Finding heat resistant glass in Toronto...

I cracked my first sheet of glass today.

Trying to get it hot enough for ABS to stick. PLA was working fine.

The glass was standard window pain from the local hardware store. So, I knew it might crack trying to reach ABS working temperatures.

I tried to find borosilicate glass, but the shop I called only had something else that was ungodly expensive.

So, the obvious questions are:

What are others using.

What should I look for.

And where can I get it in the GTA?

Scarborough preferred.

I cracked open the yellow pages (www.yellow.ca) and looked for GLASS.

I ended up buying 3mm tempered glass plates. If you are lucky you might find a local guy who will cut some excess stock. But that didn't work for me.

In the end I had to pay about $20/sheet for "custom ordered" glass. 2 week lead time.

To fill in the wait time, I just used picture frame glass from dollarama, and covered it with Kapton tape. When it breaks

1) its only a $1
2) the kapton kept all the shards in one place.


Good luck.

I also broke a sheet of glass trying to reach 120ºC. I was trying to make ABS stick to glass the way PLA does. It seems the 3mm standard glass can only handle 110ºC.

My solution was to print on a copper clad board covered with kapton tape. I placed it on top of the same 3mm glass (for flatness). ABS stick extremely well at 100ºC and when the print is finished i can pull the copper clad board off and bend it to release the parts. It leaves the tape fully intact aside from a few new bubbles that i pop with a razor blade.

I also clean the tape surface with acetone after every print.

ABS on glass is a noble goal.

I've have the pleasure of printing 3 different manufactures ABS on bare clean (acetone) 100 heated glass. My results were "interesting"

Only Clear ABS from one of the Chinese suppliers would stick to the bare glass. Once printed, and cool, the print would come right off.

I am still unable to make any other colour, or manufactures ABC stick to bare glass.

I have tried the following "tricks:"

Start the first layer very slow
Start the first layer height on the surface of the glass (not microns above it)
Start with the bed temp as hot as I can get it (100C)

Not sure why, but only the clear would work. I miss not being able to print on glass. It really is a treat when it works. And saves me a LOT of kapton


Regards

What do you mean by "clear", is it transparent, or just the natural colour?

If it is natural is it cream or white?

I

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[www.hydraraptor.blogspot.com]

----snip---------
What do you mean by "clear", is it transparent, or just the natural colour?

If it is natural is it cream or white?
------end------

Hi Nophead,

The 3mm Clear ABS I tried was fully transparent clear. I have also tired "natural" from the same supplier and it did not stick to the glass. (same glass 3mm tempered, same heat bed)

I have attached a few photos of the Clear ABS, and in the same photos you can see the White, and Natural. For comparison I have also shown black, and green. The second photo is a better shot with the 3 "colours" white, natural, and clear.

To this day, I have not had any other ABS stick to glass as well as I had the clear stuff. I presumed that the lack of pigment in the ABS was the secret.

Funny enough, I got a sample in the mail of Red from yet another supplier, and my preliminary results look promising. But I am not prepared to say until I get more than 1 meter through the machine and stuck to the glass.

Hope this offers some insight to this quest.

Regards

Thanks for the pictures.I have read that clear ABS does exist but I have never seen any before.

When you bend it does it bruise like ABS or snap like PLA?

I also can't get ABS to stick to glass but there are a lot of different blends of ABS, even before you start adding pigments, so that might be what makes the difference.

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[www.hydraraptor.blogspot.com]

Until you asked the question, I was prepared to say bends. But I left the computer, found a scarp, and I have to say it snapped clean. I now have to wonder what I was shipped with my "sample." I can barely smell my ABS so I never notice a difference in smell between ABS and PLA. Do you know of another test I can do to quantify what I might have?

I ordered and paid for 4 specific colours, and was shipped 3 different colours. I now have to question if what was shipped was even ABS. I have some PLA (trans blue) I now have to try an experiment to see if a hotter bed temp (and nozzle temp) can get that to stick to glass.

Too many experiments, not enough time.

It has been a while since I worked with that clear. I do not have much left. of all the spools of Filament I have used, that was the only spool that shattered. There was a thread on here not too long ago about someone reporting there spool breaking.

On this clear spool, I discovered one morning the whole line of filament had snapped clean every few meters throughout the entire spool; and subsequently unwound. It made printing with it a new challenge to calculate what I thought I could print based on each random length part.

Some day I will make a filament joiner, and start using up all the scarp lengths I have laying around.

Regards

I think the clear must be PLA. That would explain it sticking to glass and being brittle. An easy test would be to put it in recently boiled water. If it is PLA it will go soft and jelly like.

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[www.hydraraptor.blogspot.com]

I learn stuff every day. Thanks.

