This will be interesting/entertaining at the least. Will keep everyone in the loop on this one.
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Iâm shortly going to be trying PP for the first time. Bought Reprapper as it comes with special sheets to print on.
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Ah, youâre off doing crazy stuff too. Cool. Been wanting to play in that playground for a bit. If youâre open, please share results. 
So far, so good. First copy of the design off the printer, first of the backup copies for things in the, âoven,â as it were
ItâsâŚniceâŚas best as I can tell off the cuff without plying the part in itâs service. Stiffer than PC by itself like they claim. Tree type supports just peel right off and the resultant overhangs from those are like what youâd expect with the supports from PLA. (The same cannot be said of just PCâŚitâŚworkedâŚbut it wasnât pretty and smooth like this was.)
For the rest of the viewing audience thatâre not playing Mad Scientists hereâŚ
PC-CF works even though Creality doesnât claim it does. Hereâs the skinny so far:
- You will need an enclosure of SOME sort. I succeeded (in the second big printâŚ) with the Creality zipper bag enclosure fed into the printer via an eSun dryer outside the bag. You will want to have the up-top spool or a PTFE feed tube from a dryer. The filament will get wet within the timeframes of most prints and you will spend the better part of 24 hours in a dryer to fix that. Enclosure temps will stave off the humidity, soâll a dryer.
- It prints at the full 600 mm/s speed with only some minor flaws. (Impressive, reallyâŚ) You may want it slower to make it prettier.
- You will want to print with more than 2 wall layers. My prints are running 6 for reasons. If youâre printing with this stuff, youâre aming for maximal strength with trade offs for weight considerations. Much of your strength in the parts comes from the skin, even with 100% infill.
- You will want to only print with one of the Honeycomb variants or Gyroid. Itâs not cheap (~$50 per kilo.). Youâre printing this for maximal strength and stiffness reasons. Pick infills that help you.
- You will want 50% or more infill density. Same reasonings as the above items.
- Use a bed prep. I have Vision Miners Nano Adhesive for this in my case. MagiGoo PC or Nano Adhesive is strongly suggested. The PEI bed doesnât have QUITE the grip you want to prevent warping during print.
- Youâll want to do an extrusion test to get a determination for proper melt temp. It wonât QUITE print properly if it bunches up against the nozzle when you do this. Temps range from 260-300 depending on the blend, etc. Try to keep to the high end of the vendorâs suggested before going higher. If the extrusion run youâre doing with the stuff as youâre loading filament wants to bunch up against the nozzle it means youâre melting, but youâre just as smidge too cold as the CF is bunching up and making the stuff cool down too quickly. Layer line adhesion will not be at maximum there. If you have this, bump the hotend temp up 10 if you can. Set your slicer profile for that filament to that temp.
- Bed temp should be 100.
- Small prints will likely not need a brim. Larger parts may. Mine did to ensure no lifting because I had a couple of sharp-ish parts on the bed that would lift and warp. Mouse ears may not work- YMMV on this part.
The only downside is that this stuff is abrasive and will slowly tear up your nozzle. Thankfully the Core XZ and the K1 series use the hardened Unicorn nozzle so itâs all largely good. Adhere to the typical expected replacement schedule according to how much of this stuff youâre printing and itâll all just work amazingly.
Printing ABS without problems daily, just as easily as PLA or PETG. ASA needed a gluestick, doesnât like sticking to PEI so much. I know that PP needs a PP bed as it doesnât want to stick to anything except itself so that should be interesting. PC-CF I shall try sometime, but not needing it yet for the parts I make. Iâm expecting to be printing moulds for vacforming for components at work so that should be a bit of fun.
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Thatâs why Iâve got gluesticks, MagiGoo, and Nano Adhesive for things. ASA, etc.
I prefer ASA over ABS for several reasons you probably already know- that being said, Iâve quite a few ABS spools as well.
And, so far, so good. The part is holding up better than expected under loads. I like PC-CF. I suspect Iâll also like PA-CF when I get to play with it.
This is fantastic info Thanks
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Youâre very much welcome.
So far the part worked out really well. Folding power wheelchair font fork that failed. (Why would you use Die Cast with something that causes stress risers in your part?)
I wouldnât want to rely on this for extended periods, but it worked out stunningly well and let me verify design for an Aluminum part that is due in on the 23rd that I redesigned for brute strength out of milled 6051-T6.
Now on to an even more fun thing. Found out that I donât need 120 deg bed temps. Old info. 40 enclosure, 110 bed, 300 hotend. 30 mm/s exterior walls, 400 mm/s interior walls and infill. Working out the Orca Slicer profile changes and the filament DB right now for the madness that I hope follows.
Maybe of use at some point but Qidi Tech have just released a UltraPA CF25 filament. Some nice looking mechanical figures and a PETG temp range bed.
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Thanks for sharing. My use of my 3D printer is pretty mundane, but I like to know whatâs out there in case I run into an opportunity to do something special.
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Well, some blaze paths for others. I use my printers I have fairly aggressively, pushing limits.
I ask/do seemingly silly things to see if I canâŚand in some cases solely for that purpos.
Itâs worth note that PC-CF is a lot nicer than PA-CF (Nylon with CF) in several ways. But you wanted to know you can do both- each has itâs purpose. It prints with speed and the stuff is very strong. Perhaps the strongest stuff you can find to print on your 3v3 there. Well, until I crack the code for one of the Exotics on it. Need to see if I can get bed temps up to 120 somehow and the enclosure temps up to 50, preferably 60. This stuff (TullomerâŚ) down to the floor has layer adhesion problems if youâre not dead-on with bed temps in the 120 range, enclosure at least 50, and preferably hotter than the 3V3 can melt. But, it should print, according to the reps down to 110 for bed, but I need the 50 deg or better for the enclosureâŚitâs cooling down too fast.
Iâm just impressed that the low-end from Creality is actually this stunning in what it can doâŚcompletely out of box.
The PETG-CF and PLA-CF filaments areâŚinteresting. Itâs my understanding that they both gain quite a bit of stiffnes and some strength. After playing with PC-CF, Iâd definitely consider either of the two for a project.
Have you tried the PETG-CF yet? I picked some up by Tinmorry but have yet to try it. Hotbed 75 - 110. nozzle 240-270.
Good lord this is difficult stuff to print, warps much more readily that ABS. The PP build sticker doesnât want to stick. Might get me some Magigoo. If you can avoid printing this material avoid it. This is printing in my Qidi Xplus3, might have my settings a little out, based it on ASA/ABS profiles, really hot bed and fairly high print temperatures.
Hello @Frank_Earl ,
Just came across a new filament out by Prusa actually 1 of 2 new ones.
The one I like the look of is the PETG Magnetite.
I thought I would mention it here as you like trying exotic stuff.
Cheers.
They do some weird bed sizes 250x210, could just about get that to fit with a bit of trimming. Shame they donât have that bed for the XL I could cut that down to fit all my machines.