Filament Selection

A very good question, Tom. ABS is the plastic used to create LEGO bricks, so its properties are well known in use by younger kids and in rugged durability environments. It also requires a higher extrusion temperature than PLA, but PLA is easier to use - it sticks to more materials, and somewhat less costly to manufacture since it can be produced using plant sugars (a "green" source, although the energy expenditure to fabricate filament elinates true claims of it as a "green" (sustainable) product overall. PLA also produces very crisp models but is more fragile than ABS (which makes better springs, as an example). Nylon is coming up as a popular choice, as it bonds very well to itself on successive layers, and can be dyed as desired using common clothing dyes (the RIT brand works very well).

Other materials require higher temperatures and build plate materials like Delrin, PTFE, etc. I will not be going into those for this brief course of 5 classes, as many printers cannot go much over 250C for their extruders. Some all-metal extruders can go over 400C and allow a wider range of materials - particularly recovered materials like oceanic floating waste granules, etc. I recently upgraded from the J-Head to a nice E3D all-metal hotend, and after updating the max temperature setting in the Firmware, it has been a dream. For a filament comparison, you might want to look at my co-author's post on 3DPrintingIndustry.com (http://3dprintingindustry.com/2014/07/31/focus-colorfabb-overview-3d-printing-materials/). Richard has more experience with filament varieties than almost anyone I know beyond perhaps Bowyer and Prusa. Hope the information helps!

Kirk

A very good question, Tom. ABS is the plastic used to create LEGO bricks, so its properties are well known in use by younger kids and in rugged durability environments. It also requires a higher extrusion temperature than PLA, but PLA is easier to use - it sticks to more materials, and somewhat less costly to manufacture since it can be produced using plant sugars (a "green" source, although the energy expenditure to fabricate filament elinates true claims of it as a "green" (sustainable) product overall. PLA also produces very crisp models but is more fragile than ABS (which makes better springs, as an example). Nylon is coming up as a popular choice, as it bonds very well to itself on successive layers, and can be dyed as desired using common clothing dyes (the RIT brand works very well).

Other materials require higher temperatures and build plate materials like Delrin, PTFE, etc. I will not be going into those for this brief course of 5 classes, as many printers cannot go much over 250C for their extruders. Some all-metal extruders can go over 400C and allow a wider range of materials - particularly recovered materials like oceanic floating waste granules, etc. I recently upgraded from the J-Head to a nice E3D all-metal hotend, and after updating the max temperature setting in the Firmware, it has been a dream. For a filament comparison, you might want to look at my co-author's post on 3DPrintingIndustry.com (http://3dprintingindustry.com/2014/07/31/focus-colorfabb-overview-3d-printing-materials/). Richard has more experience with filament varieties than almost anyone I know beyond perhaps Bowyer and Prusa. Hope the information helps!

Kirk