Hello,
Well, I’m off on a new adventure. I have purchased my first printer. I have no idea what I am doing so this will be a bit of a learning curve. I would like to make some parts for my boat that will be exposed to sunlight. To be specific, I will be making a “cup” to go on my boom to hold a spinnaker pole when racing. I will have to do some research on what material will be happy with UV as well as strong enough to hold the weight of the pole and the abuse that might come from putting the pole in the cup during racing.
I am a mechanical designer so I have software to draw the object. This might be trial and error until I get the part perfect.
Any advice or insight is more then welcome.
Chris
Welcome to the Forum.
The most UV resistant material is ASA but I am not sure it is strong enough for what you are looking for it to do. ABS or PC(Polycarbonate ) may be a better fit.
PETG is generally OK for outdoors and is relatively strong. I use PLA outside all the time, some for several years, and see no signs of degradation even though conventional wisdom is that you shouldn’t use it out doors..
There is a learning curve to printing but it isn’t terrible. Stick to basics with the printer IE: use the printers default profile in the slicer. Slicers are the part you need to master, again use he stock profile for your printer and experiment after you have learned some things.
You WILL have print failures, that is part of 3D Printing. Long prints will fail. Don’t get dejected by it, just persevere. It will get better.
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Well, 3D printing’s cheaper than boating (BOAT = Bring Out Another Thousand according some friends that own them) but, both are places to spend your mad money. You can improve UV resistance with the right paint on the printed object… and if you print spares, you can always make a mid race repair… (once you get a design you like figured out).
Welcome to the madness!
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Thank you guys for the welcome and the insight.
Some groups would be sarcastic with new people so thank you again.
Chris
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