Originally shared by Whosa whatsis
I played with the PC-ABS from ProtoPasta today, and it’s quickly becoming my new favorite printing material. It looks similar to natural ABS (though maybe a little whiter) and has a matte appearance that, in conjunction with the slight translucency that makes natural ABS appear smoother, completely hides the 150-micron layer lines, at least on vertical surfaces. If we can find ways to make all materials extrude with this type of finish, worrying about unsightly layer lines may be a thing of the past.
The texture of the surface also seems to allow acetone to penetrate the top-most layer faster so that a quick dunk removes the layer lines completely and makes the surface shiny (though care needs to be taken to prevent evaporative cooling from condensing moisture out of the air, which clouds the surface). A longer exposure to acetone made the surface turn white and crack. My vapor bath is out of commission right now (broke the glass lid), so I haven’t tried that.
The material also handles overhangs and bridges amazingly well. I printed this gear double-size and at a weird angle to test supports (with Cura), and the results were incredible. The same-material supports were tough and not the easiest to remove, but they came off cleanly. After cleaning off the few bits left behind, you could barely make out the orientation of the layer lines, and the supported/overhanging surfaces looked just as good as the top surfaces, making it hard to tell the top from the bottom.
Printed using my normal ABS settings, including platform at 110C, but with the extrusion temperature raised to 280C. It stuck fine to kapton without ABS juice, and (at least at the sizes I’ve tried so far) it hasn’t shown any of the adhesion/warping problems that I’ve seen with pure polycarbonate.
