FDM (fused deposition modeling) is one of the best-known 3D printing processes and is becoming increasingly popular in the hobby sector.
Plastic filaments such as PLA, PETG, ABS and many other compositions, with various properties such as:b Weather resistance, UV resistance, chemical resistance, etc., have one thing in common:
They can be molded into one part using a 3D printer with the right temperature settings. Expressed in a simple way.
To be precise, the plastic is melted and applied layer by layer to the travel plane. The finer the height of the layers, the less you can see the individual layers with the naked eye. But this increases the printing time enormously. Of course, other factors also play a role in time, such as the filling (infill) or the wall thickness.
The filament should preferably be dried or stored in a box with silicate, as plastics generally have a tendency to absorb humidity, which could be noticeable in the printed image. That’s why heated dry boxes are also recommended.
For 3D printers with a Bowden extruder, it is recommended to feed the filament from the side, whereas for a direct extruder, feeding from the top is an advantage.
Elastic filaments such as TPU can only be printed to a limited extent with a Bowden extruder because the path between the conveyor wheels and the hotend is so far apart that the flexible filament no longer has enough force to be pushed through the nozzle and instead could already twist in the PTFE tube.