What is 3D printing? 3D printing used to be a far reached concept that only existed in tech labs & sci-fi films, but today you can get a 3D printer to use at home for less than a coffee maker and the prints can cost less than a coffee. What can you use 3D printing for? The Home 3D Printing industry been long been plagued with the false notion that 3D Printers are only useful to make useless trinkets. There are more uses for a 3D printer than you might think. You can use it for small things like trinkets and toys, but surprisingly you can use it for functional uses as well. @ 3-Dimensions we like encourage people to avoid wasting plastic on trinkets and focus on using a printer to make practical things such as replacing broken parts or making functional prints for around the home and office. For small businesses and startups, you can also use a 3D printer to make functional prototypes instead of paying to get injection moulds, which cost a lot more, until you reach significant volume.

How does 3D printing work? The most common type of 3D printers work by laying down molten plastic and letting it harden into the object, repeating this process layer by layer until the printer reaches the full height of the model. Think of it like a glue gun laying down a layer then moving up slightly and adding another layer until the design is complete. However the printing process takes time, and as the process uses layers the finish isn’t 100% smooth, but it is within an acceptable range for the average user (And there are post-processing steps you can take to finish the print). But is much cheaper than other processes such as injection moulded parts. Where can you get files to print? A popular place to get free files to print is a site called “Thingiverse”. But if you are getting a 3D printer it’s advantageous to learn how to make your own files using CAD software (see below), to print your own designs. “Give someone a 3D printer and they can print for a day. Teach them to design and they can print for a lifetime” Are kits they hard to build? Like 3-Dimensions, lots of 3D printers are sold as kits, where you have to assemble them by hand. 3-Dimension kits are sold with face-to-face training and support to help you put your printer together. This includes helping you set up up the electronics and mechanics. The advantage of building a kit is that you will understand how it works and be better placed to maintain and update your printer in the future.

Commonly Used terms CAD: CAD = Computer Aided Design. The software you use to make and or edit models on a computer STL: STL = The most common type of file used to export a CAD file ready for 3d processing (Think of it like the .xls for excel or .doc for word) Slicing/Slicer: The program that lets you turn STL files into G-Code. This is where you can adjust factors such as layer size, infill, speed and supports. It is called a slicer because it cuts slices through your model to allow the machine to print the individual layers one at a time. G-Code: Gcode is the type of file format that the 3D printers use to print objects, this is the output from the slicer stage above The common process is CAD > STL > Slicer > G-code > Printer Infill: The amount of plastic in the insides of the model. The more infill you have, the stronger the print is, but the more plastic you use and the longer the print will take. Most slicers also let you change the infill pattern, some patterns have more strength but take longer to print.
Filament: The plastic used in most printers to make objects. There are a few types of plastic with different pros and cons, some are stronger, some can take more heat, others are more flexible. PLA is a great material for most needs, the standard thickness is 1.75mm, you may also find some suppliers selling 3mm, but this is becoming less common (FYI: This size isn’t compatible with 3-Dimensions printers unless you modify them to do so) The main types of filament are listed below with the pros and cons of each. FDM/FFF: The acronyms FDM or FFF (They are interchangeable and mean the same thing) stand for Fused Deposition Modeling & Fused Filament Fabrication. These terms explain the common method of 3D printing. These types of printer work by melting plastic in a moving heated head, and laying that plastic down on the model one layer at a time. There are two main types of filament printers…

Cartesian Printers These printers are named after the most widely used coordinate system which helps robots to decide where and how to move, basicity they move in the XY&Z dimensions independently. This style of printer has a square print bed. On our printers, this bed moves back and forward on the Y-axis. The X-axis carries the print head left and right, and the Z-axis moves this print head and the gantry it sits on up and down. There are other variants to these mechanics, some printers move the print bed up and down (Rather than forward and backwards) and then the print head must move forward, back, left and right through on flat plain. Delta Another popular printer style is the Delta. These have a circular bed that doesn’t move (Which is an advantage for certain prints). The printhead is suspended above the bed by three arms in a triangular configuration (This is how it gets the name “Delta”). These printers are designed for speed, but this comes at the cost of computational power, when one arm moves up the other two need to move independently up and/or down to make a straight line. It’s a bit like trying to convert flat map into a globe. With the help of 32bit processors, the maths to calculate the moves is easy. Traditionally, deltas have been harder to set up & calibrate but with the use of bed sensors this process has been automated. Deltas also look cool when they are printing, but this does come at a cost of space, you can’t print to the top of a delta printer (as the arms get in the way), so a section at the top of the printer is “wasted” space. But as a small desktop printer, these have a great form factor as they only take up a small amount of desk space.
Other 3D printer formats There are other niche styles of filament printers (eg Scara and Polar), but these have not become mainstream in the 3D community yet.
The other main type of 3D printers are resin printers - The quality of these are amazing, but they are limited by smaller print volumes and use resin that is messier. Traditionally these have been expensive, but recently these have been coming down in price, so will become more mainstream in the future.