New 3D Resin Printer

[Julie AnnParticipant @julieann]

After a lot of dithering, second thoughts and then third thoughts, I have bought myself a belated Christmas present:

Centre right is a new 3D resin printer and associated washer/drier/curer station. If I can create decent resin prints I will set up for making my own investment castings.

The printer was delivered yesterday; first impressions are that it is well engineered.

Julie

[Mike HurleyParticipant @mikehurley60381]

Belated welcome to the group

Do keep us updated with progress ( both good and not so good! ). Are you new to  3d printing?

Mike

 

[Julie AnnParticipant @julieann]

Resin printing will be new to me. However, I’ve been using FDM printing (Ultimaker2 on the left) for 12 years. It has been used for work production parts:

And for prototyping assemblies on my engines to validate the design before cutting metal:

Annoyingly the 3D printed gear change machanism worked perfectly. Whereas the metal one took weeks of fiddling to get working properly.

Julie

[Julie Ann]

On Julie Ann Said:

….

 

Annoyingly the 3D printed gear change machanism worked perfectly. Whereas the metal one took weeks of fiddling to get working properly.

Julie

Ah, the eternal cussedness of things!  Or maybe there really are gremlins.

Good stuff, I’m impressed, please share more.

Dave

[Julie AnnParticipant @julieann]

The two operating levers tend to twist when moved, so they can jam on the crankshaft splines or on the round support rod. The 3D printed parts were a very snug, almost push, fit on the support rod. But the metal support rods had a few tenths of clearance which was enough to cause them to twist and jam.

Advice from those with full size engines is that the gear mechanism either needs to be made to NPL standards or, more practically, to be a rattling good fit.

Julie

[Julie AnnParticipant @julieann]

The Sunday before last I was able to set aside some time to try my first 3D resin prints:

Amazed by the quality right out of the box. Some test prints indicate I need to tweak exposures. Even so the prints have great detail with a good surface finish.

I ordered an investment vacuum casting unit and furnace to melt metal yesterday afternoon and they arrived this morning:

Next steps are to try using castable resins, scrap my broken 18″ shaper and make a table to hold/store the casting kit.

Julie

[SillyOldDufferModerator @sillyoldduffer]

Good job you don’t live near me Julie!  If you did, I’d constantly be asking you to print stuff!   And I’d assume it would all be done for free…

🙂

Dave

 

[noel shelleyParticipant @noelshelley55608]

What metal are you using ? I Take it that you are casting small parts by the size of the furnace ? Noel.

[JasonBModerator @jasonb]

I should think you could get some reasonable size steam fittings out of that if it is the 3.5″ dia flask machine, maybe even an aero engine crankcase. Possibly 3KG (copper alloy) furnace capacity?

The good thing with CAD is it will tell you the volume of the part and you can also model any sprue etc to make sure you can melt enough material before committing to a pour.

Looking forward to see the results.

[SillyOldDuffer]

On SillyOldDuffer Said:

Good job you don’t live near me Julie!  If you did, I’d constantly be asking you to print stuff!   And I’d assume it would all be done for free…

🙂

Dave

 

Sounds like I’ve had a lucky escape, no doubt free tea and coffee would also be expected!

Julie

[noel shelley]

On noel shelley Said:

What metal are you using ? I Take it that you are casting small parts by the size of the furnace ?

I will be casting non-ferrous, initially LG2. The set up was bought for making the water lifter parts for my traction engine. Plus other parts like the handwheels and oiler caps that are distinctive and specific to Burrell. Having got the set up no doubt I will think of other items that can be cast.

Just thought of a couple; there are two cast nameplates on the valve chest cover on my engine.They are not particularly good castings so I would hope I could make them with better defined lettering, and serial numbers unique to me.

The maximum part size, based on the biggest flask, would be around 110m diameter and 150mm deep.

Julie

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