Comparing pieces printed in bronzeFill. One on the left was tumbled in steel screws.
That’s awesome. Gotta try those metal filaments at some point.
Which steel filament?
I think the post noted steel screws, not filament.
Thanks, it’s filament from ColorFabb called bronzeFill. http://colorfabb.com/bronzefill I printed this piece on a Type A Machines Series 1 with a layer height of 150microns. Prints like PLA, no retraction needed. Tumbled for about 4-5 hours to get that finish.
O wow. So the one on the left is tumbled bronze filament? Thats very good
@Noe_Ruiz which nozzle size is your printer setup with?
Sure, the printer comes stock with a winchester direct drive system, 1.75mm filament with a 0.4mm nozzle. No heated bed, just blue painters tape. Didn’t get any warping here, but parts with bigger surface area can be a bit difficult to remove from the glass bed.
You like that series 1? Beautiful machine just out of my budget…
Why steel screws? I’ve seen a few people talking about tumbling with metal media, but I haven’t come upon an explanation. Is the media transferring to the part surface, or (in this case) is the media abrading the plastic but compacting the impregnated bronze? Is the color a product of the part itself or part + tumbling media?
One would guess that steel is harder than bronze/copper/pla and so does a good job of abrasion.
The tiny edges of a steel screw also does a good job of getting at the nitty gritty. The commercial tumbling material are usually nobby or pyramid shapes that are resin bound abrasives, like alumina or silicon carbide.
Steel nails is a very cost effective and fairly uniform tumbling medium.
Can you post photo of the tumbling setup? Thx
@Jon_Gordon It’s makes some pretty nice parts. If your looking to print large items, that may justify the price. @Tim_Visible Pretty much what @Wing_Wong mentioned. I got the idea to use a tumbler and screws from youtube. I used steel screws with bronzeFill parts to retain the original color. On copperFill parts, I use brass screws which gives it a ‘rose gold’ look. @Step_Cia I’m using a tumbler from Lortone (3A Single Barrel Tumbler), it’s on amazon for about 90USD. I’ll posts up some more pics of different parts. This is actually a custom chess set we’re designing.
That looks a lot better than any of my attempts of finishing. Thanks for the hint on using steel screws!
What happens when you tumble regular filaments? Looking at the photo, the polish now looks more like steel than bronze.
Some folks have tumbled normal filament. Using the right tumbling medium(size), you can smooth out the layer lines on a print. But it can also remove detail.