Hi guys. I don't know much about 3d printing and I would appreciate some

3D Printing
, , ,
1

Hi guys. I don’t know much about 3d printing and I would appreciate some guidance.

I would like to know if is possible to print models using 2 or 3 different “colors” and if so which kind/brand of 3d printer I should look into.
Thank you very much.

2

There’s a lot of printers with dual extruders. I’ve built machines with up to 4. Anything more than a single nozzle takes a while to tune, and anything more than 2 is a challenge, even for advanced users.
Recommend either a dual extruder machine with the expectation that you’ll be learning by starting with 1 color capability only, or one of the several filament mixing/ coloring peripherals that were on kickstarter recently, but those probably won’t be out for a while, idk if they’re taking pre orders after their campaigns ended.

3

Care to share some more info about your planned usage, budget, and requirements? There’s a big range of options here.

4

I started with a ReprapPro Tricolour a year ago and haven’t looked back. Not exactly easy to build and a steep learning curve but within a month I could bang out some pretty awesome three colour prints. I was a total novice then, but was willing to learn. The frustration was worth it.

5

Agree w these sentiments. It is becoming more commonplace. Our PrintrBot plus dual is an option but we warn buyers how hard it is up front :wink:

6

@Ryan_Carlyle actually I work at an electron microscopy lab. I got this idea of not only take images but also reconstruct samples using a 3d printer. However most materials have different components and it would be nice to differentiate them with the use of color.

7

Thank you all for the information and for sharing your experiences. I’ll look more into your suggestions.

8

For some tips on tri-colour mixing with a delta printer visit http://deltaprinter.co.za/tri-colour/index.html