Printing with polycarbonate

[pleppik]

Has anyone tried printing with polycarbonate?

I was reading an article the other day ( http://www.protoparadigm.com/2011/12/pr ... carbonate/ ) about printing with polycarbonate. The author suggested an extrusion temperature of 260C which is hot for a Makerbot or one of its cousins, but close to the normal printing temperature for an Up.

I'm curious if anyone has tried this material--it's potentially a lot stronger than ABS, but fussier in some ways (more susceptible to humidity, for example). I'm thinking it might be interesting to play with it a bit to see how it works.

[braneless]

I have some just haven't tried it yet. If nobody reports anything, I will post when I get around to trying it.

[DrewPetitclerc]

I have the Polycarbonate from protoparadigm and I tried it on the ABS settings, the temp was reading 260c but in my estimation it is still too low, the poly is thick and does not want to extrude, the motor struggled to push it, and the build plate temp will most likely need to be higher to keep the warping down.
The test shot I got was about 4 layers before I decided to stop because the edges had curled up so high I knew it would fail soon, after I removed it it continued to curl a bit.
I'm going to wait till we have a software adjustment I can use to increase the temp to get it to flow better and stay hot longer, so back into the bag with desiccant to await another day.
Was worth the money to me to try it, maybe not to others though.
Regards
Drew

[Madox]

I've had some success printing with polycarbonate, my extrusion temperature was around 270+ when I tried it and didn't run into the problems Drew described.

Post more about it later if anyone is interested

[pleppik]

So it sounds like some success, some not.

A more adjustable extrusion temp would help. Success may depend on the vagaries of your own printer and how well calibrated the temperature sensor is.

It may be worth spending a few bucks to experiment on my own. I do occasionally want the option of printing with a stronger material than ABS.

[-soapy-]

Where did you get the filament from?

[JuliaDee]

Where did you get the filament from?

Soapy, see the OP's link to protoparadigm. I tried it yesterday, and got results almost identical to those I'm seeing with clear PLA - manual extrude works fine, print starts out OK but after the first dozen lines or so of the raft, the feed gear loses traction and extrusion stops.

PC would be a great material to have available, I'm going to keep trying, with cooling air to the feeder and if necessary Drew's pressure gizmo.

julia