What is a Feinstgefräste Plate and what's the difference between it and a Dauerdruckplatte?

I live in the United states and am looking at different build surfaces. Recently I found that Germany has standalone build plates made from pei coated aluminum. I know that this is called a Dauerdruckplatte. I was looking for where I could buy one and found that they are incredibly hard to find. What I am finding however, is a thing called a Feinstgefräste plate for sale. What's the difference between them and which type is better?

Feingefräst means precision milled. It doesn't tell you anything about the surface except that it is precisely level.
What is often used in germany are aluminum plates precision milled from both sides because they tend to deform very evenly when heated and don't warp much.
You can combine such a precision milled plate with a PEI surface coating.
The Dauerdruckplatte isn't neccessarily made from aluminum, i use one based on a 0.8mm fiberglas plate that is fixed with clamps on a precision milled aluminum plate.

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[www.bonkers.de]
[merlin-hotend.de]
[www.hackerspace-ffm.de]

Okay. So a Feinstgefräste would be the type that is a standalone build plate?

According to this site, found via a quick web search, Feintgefraste plate is simply cast aluminum tooling plate similar to MIC6 or ALCA5. The plate is cast, not extruded, so it has random grain orientation which keeps expansion even as it heats, makes precision machining easy, and is milled flat and supplied with plastic tape on both sides to protect the milled finish.

Cast tooling plate makes a great bed plate if you put a layer of Kapton, PET, or PEI on it. It is flat and stays that way when heated, and unlike glass, it heats evenly and it won't ever break or cut you. You can drill holes in it to mount it on a 3 point leveling system.

I have been printing on a 317 x 305 x 6.35 mm cast tooling plate bed with clean 5 mil Kapton tape for almost 3 years, mostly ABS, and get great results.

Here's a 254 mm diameter ABS print:



Here's a Taz 3 printer with a heater glued directly to a glass bed- notice the 30C variation in temperature over the surface of the plate:



After that glass bed broke, I replaced it with a cast aluminum bed plate. Here's the same printer with the heater attached to the cast tooling plate:



Notice the minimal temperature variation across the surface.

When I replaced the bed I converted the leveling system from 4 points to 3. Leveling and zeroing is now a trivially simple, and the machine holds the settings for a long time so doesn't need a lot of retweaking.





Cast tooling plate is relatively heavy, and may require reducing acceleration if retrofitting an existing printer in which the bed moves in the Y axis. Some people will say "aluminum has a delicate surface and scratches easily", but scratches don't matter because they're under a layer of tape anyway. If you did something that scratched/gouged the aluminum, you probably would have broken a glass plate.

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 05/22/2016 12:55PM by the_digital_dentist.

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Ultra MegaMax Dominator 3D printer: [drmrehorst.blogspot.com]

Yes.
Here you can see the two plates i was talking about in my old printer

Precision milled aluminum build plate


PEI coated Dauerdruckplatte clamped on the build plate

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[www.bonkers.de]
[merlin-hotend.de]
[www.hackerspace-ffm.de]

Okay. Thank you for the info.

"Feinstgefräst" = "smoothestly milled" = "milled" + PR slang.

Precision milled would be "präzisionsgefräst" (and also a promise into quality).

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