An Adventure into 3D Printing…Photon Mono Se

[Twokidsnosleep]

So I showed me getting it and now a test print from their software and a run in the washer/UV curing unit have been completed
Pretty darn good, pretty darn easy
Now I did watch a ton of videos so knew exactly what I was getting into

[digger303]

so far so good. They look good. I an see that you'll be able to print whole sides of buildings , doors , windows and use it quite often.
Whats the cost of the consumables with just printing out those items above ?

[Twokidsnosleep]

so far so good. They look good. I an see that you'll be able to print whole sides of buildings , doors , windows and use it quite often.
Whats the cost of the consumables with just printing out those items above ?

Resin is about $30 for 500ml….I used hardly any and you can recycle the stuff that doesn’t cure in the vat. Which is a lot
Mr Clean cleaner..had it but less than $10 for 2.4L jug and you can filter it and keep using it
IPa…litre is about $12, again can recycle and reuse
Paper towels…have
Filter…have them but the printer came with 10 more
Gloves..have with work
File..this one was free

I am gonna say less than $5 if you don’t include my time

[Twokidsnosleep]

Ok on to round two
Anycubic Grey craftsman resin. Sounds hoity, but ‘‘twas the cheapest on Amazon at $28

I used the software in the memory stick from Anycubic to load up their slicing program on a PC ( swearing, swearing, swearing)
Bought a $4 file of nine different 1700’s pirate figures and duplicated them and arranged them into the virtual build plate
I could only move them around, not modify their form and I needed 1/72 scale that they came in. More swearing and general bad mood.
This is their print


@digger303
Look how close the grey resin line is to the max fill line…and I did not fill the vat full. So not much is used, you lose some in filtering excess, cleaning the plate off, but not too bad.




Luckily they are pirates as many are missing a leg or arm, but there are some good ones in there and all these were for was a starting point to add as a crew on the Black Pearl I am supposed to make in September

Compare my guys printed(grey) with the green monster from Mars figures and then some HO train figures moulded in pink.
They all are around about 1/72 scale ish


The green ones are flashy and poor with many weapons and weird poses; the grey and pink give me something to work with on this small scale
Some might call this a fail, but it is exactly what I want to be able to do…use resin printing to add detail to my model kits; use as extra parts; eventually make full finished things of my own design

My mistakes:
*Use a base for each row so they are all on on or a few supports, not feet right on the fep…easier to take off as larger units, easier to put it cleaner. Some feet stuck to the fep
*Buy a better quality file…details are ok for the scale, but arms and legs poor
*Don’t walk dog while letting this run for its last ten minutes as dog walk will take forty minutes minimum, so your excess resin can harden

[digger303]

Not a bad result though from only the second go.
Is the second machine needed ?
Where do you buy the files from ?....I could google it, but I figure I could benefit from your experience in sussing it out.

[Stokesy44]

Fascinating.

So you can buy programs of what you want to create and also create your own if you have the software?

Mind. Blown.

[Twokidsnosleep]

Not a bad result though from only the second go.
Is the second machine needed ?
Where do you buy the files from ?....I could google it, but I figure I could benefit from your experience in sussing it out.

Those files were from myminifactory.com
They were super cheap and lower on the quality scale…but at 1/72 still better than the cast ones I had
There are tons of printable files there, some amazing

By second machine, do you mean the cleaner/curing light ?
If so, no it is not necessary. I did all the little guys in a glass bath as I didn’t make a base for them to fit into the bucket with the spinning mixer. Plus they are a small print so would have been flung around by the vortex and likely broken.
BUT, it is an awesome quick cleaner system that doubles as a curing table so it kills two functions in one and does both very well
So necessary, no…..super handy and useful YES!

I am having fun with this

[Twokidsnosleep]

Fascinating.

So you can buy programs of what you want to create and also create your own if you have the software?

Mind. Blown.

