Filament Reviews

Joker 53150

Mmmmmmm, balsa.
Mentor
So that it may help others with their filament purchases in the future I'm making this thread to catalog reviews of various brands.

To start with, I'm using the Anet A8:

3D Solutech BLACK PLA filament purchased through Amazon. I paid $21.99 for a 1K roll and have used maybe 1/4 of the roll so far. My first prints had a brim around the part which started to lift and the parts were alarmingly easy to remove from the bed. I was running 200* nozzle temp and 50* bed temp, printed on blue painter tape. The recommendation was that I increase the bed temp to 60* and use some Elmer's glue stick (the purple stuff that dries clear). This did the trick, and the parts now stick very well - almost too well? Either way, I'm not worried about them popping off during an unattended print. I've printed at .1, .15, and .2 layer thicknesses, all with complete success. Basically, I really like this stuff and would buy it again.


Coming up as I try them I'll add my opinions on other filaments I've got from AIO Robotics, CoLiDo, Hatchbox, Hobby King, Inland, and Zero 3d Filament.

IMG_4344.JPG
 
Last edited:

jhitesma

Some guy in the desert
Mentor
I've used:

PLA

FolgerTech Hunter Orange PLA - Gives beautiful prints but does not like to stick. Tried painters tape, hairspray and elmers glue stick. Sometimes sticks with hairspray or Elmers but only on prints with enough surface area against the bed. Super cheap at $13 a kg (before shipping). I ordered it with my printer since it didn't add much to the shipping that way but don't think I'll buy more.

Hatchbox Purple PLA - Nice and cheap off Amazon for $23 delivered when I got it. Printed great, adhered to glass great with a bit of hairspray or elmers gluestick. Color was more pink than purple. Only complaint is price has gone up (but come back down) and availability of most colors is spotty.

"Hatchbox" Black - Ordered off Amazon (Sold by "Firesale merchant" fulfilled by Amazon), was actually sent eSun - decided to try it anyway. Hands down the worst filament I'ver had any experience with. Absolute trash. Later found the date code and it was a year old, but inner bag was still holding vacuum. Would not stick to anything, seemed fine but after every print it would get brittle for a few inches above the extruder and snap off. Then seemed flexible again. But every print done with it fell apart after a few weeks. Layers stayed adhered but they would develop cracks across the layers - even prints that were just sitting not under any stress. Wish I had sent it back when it wasn't the Hatchbox I had ordered.

Atomic Filament - Cinnamon Red - color is more of a reddish brown than a red...but was just what I was looking for because I'm using it to print a Hovalin for my wife. Prints great, adheres great, made in the USA by someone who has been involved with reprap for a long time. Not the cheapest but very high quality. If you go to the reprap IRC channel and ask about atomic the bot will give you a discount code that makes the price not much more than Hatchbox when you buy 2 or more rolls.

Maker Geeks - Various colors - Yellow, two different whites, two greens, translucent red, urban fossic, and a few others. Prints hotter than other PLA's some colors as high as 235c! Had issues with it acting like it was clogging in my nozzle with my all metal e3c v6 hot end. Was able to solve them by adding a bit of paper towel with a few drops of vegetable oil held around it with a clothespin before it goes into the extruder. Since adding that haven't had any issues. Adheres great with hairspray or elmers...supposedly adheres great even on plain glass at 60 but haven't tried since I usually have hairspray or elmers on my glass anyway and but can't be bothered to clean it off and like the extra adhesion. Made in the USA and dirt cheap if you don't care about color and get their grab bag. Usually $15 a kg but you have to buy 2-4 spools to get the cheap price. I've been doing their maker box which is a $30 a month subscription and you get 2 mystery rolls and a tool every month - has been a great value so far. Dec box had 3 spools (they weren't full kg's but still more than 2kg's between the three) And Nov included a bonus small spool of their maker flex. I've heard not so great things about regular orders from them - they don't always have the stock they claim and it can take forever for them to fulfil. But their grab bags and maker box's are a great deal IMHO. Update - 12/28/18 - STAY AWAY, I've had more and more issues both with their filament and their business practices. There's a reason they have an F rating from the BBB.


ABS

FolgerTech Pink ABS - Worst ABS I've tried. Super stinky, warps like crazy, doesn't adhere to much of anything including itself resulting in weak layer bonds...it's cheap but that's all it has going for it. I still have most of a roll. Every few months I try printing with it again to see if my additional experience helps...still prints lousy.

