The New 3D Printing Thread

Data, no worries, there is always method in my madness

Just added an Elegoo Mars resin printer to my stable of hardware, here's a couple of the first prints off the printer;

[Super]

Oh My...those look so smooth Nigels and very detailed. Is the resin always transparent or is a solid color also available? Is that a AA or AAA battery? How long did that print take compared to a Filament printer? All in all, a great first attempt at you new toy.

I deliberately picked a transparent Green resin for my testing (the printer doesn't come with any due to its low price), but I've just got another bottle of a solid colour called 'aqua blue', this is a very light blue, almost like an eggshell colour if you've ever painted a model plane

These took about 3 hours (two at a time), one feature of SLA printers is you print an entire layer simultaneously, so you can print many models at once, subject to having enough space on the build platform.

The battery there for size comparisons is an AA battery. The reason for the smoothness and detail is you are printing at 0.05mm layer height!! But the other good thing is as this is not fused layers the models are considerably stronger in all axis'

The level of detail is highlighted by for example the antenna on the Archers (the top two pictures) that is literally not much thicker than a human hair lol! The other two - Black Knight on the left, Puma on the right have different types of detail

BTW - The bases they are on were printed on my normal Ender 3 FDM printer, that sort of thing is suited to FDM and saves resin

[Super]

Easy to see the difference in the bases as you can plainly see the layers of filament in the 3D printed one. Look forward to following your fun with the new toy.

Those layer lines are not as obvious to the human eye, they only appear so clearly due to the close up nature of the shot

you can use those transparent filament to make jewelry lol

Good point Leyland you could

Super,

Here's a couple more shots, the first (still using the green resin) was a sample print provided with the printer and is basically a 'torture test' to show you what it can do.  The second is the Eiffel Tower using the 'Aqua Blue' resin, unfortunately I had a failure with this print, basically the orientation of the model is critical to reduce the chances of print failures - something I'm still learning and I sliced this one wrong as I just put it on the build plate standing upright, this caused the three of the feet of the tower to stick to the bottom of the vat until just before the first main cross-beams at which point the stuck to those points (I peeled them off).  However it still illustrates just how good the detail can be and how the opaque resins turn out.  I will be re-orientating/slicing this model and trying again - I'll let you know how it comes out

[Super]

Are there less artifacts with the resin and do you have to use some type of cleaner after the print is done? Are you able to tell how much product is used to make something like these compared to filament?

The clear looks very good and opens up for the possibility for thinks like printing the center portion of the Tower separate in a different color or opaqueness and possibly being slipped into the outer tower from the bottom

Hi Super,

If you mean by artifacts erroneous patterns or errors on the model, to date I've seen none.

You do have supports still, but they're removed easily and generally leave no marks.

In terms of material, the slicer software gives you an estimate in both ml and gm. To give you an idea an average pair of battlemechs come in between 10ml and 15ml.

This isn't much when you buy the resin in 1 litre bottles (1,000ml).

Even the bigger models such as the Eiffel Tower model only came in at around 30-40ml, can't remember the exact figure. So you can see that you'll get a lot of models out of a bottle. Cost wise per model the filament model if you could print it at the same resolution would be cheaper, but in reality it's nor tealistic to do that, you'd need to scale up and then use more material.

You do have to clean them, until recently the recommended was to use iso propol alcohol, but recently people have been trying other fluids, I'm going with one of the alternatives which is one of these household cleaner products which is good for decreasing surfaces etc... The one I'm using at the moment is a dettol product (UK brand), but I've seen various USA brands of similar products in reviews. I'm now using that neat in an ultrasonic cleaner, you could just use a pot, but I find the cleaner to be far more efficient. After that fluid has done it's job you just rinse the model in tap water and dry in the sun or under a UV light source to cure it.

Yes you could potentially add an insert depending on the model, but it's something you'd need to design.