3DPrinting

23220 readers

80 users here now

3DPrinting is a place where makers of all skill levels and walks of life can learn about and discuss 3D printing and development of 3D printed parts and devices.

The r/functionalprint community is now located at: or !functionalprint@fedia.io

There are CAD communities available at: !cad@lemmy.world or !freecad@lemmy.ml

Rules

No bigotry - including racism, sexism, ableism, homophobia, transphobia, or xenophobia. Code of Conduct.
Be respectful, especially when disagreeing. Everyone should feel welcome here.
No porn (NSFW prints are acceptable but must be marked NSFW)
No Ads / Spamming / Guerrilla Marketing
Do not create links to reddit
If you see an issue please flag it
No guns
No injury gore posts

If you need an easy way to host pictures, https://catbox.moe/ may be an option. Be ethical about what you post and donate if you are able or use this a lot. It is just an individual hosting content, not a company. The image embedding syntax for Lemmy is ![](URL)

Moderation policy: Light, mostly invisible

founded 3 years ago

MODERATORS

j4k3@lemmy.world

andypiper@lemmy.world

GrayBackgroundMusic@lemmy.zip

Filament quality (lemmy.world)

submitted 2 days ago by Maerman@lemmy.world to c/3dprinting@lemmy.world

23 comments fedilink hide all child comments

Hi, all. So I'm pretty new to this hobby, and this might seem like a short-sighted question. But I was wondering, how important is the brand name when buying filament? I live in South Korea, which means AliExpress orders arrive here pretty quickly and are generally a viable option. The thing is that I see filament on Ali for half the price of the reputable brand name stuff I can get in Korea. Do any of you have any experience with the cheaper, no-name stuff? Is plastic just plastic, and the brand is just jacking up the price because they can? Or is there an important difference between the filament produced by the big brands and filament made in China that I can get for much cheaper? Any and all advice would be much appreciated.

you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments

[–] synapse1278@lemmy.world 3 points 1 day ago

What makes the quality is the exact composition of the plastic (additives, color pigments), the consistency and accuracy of the diameter along the filament and how dry it comes out of the bag.

Bad composition could be very bad for bed adhesion and make the filament unusable.

Bad diameter will cause mostly visual quality defects

Humidifier will cause bubbles and strings, can be fixed by drying the filament.

Back when I started I ended up with some very poop quality filament that I paid way over priced ! Nowadays I have the feeling the cheep stuff is pretty good after some drying. At least as far as PLA goes.