Hatchbox green ABS - Little stinky, but it's ABS. Least warping and best adhesion of just about any ABS I've tried. Great color, prints super easy and smooths great with acetone fumes. Other than being ABS no complaints.

Maker Geeks ABS - some camo green color. Came in the first maker box. Lowest odor of any ABS I've tried. Still ABS. Stuck ok with hairspray but had to make some abs juice for trickier prints. Some warping but again it's ABS and I'm just not a big fan of ABS in general.

PETG

Atomic Filament - Royal Blue and Gunmetal Grey. The Royal blue was translucent while the grey was solid. Both printed great and adhered to hairspray (my favorite bed prep) wonderfully. Somewhat pricey but made in the USA by a great reprap supporter and the coupon code I mentioned earlier makes it more affordable. The Royal blue was a "B Quality" spool but still printed better than most other filaments I've tried. Great stuff.

Maker Geeks - Turquoise, Bomber Jacket Brown (looks like black but very slightly translucent with a reddish tinge), and Glow in the dark. All printed great with none of the minor issues I've experienced with their PLA. Most of my MPCNC is printed in the Turquoise and my UMBQ Quad was printed in their bomber jacket brown. PLA does take some extra work to get printing well at first but is well worth the effort IMHO.


Nylon

Taulman 910 - Nice stuff but so expensive I've only done a few simple test prints in it and am scared to use it for real. Super strong. Like, almost hurt myself trying to pull apart a single wall test print. But not very stiff - it can flex and bend quite a bit which gives it a lot of it's toughness. Needs an all metal hot end due to the high temp requirements. Wonderful stuff if you can afford it and the lack of stiffness isn't an issue.

String Trimmer line - $7 off amazon. 1.6mm string trimmer line. Prints translucent blue but available in other colors. Prints horribly out of the bag due to moisture absorption. I put it in a ziploc with some desiccant and set it out in the sun for a few days. After that it prints almost as well as the Taulman but not quite as strong and still has a few issues that appear to be due to residual moisture. Need to try drying it in the oven at low temp to really dry it still. Worth experimenting if you're on a budget and have an all metal hot end and want to print Nylon but can't afford Taulman Nylon.

Flexible

Hatchbox TPU - Fun stuff! Really strong, but flexible. Almost as hard to break as the Nylon because it stretches so much before breaking. But still surprisingly stiff when printed densely. Strings a lot when printing and retraction is tough to use with flexible filaments. Needs an extruder that keeps the filament constrained between the drive gear and the nozzle. Can't use supports unless they're in another material because it sticks to itself so well you'll never get them off. Great deal for the price. Wish I had tried it sooner.

Maker Geeks TPEE - Have a sample roll but haven't tried it yet so no comment. Need to load it up and give it a go but since I only have the smallish sample roll keeping it sealed until I need to print something flexible again.

Think there are a few others I've tried as well but can't think of them off the top of my head right now :D

Overall I love PETG as my favorite filament. It's tougher than PLA but easier to print than ABS making it a great all around. PLA is still nice because of it's stiffness and ease of printing...but it's also brittle which can be an issue. TPU is great but the flexibility limits what it can be used for. Nylon is even nicer than PETG...but the price means I'm saving it for something really special. ABS...nice if you have a heated or at least enclosed print chamber and are doing artistic stuff where dimensions aren't as important as being able to smooth it with an acetone bath.

I've mostly got the Maker Geeks filament because of their killer deals. The PLA has given me some issues but I've worked that out with my oiler setup. I did have one roll of PLA that was horrible tangled on the spool...but it was the exception and I've used quite a few other spools of their PLA without seeing that issue again.
 
Last edited:

Joker 53150

Mmmmmmm, balsa.
Mentor
Dang Jason, when do you have time to sleep?!

Here's another one I've tried a bit yesterday:

Hatchbox PPLA BLUE filament I also got through Amazon. I tried the same settings as the 3D Solutech Black, 200* extruder and 60* bed temp and it appears to work well at those settings. Still using the blue painter tape with some Elmer's glue stick and I found the pieces stick very well. I've done a few different layer thicknesses from 1.0 to 2.0 and the only problem I had was from my bed not being leveled properly.

On a related note, as I try new colors/brands I'm printing a pair of color chips with each before I use it on an actual project. This will hopefully tell me if my preliminary settings are good. The chips will also be a good reference in the future when I want to see how multiple colors will look together.