Yes indeed
There are lots of Files you can download , some free and some pay, that you can print out.
Certain file sellers provide choice for versions of multiple types of printers

You can try and make your own files…I have just downloaded fusion 360 program with the thought to make car parts, rivets, brake disks that kinda thing. That is gonna be a bit of a learning curve
I don’t just want to print out Knick-nacks and weird figures.
I want to be able to make parts for a model, detail bits, more intricate printing if the model kit moulding was soft or replace a part if lost or broken. So far that is a bit of a dream but that is the goal.

[Casper]

Great choice of printer scott and the wash and cure station is a must have that really cleans up the parts very well looking at the videos' online.
congrats on your first set of prints

[digger303]

Thanks mate that clears up a couple of things in my mind and makes it clearer.

[DBMiller]

I have been so temped so many time to buy this one but just can't pull the trigger!

[Twokidsnosleep]

I have been so temped so many time to buy this one but just can't pull the trigger!

Totally felt same way
So many types, models brands programs…it is mind boggling. Never the right time.
Way easy to do over analysis paralysis
Was following three brands on Fb groups and the Anycubic seemed to have had the fewest complaints and most likes. Then it had an Amazon sale on both products and two day delivery guaranteed. Boom. Trigger pulled

I challenged myself in January that I would be up and running by the end of the year with 3D printing, so that was another push
It will take a while to get to where I can design and do my own things, but that is the goal.

[ForbesHutton]

I can barely get an inkjet printer to work.

Adding another dimension and tanks to fill or wires to be feed would probably result in a fire or explosion when I beat the printer to death with my laptop....

[Twokidsnosleep]

I can barely get an inkjet printer to work.

Adding another dimension and tanks to fill or wires to be feed would probably result in a fire or explosion when I beat the printer to death with my laptop....

Funniest thing I have read all day
Believe me, I did plenty of swearing

[Tomcat64]

You've got off to a flying start with those new toys!

I think the figures look really good for just a second go at this - do you have any potential applications you could put this to for work as well as hobby?

[digger303]

I can barely get an inkjet printer to work.

Adding another dimension and tanks to fill or wires to be feed would probably result in a fire or explosion when I beat the printer to death with my laptop....

Funniest thing I have read all day
Believe me, I did plenty of swearing

Before you go down this road please set the camera to create a vid......would be the funniest thing to see and probably go viral through the modeling community....you'd be a STAR..

[Tomcat64]

I can barely get an inkjet printer to work.

Adding another dimension and tanks to fill or wires to be feed would probably result in a fire or explosion when I beat the printer to death with my laptop....

Funniest thing I have read all day
Believe me, I did plenty of swearing

Before you go down this road please set the camera to create a vid......would be the funniest thing to see and probably go viral through the modeling community....you'd be a STAR..

Or worse... an "influencer" !!

[Twokidsnosleep]

You've got off to a flying start with those new toys!

I think the figures look really good for just a second go at this - do you have any potential applications you could put this to for work as well as hobby?

Interesting question
I watched a guy make 3D resin parts and use them as he cast the shape into metal
I don’t think I will but interesting. My dad design skills are negligible so that is where ai have to start
There are various types of resins with different properties and applications
This machine is really a hobby unit

[Twokidsnosleep]

Funniest thing I have read all day
Believe me, I did plenty of swearing

Before you go down this road please set the camera to create a vid......would be the funniest thing to see and probably go viral through the modeling community....you'd be a STAR..

Or worse... an "influencer" !!

It would be worse than Ozzie man videos
I am not fun to be near when things don’t go right

[digger303]

You've got off to a flying start with those new toys!

I think the figures look really good for just a second go at this - do you have any potential applications you could put this to for work as well as hobby?

Interesting question
I watched a guy make 3D resin parts and use them as he cast the shape into metal
I don’t think I will but interesting. My dad design skills are negligible so that is where ai have to start
There are various types of resins with different properties and applications
This machine is really a hobby unit

dad design skills....is that like dad jokes ....

