3DPrinting

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Ancient filament, salvageable? (lemmy.world)

submitted 6 days ago* (last edited 1 day ago) by SkyezOpen@lemmy.world to c/3dprinting@lemmy.world

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Abandoned printing a few years ago, getting back into it. I have several rolls of PLA and one ABS. The PLA rolls are brittle due to being stored in the open for years. I ran them through a dryer at 50c for 12 hours with no improvement. I've seen suggestions online for 55c so I'm trying that right now, but I imagine they're fucked.

Will more heat help or am I wasting my time?

Edit: another 10 hours at 55 did nothing, I'm abandoning the spool and trying the ABS at 65 for a full day. It wasn't brittle to start so I'll have to test print to know if it worked, but I'll post an update here for posterity.

Edit: ABS 65c for 24 hours. Clogged immediately. Didn't have a needle handy, so I took a Sim card removal tool and a lighter, heated it up for about 30 seconds and stuck it in the top of the hot end and let it cool, then yanked it out. Weird thing was there was still some pla left in the hot end, so it clogged early and pushed out nothing.

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[–] SkyezOpen@lemmy.world 1 points 6 days ago (1 children)

There's probably only 150g or less on the spool so I did not unravel it. After the 12 hour bake I gave the very end a bend and it snapped like a twig. It's running at 55c and 15% humidity right now so here's hoping. If it's screwed it's not the worst thing ever, but I have nearly 1kg left of old ABS as well and I would be sad if I couldn't save it.

[–] AnyOldName3@lemmy.world 1 points 4 days ago

A trick is to weigh the filament before you start drying it and then weigh it again every few hours to see if it's stopped getting lighter. If it's been hours since it lost a single gram, then it's probably close enough to as dry as it's going to get, and if it still doesn't behave, then there must be a second problem.