IMG_4344.JPG
 
Last edited:

Snarls

Gravity Tester
Mentor
Well its been over a year and I'm only just nearing the end of my first kg of filament (I know how is that possible). I don't get to print very often obviously. The white Hatchbox PLA I have is still going strong. Blue tape with glue stick on an unheated bed and the prints need to be pried off with a putty knife. Print quality is very nice and the price is not bad either. I've had issues with printing on a plain heated glass bed, but can not say I have tweaked the settings enough to blame it on the filament. When I can't print I store the spool in its box inside a plastic bag with a silica gel pack to absorb the moisture, and by doing that the print quality has not changed since day one.
 

LitterBug

Techno Nut
Moderator
Filaments usable with XYZ Printing Da Vinci 1.0A

I've been playing with some different filament over the last month. My XYZprinting Da Vinci 1.0A printer uses proprietary cartridges with chips, much like some inkjet printers which is "supposed" to keep you from using other filament. Of the "stock" XYZ printing cartridges, the "nature" PLA is the best. It will print anything I throw at it with good adhesion both to itself and the bed. Good strength as well. The Blue ABS that came with the printer does OK, but has poor adhesion to itself. Fluorescent Green and Black will print most jobs if I tweak the speed and extrusion settings in Simplify3D. I have found that the pricey XYZ proprietary cartridges in other colors are sketchy at best when using "stock" software. Can't complete any of their built in demo prints or most detailed prints with their software. The clear red is completely unusable and is PINK. The max temperature settings are locked down in the firmware which prevents using higher temperatures that many times are needed to improve flow.

There are ways to "reset" the chips in the cartridges, and after using up my first clear PLA cartridge, I am using the chip from that one to use other filaments. So far I have tried two other spools.
1) inland PLA clear. I have had limited success with this filament. For simple constant flow prints, it does OK. It is almost as unusable as the XYZ clear red filament on complex prints with a lot of fine start/stop of the extruder.
2) HatchBox PLA Yellow. This stuff ROCKS on my printer. Prints just as good if not better than the XYZ Nature PLA and is the only other PLA filament that will complete the built in printer test prints without any gaps.

Have a few other spools to play with, but haven't tried them yet. Going to try changing the media type in my "reset" chip from PLA to ABS. This will allow me to use higher temperatures to see if the filaments that are failing miserably are due to using too little heat. The extruder tends to "click" and stop feeding on the filaments that have higher melting points. Eventually will flash Repetier firmware on this printer to fully unlock the temperature settings and skip the whole chip reset procedure.

Cheers!
LitterBug
 

Joker 53150

Mmmmmmm, balsa.
Mentor
AIO Robotics, PLA Orange. My first prints were very stringy, then I noticed my retraction settings were way off. A little tweaking and this stuff is printing very nicely!

Current settings are 205* at the extruder, 55* at the bed. With my Anet A8 the retraction settings which I like (so far) are 1mm retraction at 50mm/s speed.

Right now the printer is re-printing the same file I first used the Orange with, some magnetic brackets for my building board. So far I see zero stringers between the 10 pieces being printed. The first try they were all over the place. This stuff is certainly on my "buy again" list.
 

Joker 53150

Mmmmmmm, balsa.
Mentor
Tried another filament last night and for an overnight print, the Inland PLA in RED. This one showed up by mistake, as I ordered on Amazon and then got notice that the order was cancelled because the part was out of stock. So I ordered red from a different supplier, only to have this order actually be fulfilled. Oh well, red is likely to get used quite a bit so having two rolls isn't a big issue.

The factory recommendations on the Inland red are to print between 205-225*, similar to the Orange PLA I got from AIO Robotics which calls for 195-230*. For a starting point I left my settings as they were for orange (including a bed temp of 55*) and the prints turned out great. My daughter wanted a Harry Potter bookmark so I showed her how the printer works by printing one. Print quality was very good and it sticks well to the painters tape without any extra glue or hairspray, so I was fairly confident in letting it do an overnight print. 8 hours later it finished up with no issues at all. I did notice a little bit of stringing on the red and the orange, but only at areas which are support structures. The actual printed items have no stringing.

IMG_4342.JPG
 

Joker 53150

Mmmmmmm, balsa.
Mentor
I didn't know FT was selling printers and filament! Their price is good for the .5 KG rolls, comparable to other discounted sites. If it works well it'll certainly be worth the cost and it'll obviously help help support FT.
 

Joker 53150

Mmmmmmm, balsa.
Mentor
Two more filaments, and I'm noticing a trend. So far I haven't found any "bad" filament, and am getting decent prints from the various brands & colors. Most of my problems are just from dialing it in or from printing with bad settings, which is my fault.