[Twokidsnosleep]

You've got off to a flying start with those new toys!

I think the figures look really good for just a second go at this - do you have any potential applications you could put this to for work as well as hobby?

Interesting question
I watched a guy make 3D resin parts and use them as he cast the shape into metal
I don’t think I will but interesting. My dad design skills are negligible so that is where ai have to start
There are various types of resins with different properties and applications
This machine is really a hobby unit

dad design skills....is that like dad jokes ....

Oops cad skills…autocorrect strikes again

[Twokidsnosleep]

Had a test print fail on me today, this is my third run of the machine
May be the grey resin, may be the settings, may be the plate not perfectly level

This is supposed to be the design…a latticed cube


This is what I got in the plate as I stopped it when I saw the fail

Cleaned up mess





I gotta say there are some helpful people on FB and there are some complete a holes; the majority is the latter
Seriously won’t post very much on the Anycubic owners FB site…jerks galore

Edit: as I have progressed a bit here and had a few more fails and resolved them, I find the test file is the problem.
Poor design with no supports. Now I would take this file into Lychee slicer and support it better and get a good result
But I am past this test file now and it holds no interest to me

[digger303]

I suspect 3d printing has problems and a steep learning curve with a multitude of factors to take into consideration.
All I can say is you have my deepest commiserations in killing a perfectly harmless cube.

[Tomcat64]

I guess that lattice isn't an easy shape to build, so actually what you ended up with wasn't too bad as a first go at it.

Most of the bits are there... just not exactly where they should be...

[Quax]

I suspect 3d printing has problems and a steep learning curve with a multitude of factors to take into consideration.
All I can say is you have my deepest commiserations in killing a perfectly harmless cube.

I guess its just a roll of the dice whether cubes are good or bad....

Paul

[digger303]

I suspect 3d printing has problems and a steep learning curve with a multitude of factors to take into consideration.
All I can say is you have my deepest commiserations in killing a perfectly harmless cube.

I guess its just a roll of the dice whether cubes are good or bad....

Paul

Beware the Borg cube

[Twokidsnosleep]

Different resins, different conditions, an unsupported design, a newbie at the helm and so lots of failure possibility

Something I have learned (the hard way) by a FB site is that many leave their resin in their vat all the time
I don't as I am changing between resins as I try them; am a rare printer in my time; had a failure so want to see the clear plate and clean it; don't want those fumes lofting about my model room; have a cat who would probably find her way in with her toes or knock it over.
A nicer FB guy suggested batching prints and going at it over a weekend like crazy and so then leaving the vat full. He also linked a better test pattern to try than that hell cube.

Anyhow, resin vat is a hot button topic over which people will flip out at you if you walk on that land mine.
Much like using Future as a clear or how silly you are if you build tanks
I will just lurk there now more and do my own research

[Twokidsnosleep]

I showed BFRD this and posted in the Vincent motorcycle thread, so should show it here

There are flexible 3D resins you can use to print things that need some movement.
In modelling, this would be especially good for making tires

https://wanhao.store/products/3d-printi ... 0ml-bottle

Not sure what "preassure" means sure that got lost in translation
The manufacture of hard resin tires that you paint seems Neanderthal to me...like chipping out a wheel from a stone like a caveman.
Making actual rubber tires seems super cool!! And I am sure it will be very finicky to master
But how much potential there blows my mind

[aur0ra145]

This thread makes me want to get one... especially with how I've started to fall in love with painting minis.

[Casper]

As digger said "multitude of factors to take into consideration"
different Makes and different coloured resins and filaments perform differently on different printers, that's a lot of differents
Matt,shinny and glossy filaments and resins require different setups and bed levelling and bed heat temperatures also come into play. I tried a matt filament on my printer and it took me a few goes to get the settings correct to get a half decent print so I've gone back to the shinny one, It prints much better and the recommended settings worked perfectly almost every time.

