Greetings,
I have a student researcher that wants to try 3D printing HDPE for a HS research project. Does anyone have any experience printing HDPE? Any recommendations for filament supplier in the US?
Right now we have Printrbots with the Ubis hot end. I’ve been trying to convince the student to see if any of the new ABS or PLA blends might meet his needs but he seems pretty set on Polyethelene.
Thanks,
Josh
Haven’t heard of this type yet… Quick search i found inventables sells sheets of it, couldn’t find any filament tho…
Interesting experiment http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S-hyB-e8Kys
I ran some high temp stuff last night- worked like a charm. You may have to reset the temp max in the firmware, but don’t go above 270! Carl Ubis says your peek will get soft and bad things could happen. There are accounts of higher temps but that’s way off the reservation 
-brook
IIRC PE warps a lot, but other than that should be workable.
http://reprap.org/wiki/HDPE
http://blog.reprap.org/2009/11/revisiting-hdpe.html?m=0
I have a filament extruder and coincidentally just ordered some HDPE pellets. I can try extruding some for you, since it sounds like you’re in the US. 3mm or 1.75mm?
@Bryan_Boettcher HS in northern VA. 1.75mm is our preferred size on our printer with a heated bed.
Seems to be some question on HDPE of melt temp vs. extrusion temp.
HDPE may be too soft for 1.75mm. I have only used 3mm filament.
It melts at about 130C but, as with all plastic, you need to extrude it considerably hotter to reduce the viscosity and make it bond to the layer below. I used 240C IIRC.
We have a spare 3mm Ubis hot end that we can swap in.
Student will run test print in ABS and once that is successful he will try the HDPE.
HDPE was used on repraps before ABS an PLA. It was abandoned because the warp factor was so high, making it much more difficult to print with. I’ve wanted to try it anyway for some time, but haven’t been able to find a supplier. I backed an Indiegogo project that was supposed to be making some, but recently got a message from them saying that they failed to make HDPE work and offering to send ABS or PLA instead.
You said he wants Polyethylene, but does it have to be HDPE? Polyethylene Terephthalate (PET) is much easier to print with, and is available from http://taulman3d.com/ as “t-glase”.
I just printed with PET a couple days ago and loved it. Polycarbonate and flexible PLA tonite. The later was pretty difficult but the model sucked and my first try at .15mm was a little ambitious. Printing tires and rims for the open R/C project!
Definitely a lot of potential for student researchers to explore the physical properties of these new materials. Not enough solid information out there so excellent opportunity for students to make meaningful contributions to the field
Octave has t-glase on Amazon http://www.amazon.com/Taulman-T-Glase-Polyester-Filament-1-75mm/dp/B00GOKYZ3I/ref=sr_1_1?s=industrial&ie=UTF8&qid=1391622219&sr=1-1&keywords=t-glase
Is this legit or should we order straight from taulman3D?
Thanks for all the advice.