What filament are you using?
 

Share what filaments you are using or have used, success or failure.

My favorites:
- 3D Solutech PLA, black, printing at 206 C. This is pretty much my go to. It's cheap, easy to print, made in the US, and gives a bit more of a matte sheen.
- eSun PETG, black, printing at 235C and 75C bed temp. My new go-to filament. More durable and hear resistant than PLA.

Other good ones:
- SainSmart TPU, neon green, printing at 225C and 65C bed. Pretty flexible, and feeds find in my bowden setup.
- Hatchbox PLA, various colors. This is my other go to, but more expensive than Solutech.
- Dazzle Light PLA, grey. Also has a nice matte sheen.
- AIO robotics PLA, neon green.
- TIANSE PLA, white. Also have tried orange, which prints great but it's a funky shade/sheen of orange.

OK, but not great:
- Tritechnox. Hard to get printing right, but had great colors. Company defunct now anyway.
- SUNLU PETG, orange. I just couldn't get this stuff to print well, YMMV.

Bad:
(none so far for me)

Currently loaded:
- ZYLTech PLA - Orange - I have been messing with the settings.. At first it was printing very poorly. Creating "spongy" prints. I turned the temperature from 200c to 215c and some of the issues went away, but the under extrusion kinda still existed. I then turned the Flow up to 115 and things seem much better. I also measured the filament, and it is 1.73 to 1.74mm dia. :/ I suppose I should go and create a material preset for this filament.

Previous filaments:
- ZYLTech PLA - Black - 200c hot end, 60c bed. This stuff printed like a charm! I ordered the orange, above, thinking it was the identical filament... I was WRONG!

I have some SUNLU TPU to test, along with more PLA by ZYLTech, and some ZYLTech PETG, too

Ty

I have only used SUNLU PLA+ in black. It prints beautifully at 200C with a 60C bed temp. However, it is the only stuff I have used so I have nothing to compare it to.

I've been printing the house brands of Filaments.ca and Spool3d.ca PETG, 230 hotend and 80 bed.

Filaflex TPU at 230 and 60 bed.

EDIT: Update, had messed up the temps

Both print beautifully. Minor stringing, which is the only downside to these two materials but very minor, and more retraction is only likely to lead to jamming so I'm happy with it.

Totally experienced this before. Batch to batch, filament diameter can vary but also the pigments between different color can affect ideal print temperature.

Which slicer are you using? I've had nothing but trouble with PETG lately. In fact, I had to tear apart my hot end last night to clear a nasty jam. When it does print, I get so much stringing. I've played with travel speeds, retraction, temperatures, fan speeds and I forget what else. Care to share your settings?

I have a Flashforge, Flashprint is their in-house slicer. I struggled with others (in general, not filament-specific issues), but this works great with my Creator Pro. For PETG, I'm just using a slightly modified PLA profile - edited only the temperature and extrusion multiplier. I'll grab a screenshot of the settings when I get home for more detail.

I do cold-pulls with nylon to clean my nozzle every time I change filaments, have foam-filters on every roll to keep dust out of the hotend, and the all-metal hotend upgrade from Microswiss. Every roll is kept in a Ziploc with desiccant packs. If a roll lasts more than a couple months, I dehydrate them in the oven for a few hours. Less of a concern with PETG, but critical for filament like nylon which needs it prior to every use. Print on borosilicate glass with purple Elmer's gluestick, most parts pop off on their own when the bed cools. If the glue has sat for more than a day, I give it a spray with some Isopropyl alchohol to reactivate it. Very rarely have to reapply, only when enough of the glue has transferred away with prints to reveal bare glass.

Thanks a lot. I'm printing on glass with glue stick as well. Reactivating it with alcohol is a good idea too. I've been cleaning my glass and applying a fresh coat up until now. All of my rolls are stored in Ziploc bags with desiccant packs. This is especially important since my setup is in the basement. I also have a dehumidifier running down there. If I need to start printing hot again, I'll look into an all metal hot end. I've already replaced the plastic extruder with an all metal one. That definitely seems to help with more flexible filament.

Nozzle temp: 230
Platform: 80
Print speed: 60mm/s
Travel speed: 80mm/s
First layer speed: 20mm/s
Retraction:1.5mm
Retraction speed: 50mm/s
Extrusion ratio: 99%
No cooling, no enclosure (PETG doesn't like active cooling, I just leave the doors open on my machine)


There's nothing else specific I do to print PETG. All the other settings are otherwise default PLA profile, and the rest are all either machine specific or supports stuff. Dunno if that helps or not, there's no denying some machines just work better with certain materials than others. Mine has a direct drive extruder, so less retraction is needed, it's very immediate, and I get less stringing by default because of it.

What filament are you using?
 

Freedummy - what surface area you printing that PETG on?

Against my better judgement, I'm trying PETG again, haha! I'm trying your settings Freedummy, and printing on blue painters tape,lightly sanded. So far the first layers are OK! Leaving for work though, so we'll see if I come home to a blob...

Thanks! I took your advice yesterday and tried a modified PLA profile. I'm still working out a bed adhesion issue but I think I have it pretty close to dialed in.

If you ever decide to get an Octoprint server set up, Install Telegram on your phone and set up a bot (instructions here). Using Telegram, I can send a /status text to the bot for a photo of my print bed along with printer stats. If I see a problem, I can send a /abort text to the bot to kill the print. That's barely scratching the surface of what it can do. This way you can keep an eye on things while you're away and avoid coming home to a plate of spaghetti.