The special filaments are truly unique 3D printing filaments. Our first special, woodFill, was released in the fall of 2013. Not the first wood filled filament in the world, but one that made people notice colorFabb more. From there we knew that special filaments would be one of the focal points of the years to come. In May 2014 we released our first truly special filament: bronzeFill. As printed, bronzeFill already looks great: a rough and distinctive surface and of course four times heavier than a regular printed object. Now, where the metal filled filaments truly shine (yes, that is a pun and we’re proud of it) is the ability to post-process them and bring out the metal particle aspects of the filament.
For today’s showcase we have chosen Makies Tea Pot by Makies, part of the Makies tea set. Not only is it a great model, it also fits the material from an aesthetical point of view. We used the second metal filled filament, copperFill, for these prints.
Design by Makies: https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:178668
We printed these little tea pots on the Stacker S2. Where we normally focus on big prints, functional prints or a lot of prints (small series production) on the Stacker printers, the special filaments also work very well on the industrial grade line of printers.
We used two ways of post-processing. One tea pot was manually polished. We did this the same way we did the gCreate Rocket Ship a long time ago (read the original post here). Manual polishing takes a long time, but it gives such a beautiful result it is well worth that time. Most people do not even believe such a print is even a print and reckon it was store bought!
Another way we post-processed (and give it the old patina look) was by using salt and vinegar. To achieve accelerated aging, add salt to the vinegar until the salt does not dissolve anymore and the vinegar is saturated. The Lulzbot team already did an extensive blog about this, which you can read here.
copperFill was launched in the fall of 2014 and it was our second metal filled filament, after bronzeFill. The red shine that comes from the copper after post-processing has made it a fan favorite ever since. As with our other metal filled filaments, the aesthetics and weight are the key factors for choosing this filament and these characteristics make it a perfect filament for fidget spinners, for instance.
There are several five star reviews for copperFill on our website:
Learn more on how to print with copperFill with our handy tutorial. You can learn more about post-processing our metal filled filaments by visiting our blog or FAQ page on this topic. We will post more blogs with tips & tricks in the time to come about post-processing our special filaments.
These prints were made on the brand new Stacker S2.
For Stacker the term “industrial grade” is not a hollow marketing term. It means their printers are designed for extra long service life, extremely low maintenance and that the printer will maintain its positional accuracy throughout its life cycle. This printer has been designed to be used in a professional environment, be it for large prototypes or small series production.
As many of you know, we are the distributor of Stacker 3D printers in Europe. We have been working with Stacker ever since their first prototype and now have several in our print lab. In the past 4 years we have seen 3D printing emerging from a hobby market to more professional uses. A lot of our users are using 3D printing to make a living or at least support their business in one way or another (as detailed here)
Both the Stacker S2 and Stacker S4 ship from stock right now!
What makes this printer so different from the rest? First of all, it is based on the technology that has made the Stacker S4 such a success.
You can also expect the following:
- Copy mode for printing two objects at once for 2X print speeds
- Dual print heads can be offset to prevent the idle head from dripping on the print when not in use to achieve super clean dual material prints
- Large build volume: 395mm (X) axis, 325mm (Y) axis, 525mm (Z) Axis
- Built-in mobile base, essential for EDU and work groups
- Superior print quality
- STACKER designed and manufactured hot ends and filament drives produce a superior finish, and work with all filaments, including flexible and metal filled
- Uses 1.75mm filament for high-speed printing.
- Quick change nozzles in a range of sizes from .4mm to 1mm
- Comes with a license of Simplify3D slicing software
- Includes a sheet of BuildTak print bed surface but will accept glass
You can find more information on the dedicated Stacker page or contact us directly to get a quote at sales@colorfabb.com