I’ve had a few customers ask about filament storage lately. I know this varies depending on environment, so I was just curious as to how everyone stores their filament - and if you have any suggestions for newbie printers.
Personally, we have our printers in our basement and humidity relatively stays the same in that area, so we’ve stored filament in the same bags they’ve come in, with their desiccant, back in the box. We’ve never had an issue so far with any moisture.
I know some people go all out with airtight filament storage systems - if so, how’d you come to storing them that way? Would love to see how everyone does that - including DIY storage solutions.
I just put filament of all types in ziploc bags Nylon gets silica but not much else. I used to be very careful everything got silica gel but now I don’t bother, it doesn’t seem to be an issue for me.
Alberta being a fairly dry place, I had been just storing my filaments like everyone else - spool in ziplock bag with silica packets and then shove it back in the box. This year has been pretty humid, though, and I’ve been having a lot of stinging issues. Especially with the major culprits like PETG, but even some with PLA. So I decided to get a dryer.
I ended up with the Eibos Easedry. It had fairly positive reviews, it was something I could print with - useful both because I tend to do a lot of long duration prints and because I was needing an external spool holder anyway - and because I liked the idea of a fan to vent the humid air. Anyone whose been in a car in winter knows how trapped moisture can be a problem!
All in all I’m content with it. I put a spool of PETG that had been just awful in the dryer, left it for a few hours, and had really clean prints thereafter, despite the local humidity being so bad I felt like I was visiting England. It works well as a spool holder, though it’s a little awkward to get the filament out of the little hole. You have stick the end through and then get the spool in without crushing anything.
My hygrometer isn’t working - apparently this is a common problem - and I feel like they could have found a better retention method than the little, easily lost elastic. But those are minor niggles.
The price wasn’t too bad nor did shipping take too long (at least by ?post?-pandemic standards), and it does what I wanted it to do.
I am making a DIY dry box based on this YouTube video:
I add PTFE tubes to the valves through which the filament leaves to dry box so that the filament stays in a tube up to where it is introduced into the extruder. The ends of the tubes are sealed on all filament tubes not in use at a certain moment. So changing the filament means just connecting the tube from the different filament to which I want to change. All parts used in this dry box that can be printed are available.
I use the PrintDry vacuum containers. They’re excellent but pricey. Any time I see them on sale for less than 70 CAD per 5-pack, I pick up another set or two. I’ve only got 30 of them at the moment, so I have a handful of rolls in vacuum bags until I can get another couple 5-packs of the containers on sale. If anything needs to go into a vacuum bag because of container shortage, it’s PLA. All PETG, Nylon, TPU/TPE, and PC filaments are always in the containers if not printing with them, during which they are in a dryer.
I use Ziplock bags with dessicant. The large ones from Costco fit a 1KG roll nicely.
I have converted an American Harvester food dryer to use for the times that I need to dry some filament.