[digger303]

I showed BFRD this and posted in the Vincent motorcycle thread, so should show it here

There are flexible 3D resins you can use to print things that need some movement.
In modelling, this would be especially good for making tires

https://wanhao.store/products/3d-printi ... 0ml-bottle

Not sure what "preassure" means sure that got lost in translation
The manufacture of hard resin tires that you paint seems Neanderthal to me...like chipping out a wheel from a stone like a caveman.
Making actual rubber tires seems super cool!! And I am sure it will be very finicky to master
But how much potential there blows my mind

That's cool and interesting. I didn't know that soft elastic subjects could be printed. Although a did know about the medical use in printing parts.
Now that begs the question . Will your printer print these materials ?
Second question since these printers print in layers how hard is it to clean up ?

[Twokidsnosleep]

I showed BFRD this and posted in the Vincent motorcycle thread, so should show it here

There are flexible 3D resins you can use to print things that need some movement.
In modelling, this would be especially good for making tires

https://wanhao.store/products/3d-printi ... 0ml-bottle

Not sure what "preassure" means sure that got lost in translation
The manufacture of hard resin tires that you paint seems Neanderthal to me...like chipping out a wheel from a stone like a caveman.
Making actual rubber tires seems super cool!! And I am sure it will be very finicky to master
But how much potential there blows my mind

That's cool and interesting. I didn't know that soft elastic subjects could be printed. Although a did know about the medical use in printing parts.
Now that begs the question . Will your printer print these materials ?
Second question since these printers print in layers how hard is it to clean up ?

Those are both good questions
I have found some free computer designed files of tires, so they will be answered this autumn

[Twokidsnosleep]

Here is a video from Tom Grigat; an awesome German modeller who does stop motion videos of his builds
They are fantastic both in videography and in model building
In this one he uses an Anycubic 3D printer to modify some parts to improve on them. It is where I want to be in my modelling.
Have a look

[digger303]

Very nice with lots of top level skills on display.
I don't think I'll be doing any of that 3 d work though unless it gets lot easier. I'll still be buying off the aftermarket guys for a long time.
I enjoy watching your work though and how your making it happen.

[Twokidsnosleep]

Very nice with lots of top level skills on display.
I don't think I'll be doing any of that 3 d work though unless it gets lot easier. I'll still be buying off the aftermarket guys for a long time.
I enjoy watching your work though and how your making it happen.

I am with ya here. There is a steep learning curve and $ to be spent.
100% like aftermarket especially metal stuff Vs resin
BUT many times for my projects there is no aftermarket products, so I am on my own
Often aftermarket stuff is so expensive or limited in quantities and variable in quality. They tend to have little or no guidance or instructions as well.
About half the PE and detail stuff in aftermarket that I purchase I never use
I still want to get into metal milling and lathe work as well to do car wheel rims and engine parts; that is a whole other story

[digger303]

Very nice with lots of top level skills on display.
I don't think I'll be doing any of that 3 d work though unless it gets lot easier. I'll still be buying off the aftermarket guys for a long time.
I enjoy watching your work though and how your making it happen.

I am with ya here. There is a steep learning curve and $ to be spent.
100% like aftermarket especially metal stuff Vs resin
BUT many times for my projects there is no aftermarket products, so I am on my own
Often aftermarket stuff is so expensive or limited in quantities and variable in quality. They tend to have little or no guidance or instructions as well.
About half the PE and detail stuff in aftermarket I never use
I still want to get into metal milling and lathe work as well to do car wheel rims and engine parts; that is a whole mother story

Yes I hear you and totally understand the dilemma you find yourself in concerning parts that aren't available.
I echo your wish to get into the metal work side of things especially for me in that I have always had a fascination for lathes and the way the metal is cut away to form a object. Just love it.
One thing that seems to come though from experienced tradesman with a lot of these cheaper lathes is the inability to reproduce exact tolerances. Seems to be a fair amount of slop due to the amount of run out they have built into the machines. This in turn seems to because they are built to a price. A top tradie can compensate for that to a certain degree, but I doubt that I could not having the benefit of being trained by a man with many years of experience. Of course there's always utube

