print creations that are functional, durable, efficient and attractive.

nGen_LUX is the first special filament based on nGen and the second one in our range of co-polyesters after XT-CF20, our carbon fibre enforced filament based on colorFabb_XT.

 

Quick facts

Material: colorFabb nGen_LUX

Diameter Tolerance: ± 0.05 mm

Density: 1.2 g•cm-3

Glass Transition Temperature: 85C

Adviced 3d printing temperature: 220-240C
Adviced 3d print speed: 40-70 mm/s
Advised Heated bed: 75-85C

Click here to go directly to our webshop.

 

SNES Cart Holder

Where new tech meets not so old tech. One of our colleagues to his Prusa MK3 to good use and printed a holder designed by Ken Walton for his beloved Super Nintendo Carts:

Design: https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:2653679

Printed on the Prusa MK3 with standard PLA settings. He used PLA Semi Matte Black for this print.

When developing our PLA Semi Matte Black we’ve been looking for a solution which doesn’t involve fibers to achieve a less glossy surface finish. We did not want to loose the ease of use our PLA and keep print settings and parameters as close to regular PLA setttings. For a full matte finish our XT-CF20 and PA_CF Low Warp do the trick, but they need a hardened steel nozzle to print with. The brand new PLA Semi-Matte Black, released earlier this year, will bring a new aesthetic quality to our range of PLA filaments.

If you’re looking to upgrade your 3D printed projects to the next level, our PLA Semi-Matte will do the trick.

This filament contains no fibers and prints at regular PLA temperatures and settings. The material is as reliable and easy to work with as any other PLA type material.

The difference between regular PLA and PLA Semi Matte Black can be spotted easily:

 

Left: PLA Economy Black / Right: PLA Semi Matte Black

PLA Semi-Matte Black is available now. Click on the image below to go directly to our webshop:

XL spools and samples are available as well.

 

Cloud Gate

After last week’s Willis Tower we are highlighting once again one of Chicago’s landmarks: Cloud Gate, aka “The Bean”. Designed by Anish Kapoor, and turned into a 3D printing model by Ben Sauerwine, today’s featured print was made by Cloud3D using our special filament steelFill. Both printing and post-processing was done by this young 3D print bureau. How? Find out by scrolling down…

Design: https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:684126

The goal was to replicate the original Cloud Gate as good as possible and steelFill came the closest in regards to the materials on offer. Especially after post-processing the shine would resemble the Bean the best.

The print was made on the Prusa i3 MK2 using the following settings:

  • Nozzle diameter: 0.4mm
  • Layerheight: 0.1mm
  • Printspeed: 20mm/s
  • Perimeters: 4
  • Infill: 20%
  • Scaled to 150%

The print came of right away from the support material (also steelFill) and left a nice and smooth surface on the print.

 

Next step: Sanding

Different grids of sandpaper were used in the following order: 80-180-240-600 waterproof-800 waterproof-1200 waterproof. After sanding Cloud3D started polishing with a steel polish. When that was done it was time for the high gloss clear coat.

Last step was polishing the paint.

 

Of course every great print needs a pedestal, even a small one. For this our woodFill was used and to give it a more premium feeling, it was panted with interior wood laque.

With cyano acrylate glue the two parts were glued together.

Make sure to check out Cloud3D’s website to see their work and what they can offer you!

 

About steelFill

steelFill is the latest in our range of special metal filled filaments, being launched in 2016 after bronzeFill and copperFill (both in 2014) and brassFill (in 2015). Our special filaments are PLA/PHA based with actual metal particles in them (we do not disclose exactly how much), giving them a unique look and weight (up to 4 times as heavy as a regular print).

With special filaments like steelFill you can make objects that don’t look like plastic for a change. The trick is to have the right post-processing tools to do so. We have collected a nice collection of blogs and articles regarding post-processing of our special filaments: click here to find them all.

Another handy tutorial is our “How To Print With…” article regarding steelFill:

The high steel content of the steelFill material makes this filament quite abrasive to brass nozzles. Although it wasn’t used with this print, we always recommend using hardened steel nozzles or the Olsson Ruby Nozzle when printing abrasive filaments like steelFill.

steelFill is available in our webshop and ships daily, worldwide and from stock.

 

 

Full disclosure: one of the founders of Cloud3D, Sven Hacken, is also a colorFabb employee.

TCT 2017

Back in Birmingham!! This week we are at the TCT Show again for the fourth consecutive year! If you are at the show or plan to visit, you can find us at stand H39 and we have some exciting new developments to show you!

A cool feature of our stand is that you look directly into our factory where your favorite filaments are made. This backdrop gives you a good look at colorFabb’s new production facility.

Of course there is nGen_LUX. This is our brand new filament we announced last week and will release in November. With nGen_LUX we put years of experience in development, 3D printing, R&D and production into a single 3D printing filament that will bridge the gap to production with unmatched surface quality.

nGen_LUX uniquely features diffuse reflection, which means that the light that shines on the print scatters to many directions and allows for a perfect surface quality that looks like nothing you have ever seen before.

You can now see nGen_LUX today exclusively at the TCT Show before being released later this year. Tomorrow nGen_LUX will also be featured at the Dutch Kunststoffenbeurs in Veldhoven at the stand of our sister company Helian Polymers.

You can read all further information in last week’s blog!

Furthermore we will have four printers continuously running in our stand. We have the Stacker S2 printing with colorFabb’s signature PLA/PHA, making parts for investment casting (more on that soon!) Next to it the Lulzbot TAZ 6 prints with our all-round filament nGen. nGen is a terrific material for every day use and it works flawlessly on the Lulzbot range of printers.

On the other end of the stand you find the brand new Robo R2 and the Prusa i3 mk 2 – both of printing with the aforementioned nGen_LUX.

Both printers have some stellar examples displayed in front of them made with this great new material. Pictures can hardly do justice to the optical quality of nGen_LUX. Seeing is believing!

Aside from the Prusa, all printers in our stand are readily available in our webshop. We ship from stock and with free filaments! Free shipping in the EU to selected countries. Click here to go to our webshop or on the image below:

All printers have been extensively tested by the colorFabb team with our filaments!

During the TCT we offer a 10% discount on all our filaments in our webshop! To get this immediate discount, which lasts all week, use the coupon code TCT2017 when checking out or simply click here!

Overwhelmed with all the choice we have these days? Check out our latest catalogue with all our filaments categorized, the entire color range neatly presented, some beautiful examples of prints plus settings and tips & tricks per filament! You can also find out more about the printers we offer!

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