I wanted to try some "cheap" filament and picked up a roll of Green Grass PLA from Hobby King. It was about $13 for a full 1 KG roll. It's green, but not quite what I'd consider "green grass" - more of a translucent green, but I purchased it based on the color shown on the website and not the name. It's pretty accurate in that regard, so no complaints. My daughter wanted a Harry Potter bookmark found on Thingiverse, so I printed this one up for her. It's designed to fit over the corner of the pages and works very well, with no stringing or blockage inside to cause a problem. Printing was done at 205* printhead and 55* bed, with 1mm retraction @ 50mm/s, and .1mm layers. This set of temps has become very common with my printer on PLA.

IMG_4345.JPG


Next up was a cylinder head for the 3D Printed Stearman I'm slowly getting started on. This was done also using Hobby King filament, but one of their "metal" filaments. I don't think there is any actual metal in the filament, but for the price I don't expect it. Color is "Aluminum", and it does in fact look like a metal casting. My first test-prints didn't stick well, until I bumped the bed temp up to 60*. The rest of the settings for retraction are unchanged. There was stringing around the support structure and some very light stuff between pieces when I printed multiple heads, but it was easily cleaned up. Hobby King recommends a print temp between 190-200*, but 205* seems to work very well, which may be why I'm getting some of the stringing. But notice the cooling fins, which needed almost no clean-up. That's a fine detail and it did a very nice job! I'm going to try some of their other "metal" colors in the future.

IMG_4349.JPG
 

jhitesma

Some guy in the desert
Mentor
As part of this months MakerBox from Maker Geeks I got a roll of their "Raptor PLA" in battleship grey. I've been curious about this filament for awhile, but given my initial shakey results with makergeeks regular PLA I was hesitant to spend the premium price to give this stuff a go.

It's FDA approved for food contact and they claim it's dishwasher safe. They also claim it's stronger than some nylon's (tensile strength of over 6,000psi IZOD impact strength (notched) @ 40 Newtons) and can be annealed after printing for extra strength and temperature stability (up to 250f!). But that it prints like normal PLA - just at slightly higher temps (245c - really pushing it for PTFE lined hot ends.) Supposedly this is a resin that they have exclusivity on.

Those are some pretty bold claims. And a premium price of $38 per KG (if you buy 12+ rolls it goes down to $33 - you can also get it in their grab bag but it's $15 per spool extra putting the price at about $30 per KG if you buy it that way) made me wary of actually trying it.

But now I've got a full spool to play with and am looking forward to it.

First test print of a simple 20cm single wall cube came out basically perfect. Walls were right at 0.48mm with my default settings so no extrusion multiplier needed. Then I tried to tear it apart. WOW. This stuff is TOUGH. I had to work at that little test print for almost 10 minutes before I managed to get a layer to separate and I was completely unable to tear it across layers even at the seam - with PLA I can almost always pull the seam apart. This really is in nylon territory for strength! In fact for layer bonding I'd say it's even better than nylon.

Next I tried the canopy for this plane I'm printing which as been vexing me. I printed it on edge this time and it came out great - supports came right off with no real fuss!

The one thing I've noticed is that it's not quite as stiff/brittle as normal PLA. I'd say it's still stiffer than ABS or PETG but it's definitely not as hard as normal PLA - which is probably why it's so tough. It will bend and stretch a lot more before it breaks - very much like Nylon or PETG rather than PLA.

I'm seriously thinking about using this to reprint the new center section for my MPCNC. I'm going to do some tests on annealing parts first to see how that goes and how well they can keep their dimensions - then I'll make a decision. But so far...I'm VERY impressed by this stuff.
 

jhitesma

Some guy in the desert
Mentor
So what's the deal with the monthly box you get?

It's a monthly subscription for $30: http://www.makergeeks.com/makergeekbox.html

Includes 2kg of filament, a 3D printing tool, a sticker, and a coupon for at least 10% off anything else from MG that month. They also include a little sheet with details about that months filament, and info about a project to print from thingiverse that fits the theme of that months box.

Let's see if I can remember what they all were so far off the top of my head:
Nov:
1kg Urban Fossil (think greenish ammo khaki) PLA
1kg Army Green ABS
Sample spool - MakerFlex (I haven't tried this yet, it's not a lot so I'm saving it for a good cause.)
ABS Smoothing pen (basically a refillable marker you fill with acetone and then use to brush onto ABS prints to smooth them - neat idea, but not overly useful.)
Keyring ring to go with the months printing project which was a little army guy I don't have the link for handy.

