What is the best filament for high temp applications?

[bvandiepenbos]

I have a customer that wants a printed bracket part that will be in a continuous steamy environment at 100c up to 150c at times.

Any suggestions on what is the best filament for this application?

I am thinking ABS would be fine, but I don't really know for sure.
What temperature does ABS start to soften?

Nylon would be bad since it absorbs moisture and gets limp, correct?

[Nylocke]

ABS glass temp is too low, I think it's around 85. PC and Tritan are at the 110 mark. Generic Default might be able to chime in, I think he's talking about PEI printing?

[0110-m-p]

PEEK would be best...glass transition temperature of about 150C, but still strong to about 240C. Looks like someone has been looking into it at least.

http://www.arevolabs.com/

[teoman]

İnvestment casting?

[Jimustanguitar]

What are the thermal properties of resin prints like?

[Cedric_K]

I have a customer that wants a printed bracket part that will be in a continuous steamy environment at 100c up to 150c at times.

Any suggestions on what is the best filament for this application?

I am thinking ABS would be fine, but I don't really know for sure.
What temperature does ABS start to soften?

Nylon would be bad since it absorbs moisture and gets limp, correct?

The bad news is you're wrong about ABS : it starts soften around 105-115°C (but it's very difficult to say because quality of the material plays a lot), and soften more and more with temp elevation. This is very progressive, this is behaviour for a amorphous material (abs come from the styrene family , which are the most amorphous plastics)

The good news is you're wrong with nylon, too.

Far away from pla, abs or other hips. Nylon (PA6-6, polyamide), is opposite to amorphous, it's a semi-crystalline material, the difference is that it's doesnt soften proportionnal to temp, it as no glass temp, but a melt temp. It always keeps hard, and when it reach the melt point, its becomes liquid immediately. There is always a bit degrees difference between solidstate and meltedstate, and very very small soft range. Melting is very brutal with these material, which is a good point for heat resistant purposes. (sorry, i don't speak english good enough to use the right words, i try to do with my ones).

Know that the melt temp for nylon is higher than 200°C, which matches to your customer's needs . Don't worry about moisture, it's only an issue while injecting, printing, or extruding nylon... Once the part is done, it takes bake moisture naturally a few hours after, around 0,02% and its changes nothing to its quality. Actually, this is the opposite, the best impact strengh (mecanical resistance) for nylon is when fully moistured. In plastics, injection molding (this is my work), sometimes, we put fresh made nylon parts into boiling water to get a faster moisture recovery, before sending them to customers. So, we are sure that parts are as strong as they should be.

Furthermore, you can still increase the heat resistance of nylon by including 20 or 30% of glassfiber inside... This is exactly the reason, when you look into your automotive engine, most of plastic parts are nylon-glassfiber-reinforced... And polyamide parts in an engine, are used for inlet manifold (oil steams...), cooling water transfert (which is hot...), as you see, it's what you need...

ABS glass temp is too low, I think it's around 85. PC and Tritan are at the 110 mark. Generic Default might be able to chime in, I think he's talking about PEI printing?

about 110°c for standard quality ABS. But glass temp don't mean something useful. PP (polypropylene) glass is 10°C, PE (polyethene) glass is about -110°C.... Glass doesnt means that it melts, glass means that there are no more molecular moves into material. A plastic bag is easy to make the shape you want to even in winter because it's PE made... If it where cooled at -110°C it would no move anymore, like if it were wood or steel... It would break immediately because it's very thin.

PEEK would be best...glass transition temperature of about 150C, but still strong to about 240C. Looks like someone has been looking into it at least.

http://www.arevolabs.com/

PA66 (Nylon) is about 2$ per kilogram were PEEK could be more than 100$/kg and the more expensive PEI I worked with, was 40%/kg (in plastics, materials are sold in 25Kg bags of pellets)

PEI is fanstastic, and PEEK just awesome, could be more solid than steel, but very very expensive, need to be heated around 365°C to melt (YEAH 689°F!!), not sure you will print these high end material tomorrow... And for the prices, these are industrial prices, just look at the price of the nylon in industry, and in spool for home printing...

When I produce peek or pei parts, customers are called airbus or boeing.

[Generic Default]

I don't think you'll be able to do this part in 3d printed plastic unless you can get your hands on some PEI or PEEK or PAI. Trimmer line nylon is dirt cheap and can take higher temperatures than ABS or PLA or any other printer plastic, but it is flexible and will creep at temperatures above around 100C. I haven't measured the creep temperature exactly, but I know that nylon will keep its shape up to around 200C if it is not under load.

However, glass filled plastics are good for higher temperature. Unfortunately there are none on the market for us right now and I still haven't gotten around to extruding my own. This chart is the most useful thing I can post here;

http://www.matweb.com/reference/deflect ... ature.aspx

The blue trimmer line nylon is a weird material to print with. It's easy to print and it is VERY tough stuff, the strength is good and it doesn't break when you stretch it or hit it. Creep is the biggest problem you will have with unfilled plastics.

[Cedric_K]

I have a customer that wants a printed bracket part that will be in a continuous steamy environment at 100c up to 150c at times.

I'm not an expert about filaments, but trust me, if nylon is PA66, it shouldn't move in these conditions. Sure a glassfiber reinforced nylon would be greater for heat resistance and dimentionnal stability, but as you menntionned, not availible for us... a good thing, our soft metal nozzles wouldn't appreciate.

There are other head resistant material as PPA, PPSU, PES, PSU, which are very good (a very tiny shrinkage with ppsu and infinite resistance to steam), but just try to find that into filaments... temperatures up to 360/390°C for melting...

[bvandiepenbos]

Thanks for all your info.

Looks like I will try nylon.
I have some of the Taulman 618 and Taulman Bridge.

What is the best print surface?

[enggmaug]

Yeah, the best is probably to try it yourself.

If you have specific requirements for the loads it is supposed to stand on, boil some water and try it up? I would probably try until it breaks, to see what is the limit you can reach.

And then, if you could give your feedback here, that would be great.

[Nylocke]

I got a sheet of Garolite/Tufnol from E3d that I like using. For most parts (Ive printed a few larger ones up to 5 inches in diameter with very minimal warping) it works pretty great. Cope uses Scotch Permeant glue stick (this exact brand, this exact type) on a sheet of glass at 75C from what I remember. http://www.amazon.com/Permanent-Glue-St ... B001E3TG48

Ive had better luck with the glue when using Bridge. 645 is what I normally use and the Garolite works well if it is clean and you Z height is "properly set" (I normally have it squished a bit, first layer is .3 and I squish it about .05-.1mm into it)

[Cedric_K]

Once again, my job is to be an expert about industrial plastics, but 3d printing is very new for me, and it's just a hobby.

I'm not sure about what I say but I think the best surface print would be metallic... a flat aluminium bed should do the job, even if steel is much better for me (keeps the heat longer, more thermical inertia, so less heat differences during process, less sensitive to surface changes due to the fans...

Aluminium is, I think, too good for heat dissipation, and it will tend to become cooler at the edges (the perimeter) of the part, while the center will keep hotter due to the printed part (adds heat and generate insulation)

this heat difference on the bed, between the center and the edge of the part, makes the part cooling faster on edges. Faster cooling = faster shrinkage. Warping could happens sooner.

Not sure because not experimented yet with printing, but it makes sense.

[jdurand]

If you look at cookware for even consistent heat, you either have a fancy aluminum or copper clad stainless steel pan or you have one made of cast iron. I personally prefer cast iron.