Affordable multi color fdm 3d printing? (Anycubic Kobra 3 Combo)

[Alan Timm]

It's crazy how much this has advanced and the price has come down over time.  On sale for $379 (normally $550) for anyone who has a use case for multi color printing.  Kitty-Flexi-Calico anyone?

https://store.anycubic.com/products/kobra-3-combo?variant=44400112205986

Years ago I tried out dual filament printing using pla and pva for nonstick supports, but no matter how much i purged there was some amount of pva in the nozzle making the pla prints more brittle.  maybe with this approach it would work better?

[Chris Albertson]

THis works if you want the color to change at a given hight.   But is very poor if you need the color stripes to be not horizontal.  To be general purpose you need to use more then one print head on the printer.

For robots, I don’t think we care much about color but using different types of plastic in the same part might be good.   I have been wanting to mix ABS and TPU to make robot jpoints that are a little bit compliant.  It to make soft pads and fingers and feet.

The other way to make multi-color parts is to cut the part and print each sub-part in a different color then use CA glue to assemble.  

THis is a good way to make TPU tires over ABS wheels or to print tank tracks with TPU pads on each link.

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[Alan Timm]

Hey Chris,

Actually with modern slicers and this style of multi color extruder it can arbitrarily swap colors within the same layer.

https://youtu.be/6cFOOzAoupo?t=221

Here's a quick pic of a purge tower that is used to clear the nozzel between color swaps.  it does significantly increase the print time and I think other slicers bury the purge inside the print as an option.

[Alan Timm]

Another fun short clip showing a multi color print timelapse:

https://www.youtube.com/shorts/67yMsqEjbow

[Chris Albertson]

Yes, of course you can do multiple flushes per layer.   But as said, it is not what you like to do, You waste a lot of time and plastic.    Multiple print heads speed this up but they add cost to the printer.

How this works depends on if these are cosmetic models for show or if they are mechanical parts.  With artwork, you can bury some of the purges inside but with funtional parts, you care more about internal structure.