Dec:
Crystal series red PLA (about 750g)
Crystal series green PLA (about 750g)
Clear PETG (about 750g)
Print removal spatula (Useless IMHO)
Project was Gear Ornaments: http://www.thingiverse.com/thing:1864787

Jan:
1kg Black PLA
1kg Milky White PLA
Nozzle cleaning kit (nozzle floss, small cleaning pin, nylon cold pull sample)
Project was a polar bear that works like a super simple rubix cube: http://www.thingiverse.com/thing:697635

Feb:
1kg Battleship Grey Raptor PLA
1kg Nuclear Green PLA
Some skate bearings
Project is a fidget spinner that uses the skate bearings.
(the stickers looked a bit different this time but I haven't taken a close look at them yet.)

Overall I'd say it's been worth it. I haven't been huge on some of the filament choices...the colors in the first box were not my cup of tea at all:

20161203_214126.jpg
(I really need to order some screws so I can assemble that...)

But...the bonus spool of flex was nice. The smoothing pen...meh. I don't use abs much and the pen didn't work all that great, a paint can with acetone soaked paper towels in it over the print works much better. December the spools weren't full spools, but there were 3 of them and the weights seem to indicate that there was more than 2kg overall in the box. The print removal tool was too blunt to be useful for me. January the nozzle cleaning kit was quite nice and something I've been wanting for awhile. The black and white PLA are also working great for me so far. This month the Raptor is very impressive on it's first print and the green looks like their standard PLA just in a bright bright green color I'm not sure what I'll do with - should be nice for some high viz RC bits. I haven't had time to try and make the spinner yet.

If you don't mind not knowing what colors or materials you're going to get it's a pretty good deal so far. I'm probably going to keep it going through May then shut it off since I don't like having PLA shipped in the summer out of fear that it will arrive half melted :D Then around Oct/Nov I'll turn it back on if they're still doing it - if I'm ready for more filament!


I've also ordered samples from a couple of places that do samples. But I found I don't care for samples because they don't often include enough filament to actually dial in settings and print a reasonable test piece. So now I just order full rolls for things I want to try.
 

Joker 53150

Mmmmmmm, balsa.
Mentor
Very interesting. I'm fairly tempted, but the lack of color choice is my biggest hurdle. I'll have to kick the idea around a bit.
 

TedroT

New member
Rookie filament question

So that it may help others with their filament purchases in the future I'm making this thread to catalog reviews of various brands.

To start with, I'm using the Anet A8:

3D Solutech BLACK PLA filament purchased through Amazon. I paid $21.99 for a 1K roll and have used maybe 1/4 of the roll so far. My first prints had a brim around the part which started to lift and the parts were alarmingly easy to remove from the bed. I was running 200* nozzle temp and 50* bed temp, printed on blue painter tape. The recommendation was that I increase the bed temp to 60* and use some Elmer's glue stick (the purple stuff that dries clear). This did the trick, and the parts now stick very well - almost too well? Either way, I'm not worried about them popping off during an unattended print. I've printed at .1, .15, and .2 layer thicknesses, all with complete success. Basically, I really like this stuff and would buy it again.


Coming up as I try them I'll add my opinions on other filaments I've got from AIO Robotics, CoLiDo, Hatchbox, Hobby King, Inland, and Zero 3d Filament.

View attachment 82495

Okay. The more I read, the more questions I have. I've ordered the Original Prusa i3, Mk2 and look forward to joining the party. I've been scratch building (mostly) the Flite Test planes and now that there are lots of parts to be printed, to say nothing of entire airframes, it seems like a great time to jump in. All of that said, what filament do you recommend? Any particular brand? I'm leaning toward PETG based on the number of positive remarks I've read but perhaps it's easier to simply use PLA, at least at the outset. ? I'm not thrilled with the idea of ABS, given the nasty odor problem. (The wife is particularly sensitive in that regard and we don't want to upset her, right?) Any wisdom you can share will be most appreciated. No huge rush. The printer probably won't show up until mid- to late-April.
 

Verris

Active member
I've got the MK2 as well and while I've bought a roll of PETG because I've heard all the wonderful things, I've still just been printing everything out of PLA because I've got lots and it hasn't run into anything it can't handle yet. I haven't printed ABS for a couple years after discovering PLA. Though I did use ABS to print some vial holders that were going into a heated oil bath for chemistry. The PLA kept melting. Just be careful if you do go with PETG with the MK2, apparently it sticks TOO well to the ultem sheet and you can end up chipping it trying to get it off. Putting down glue stick first apparently helps as the glue breaks off first.
 