If PLA sticks to glass I might order more of that. That would also explain why my hot end did strange stuff after I switched from the Clear to Black.

grrrrr at that supplier.

-----------snip-------
I think the clear must be PLA. That would explain it sticking to glass and being brittle. An easy test would be to put it in recently boiled water. If it is PLA it will go soft and jelly like.

----------end----------


Well, I took a few moments and did the hot water test to see what I had.

Some background Info for those just joining us......

I ordered and paid for 4 spools of ABS filament from somewhere offshore. When I received the spools they were 4 different colours from what I ordered. I am now wondering if this mystery Clear filament actually is ABS or PLA.

I clipped a few inches of a know trans Blue PLA, also clipped a short segment of a known silver ABS, and lastly I clipped a similar amount of this mystery Clear.

Nophead had suggested that to test if it is PLA or ABS, I could put some in boiled water. (a known 100 C.) PLA would go soft, and ABS would maintain its structure. I put the kettle on, and proceeded to make a nice cup of tea, and I brought the water to a good rolling boil, and then poured water into a mug.

In went the Grey ABS , Clear Mystery , and Blue PLA. I think a picture is worth a 1000 words. (see attached)

The Grey ABS stayed hard, the Blue PLA went soft like cooked pasta, and the mystery Clear stayed hard like ABS.

I am officially stumped.

If this Mystery Clear is ABS, why does it snap and print to glass like PLA, yet if it is PLA, why will it not go soft in boiling water?

I defer to the collected wisdom of the group.

Regards

The clear could be polycarbonate I suppose.

There are other tests you can do like: [www.boedeker.com] and [www.modernplastics.com].

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[www.hydraraptor.blogspot.com]

I found an amazing solution to this problem today.

If you have failed prints laying around (ABS), dissolve them in acetone until you get a thick liquid. I call it slurry. Spread a thin, even layer on the glass when its cold. The acetone will evaporate and leave an ABS film. You can then heat up the bed and print. The printed ABS sticks extremely well to the film and it also releases with ease when cooled (just like PLA).

Advantages:
1. Excellent adhesion
2. Excellent release of cooled part
3. Practical use for failed prints / rafts / skirts / scraps etc.
4. Way cheaper than Kapton tape + copper clad board (which i was previously using)
5. Perfectly flat bottoms (no extrusion lines either)

Disadvantages:
1. You have to apply the slurry to the glass before every print.
2. You have to clean the film off with a razor blade after every print.
3. You have to peel, and sometimes cut, the film off of the finished part.
4. You have to match the color of the slurry to the color you are currently using.
5. Acetone is flammable and poisonous and also smells bad.

From reading Nophead's blog, i think i know why it works. It creates an airtight seal with the glass that is also larger than the part. The airtight seal prevents corners lifting the same way a raft does.

PS: this is normal picture frame glass at 100ºC

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 02/24/2012 10:07PM by aplavins.

Sorry to hijack this thread back to its origin...

I found out that RichRap was printing on glass 'Trevets' found in Kitchen stores. (in the States anyway... )

I searched all the local kitchen stores I knew and came up empty. Benilex(sp?) had something close...

I did a web search and found Bed Bath & Beyond had some on clearence. However, this meant not at the stores. I had to order from the web site.

So, I searched the kitchen and found an ols white glass Trevet. It was slightly small fo the bed and had a pebeled serface. However the bottom was shiny smooth!

Tried it on my hot bed. Took the heat fine. The ABS stuck to it great as long as it was hot enough, and the finish was sweet.

So, I ordered a couple Monogram Trivets from BB&B. They fit my bead perfectly!

However, the Monograming is painted on the bottom. The top is textured.

Thankfully the texturing is very low. But I tried printing on the flat bottoms first.

My ABS sticks fine to it. (Again heat dependant) But the black for the monograming transfers to the prints. Makes for interesting bottoms.

I may try paint remover... but it's working as is.

@Komb': I ordered 4 of the trevets from BB&B and I'll let you know how they work for me when they arrive. Thanks for the advice!

@Nophead: fredlatesta gave me a sample of his mystery clear filament and I believe it is ABS. I was able or dissolve it in acetone, make a 360º bend in it without it snapping. Using your burn method, it produced a yellow-orange flame that was blue on the bottom, produced sooty smoke with an acrid smell and dripped. It also stayed alight after the flame source was removed. It also has a similar melting temperature to ABS.

Aplavins,

Thank you so much for that confirmation about the clear ABS. By any chance did you risk running it through your printer to see if it stuck to glass?

re-inspired by all the talk of printing on glass, I when home, and tried a few more prints on glass with different ABS, on 3mm tempered glass; no luck.

That clear stuff really is magical.


Regards