[Twokidsnosleep]

So bit of experimenting today
I got a mouse for the little pc laptop and it is soooo much easier to use now than with the track pad thing
I have been downloading some files and getting them into a slicer program to direct the printer how to do the layers
Learning as I go..Lychee is the slicer program

I got a good resin test print for my clear resin, so tried a t-Rex that came with the program…meh his supports failed and he went wonky
At this moment I have Capt Jack Sparrow’s tricorn hat being printed…two hours long and that is past my bedtime. So I am going to leave it go print and clean up in the morning. I will do photos then as it is too dark now and I am knackered

[Twokidsnosleep]

Well FFs
Total and utter failure again
My tricorn hat was swimming in the bottom of the vat this morning…drowning actually
More work to do still

[digger303]

Well FFs
Total and utter failure again
My tricorn hat was swimming in the bottom of the vat this morning…drowning actually
More work to do still

try try again I guess. I'm sure you will get it figured.

[Twokidsnosleep]

So trying to dial in just one resin, the clear one to get it printing consistently
This is a test matrix and 1.5 sec cure time…it is pretty good with sharpness and clarity. A few air bubbles



These are the kind of nuts and bolts I want to print…some are large enough to work

[Twokidsnosleep]

Now some fails.
The t-Rex supports separated and he got wonky. I stopped it anyways once I figured the auto support in the program shifted the figure to miss its nose and tail



So I have re-engineered him with big honking supports

Then the tricorn hat for Capt Jack
I got two horns and a flat


Again I have re-done the supports manually now and made them way thicker, reduced the hat’s angulation and moved the hat to a corner of the plate to see if it stops it from sticking


One hour to see how it goes

[BigWall]

It looks like you're progressing along the learning curve. It's way more fiddley than I would have expected it to be.

[Twokidsnosleep]

It looks like you're progressing along the learning curve. It's way more fiddley than I would have expected it to be.

Indeed

I think at some point I will have to upgrade to a purchased slicing software to get all the options
But at this point I can monkey about with a couple free ones and get the hang of things
Praying the arms come out with my super crazy over supports added

[aur0ra145]

I think I'm sold on a resin printer now. What was the print time for the hat?

[Twokidsnosleep]

I think I'm sold on a resin printer now. What was the print time for the hat?

That was 90 min I think
This little baby is a bit quicker in printing BUT it has a small printing footprint. So it is good with small figures and parts, but if you get larger stuff, it gets too cramped quickly
I am not sure If I can print out my 1/8 scale Corvette mags on her…more fiddling to try

Edit: the hat file says on it; 1hr 0min and 43 sec for printing

[digger303]

Nice work The texture on the hat was more than I expected and pleasantly surprized me. I noticed on the other thread which is locked some circles down the figures blade. Are these air holes where the curing process hiccuped ?

[Twokidsnosleep]

Nice work The texture on the hat was more than I expected and pleasantly surprized me. I noticed on the other thread which is locked some circles down the figures blade. Are these air holes where the curing process hiccuped ?

No those are little blebs from the underneath supports on the blade. You would never see them if not for the clear resin
I clipped them off, but didn’t smoooth them until I have the thing fully cured
Large probablility I will be CA gluing that blade back together

[Twokidsnosleep]

Final six hour print of the torso and head complex of Jack Sparrow
Holy cow this is cool







I am really impressed with this little machine
Look at the trigger in the gun

[digger303]

Cool and faster than the post

[Twokidsnosleep]

Cool and faster than the post

True
It took me a good day to dial in the resin and learn the slicing program nuances
Then a full day to print all the parts (over two days really)
You have to plan the time of the print around your day as some are very long
It is a smidge addictive