TedroT

New member
Thanks, Verris. I'll probably just use PLA at the outset based on the relative ease of printing with it, according to most accounts I've read. However, PETG has also been praised by many so I expect I'll have to try it one day soon. I'll keep your suggestion in mind about the adhesion to the print bed. It would be a bummer to damage it that way. I appreciate the heads up. ☺
BTW, I ran across a site, all3dp.com, where they have a listing of 30 different filaments for 3D printing, along with a brief description of each and their characteristics/strengths and weaknesses. I never realized there were so many options out there. Go to their site and click on "basics" then scroll down to the topic. Lots of other stuff to see there as well. Whoever wrote it is obviously not an English language professor but it is interesting reading nonetheless.
 
Great Information! I'm printing using the Anet A8 and I'm using Smart Buy 1.75mm Pla filament and it is Fantastic with 190 nozzle and 60 bed temp and 6.5mm retraction. I get great bridging and great sticking to the bed. I cover the bed in regular masking tape and it prints wonders
 

mjmccarron

Member
Ok, so after two weeks of playing with my printer (Anet A8) I will share some of my experiences so far.

Filament:
I have filament from only 3 sources.
FT: PLA in blue, fluorescent red and black
The FT filament is consistent and so far I haven't had any trouble with it. All three colors print well at 205C with the bed temp around 55 - 60. The FT PLA is glossier when finished than the other PLA I have.

Bargain PLA from eBay (white). This was purchased before the printer arrived and was very cheap. It is Filamex PLA. I almost wrote this one off as I couldn't get it to stick to the bed for love or money. When it did stick, the first layer was awful resulting in less than acceptable prints. I finally got it to print after some experience and it turns out that turning part cooling off and slowing the print speed on the first layer is the trick. Also, fiddling with retraction solved the stringiness. It is much duller in appearance than the FT PLA but the parts are acceptable.

ABS: I have two different brands of ABS. Gearbest TRONXY blue and FoxSmart (another eBay purchase) in white.
The TRONXY is very consistent and so far, I like it the best of anything I've tried. It was a learning curve to get it to stick but with a little patience (I have very little most of the time) I got it to work. Hotend 255C bed 90C first layer .015mm at 10mm/sec and it prints on blue masking tape with nothing else. I turn the bed down to 70C after 50% of the run time is done and leave part cooling off. The FoxSmart uses the same settings but I have noticed contaminants in it every once in a while. You can see a blotchy appearance if you hold it up to a light and at least once per print it spits a weird spot often brown or relish. I'm not convinced that it's not just moisture from the humid climate here in the northwest but the other filaments don't do this.

Ok, so there's the filament review but I have found that the environment is effecting print quality more that individual brands. I'm cheap, so my house is kept at 65 - 68F. (electric heat is spendy) The other day I ran some parts (Upgrades for my A8, I will share more on these in another thread if anyone is interested) in ABS. First set was near perfect. I started the second set after the heat was turned off and the ambient temp was 63F. It took 4 attempts to get it to stick to the bed and was stringy and BAD! Same settings, Bed leveled between attempts etc. Then I found it. The bed was changing shape at 90C. It wasn't even close to level at temp. (I was leveling it after it cooled) I also had to increase the hot end temp by about 5 degrees. I'm not sure if it was the change in ambient or bed warping that was causing my grief but i hadn't noticed the warping when the ambient temperature was higher. In any event, my next upgrade is auto leveling and I will always level at operating temperature.

My point is: Variations in material quality are real but, they can be accommodated through machine settings (for the most part) It appears that the quality variance could be difference in material formulation requiring adjustment to the machine settings in order to accommodate the material. My question is: Has anyone else experienced variations caused by ambient temperature and humidity? Any other factors I'm missing?

This has been a lot of fun so far and I love learning new things.

Mike
 

LitterBug

Techno Nut
Moderator
Been having good luck with Hatchbox PLA on my XYZ Da Vinci 1.0A. So far I've used Yellow, Gray, and Black. Just finished off the Gray spool. Yellow and black need Less temperature (185) and extrusion multiplier (1.03) than the gray to prevent blobbing and stringing. Gray needs a bit extra Multiplier (1.06-1.1) and 195 temp. Running 55-60 for heated bed with good adhesion.

Cheers!
LitterBug