Hi folks,
just for the first time try to print Polypropylene on SM2. Did before on my old printer with a glass bed and had problems with build plate adhesion (although I got it in the end to some extent, but never perfect), so I was curious how well this would work on the SM2 stock print sticker. Turns out: Not too well directly on the sticker. But reading the Simplify 3D guide on PP, I read that PP sticks well to itself, which is why they recommend to use packaging tape to print on. My print is now at layer 10 or so on packaging tape, and as of now it seems to be the perfect tipp! PP also tends to warp, and my print is no exception, but I can see that the warping lifts the tape from the print bed, and not the print lifts off the tape! Very well…
Still, this is work in progress, all things may still go wrong - will keep you posted, also on how well I get the tape of the print bed, the print off the tape and how bad the print bed looks afterwards…
Fingers crossed!
Cheers
Hauke
@Hauke I’ve specifically avoided printing anything made from PP, I saw that the required bed temp is between 80-100. Can’t really guess for nozzle temp because apparently it has a big variable range of. 205-275. I never thought about how it might adhere but it makes sense that the tape is coming up because of the heat. Maybe there is a PP tape with an adhesive that won’t come up?
Huh…
Hi @Artezio, I did not post my print parameters, sorry! I use 230°C for the nozzle, and 85°C for the print bed. The tape coming up is because the print sticks so well to the tape that by warping it develops enough force to pull up the tape, which is a good sign in the sense that the print sticks better to the tape than the glue of the tape to the bed.
That said, my print was a partial success. At some point the warping got really serious, and in parts the print came off the tape. Fortunately, enough of the print stuck to the tape that the print finished successfully, although heavily warped (which did not matter for the print, I am still happy with the result). As many, I suffer from a not perfectly flat printing bed, and the parts where the print stuck well to the tape were those where the nozzle was closer to the print bed and thereby squashed the PP stronger onto the tape. The parts that came loose were those where the nozzle was a bit further away and the PP was not that heavily squashed down.
The tape was easy to remove from the print sheet, with a slight residue of the tape glue, which I think I successfully removed with alcohol. The next print will show if anything remains on the sheet that has any influence on printing. The print came away from the tape easily.
Looking to future PP prints, I suppose I’d look for packaging tape that I am sure that it is made of PP (I’m not really sure with the one I used) to see if I can get better adhesion from that. Only with better adhesion I could counter the warping efficiently I suppose. Also, I’ll try to print without cooling fan on. The Simplify3D guide says you should have it on, but I’m a bit confused, because I’d think that this increases the likelihood of warping.
I needed the dual extruder head locking blocks from Snapmaker printed in something flexible, so I printed them in PP with the dual extruder itself. As described above with the single extruder, I used packaging tape for adhesion. Was an immediate success, so the DE seems to handle flexible filament well. Settings were 80°C print bed, 230°C nozzle. Forgot that I planned not to use print cooling. A tad of warping visible, even with these ridiculously small pieces.