Now selling PLA and ABS filament at toybuilderlabs.com

[Joseph Chiu]

Hi everyone,

As many of you already know, we've been selling ABS and PLA filament for some time through our online store at Tindie.   

Now, I am pleased to announce our very own online store: http://toybuilderlabs.com 

We have plenty of PLA and ABS filament in stock, with a good selection of colors.  The filament is available in 1.75 and 3.00 mm nominal diameter, and is spooled on wide-core plastic spools.

Thanks,

Joseph Chiu

toybuilderlabs.com

[delsydsoftware]

Very nice!
Bookmarked for payday  :)

[Gernreich]

Can you go over what distinguishes your plastic, PLA in my instance that makes a better choice than sainsmart, jet, octave, zen, rainbot, MBI and possibly others?  I just started out with my rep2 and really have no clear idea of which to buy from.  And opinions are varied as to which is the one to use.

-Gernreich

[Joseph Chiu]

Well, the key thing is to buy filament that has been manufactured explicitly for 3D printing.  In the past, there was a lot of plastic filament that were originally made for plastic welding applications, where the quality of the plastic and the dimensional control was not as critical as it is for 3D printing.

ABS and PLA filament are all basically made by the same process -- the source material should be virgin plastic pellets, but lower-grade products may use some or a lot of recycled plastic ('regrinds').  There should be screens in the extruder to catch impurities so that you don't get foreign particles into your extruder and possibly jamming your nozzle.  The plastic should be consistent in diameter over the entire reel - or at least not swing quickly between different thickness.   The filament should ideally be perfectly round, although in reality, some amount of ovalness is likely to occur.  The filament should be one continuous string -- there has been reports of some brands where one string of filament ended, and was attached to the next with a piece of tape, or tied together with a knot!  (Those spools were most likely made for plastic welding applications.)   There also were reports of some filament with a big bulge of plastic -- possibly from where two strings were fused together.

Different grades of plastic have different strengths, "meltiness", shrink, adhesion, smell, UV resistance, etc.  They also have different melting temperatures and different behavior as they are melted.  This is due to the different additives to the PLA or ABS that give the plastic its color and performance.   I don't have my plastic analyzed to that level of detail.

While I can't absolutely attest 100% that every roll that I have in my inventory is flawless, my factory has assured me that the filament they produce comes from virgin plastic, made with a controlled master batch, extruded with a screen, extruded continuously for each spool, and laser-micrometered to control the size.   So far, the people I have sent the filament to have said it's good.  And before I bought my lot, I talked to two printer makers that have both said that the factory I selected makes pretty good stuff.

Joseph

(BTW, sorry for the cross-post to the multiple lists -- I should have realized that I was doing that, but didn't -- I removed the groups on the visible to/cc lines in this reply, so hopefully, that'll cut the cross-posting now.)

[Scott Jones]

Just got my black and white PLA and 24 minutes later I have a new friend ... printed him with MW default medium settings.

Only issue is that the MB spool is too big, What spool would you suggest I print?

[Joseph Chiu]

I am sorry to say that I am not currently set up to take international orders.

On Apr 17, 2013 1:56 PM, "Arik Czerniak" <ar...@supersonicads.com> wrote:

do u ship international?

[Jay Raxter]

Joseph,

Order sent!

Jay

[Michael Carnright]

#10 :-D

-Gernreich

[delsydsoftware]

Hmmm, i'll have to try to order from home later tonight. I think our network at work is blocking something on the page. I can add stuff to the cart, but when I try to checkout, it hangs and gives me a blank page in Firefox. When I try in IE, I get a corporate firewll warning that says:

Technical Information:
URL: "http://toybuilderlabs.com/pla-175/red-pla-filament-175mm-1kgroll"
Your username: "<guest>"
Category: "unavailable;Weapons"

[MarksLaboratory]

Got my order of black ABS today. Only took 2 days to get here. Looking forward to trying it out!

On Tuesday, April 16, 2013 10:43:35 PM UTC-4, Joseph Chiu wrote:

[Darrell jan]

Picked up glow-in-the-dark PLA and white ABS today!

On Friday, April 19, 2013 2:15:26 PM UTC-7, xenogear.alpha wrote:

Looks like you have a nice selection of colors in PLA.  The next time I need a spool I'll try some from your store.  Bookmarked.

On Tuesday, April 16, 2013 7:43:35 PM UTC-7, Joseph Chiu wrote:

[Joseph Chiu]

Thanks to everyone that have purchased from our store so far.  I would love hear and see pictures of the prints that you guys make with the filament!

I have posted a Replicator 2 spool holder that was done with the Customizer! to fit our spool.  I hope to have other spool holder designs up in the next few days.

Thanks again!

Joseph Chiu

toybuilderlabs.com

[Gernreich]

Is the spool holder on thingiverse?  I don't see it on your website.

-Gernreich

[Joseph Chiu]

I should have posted the link to the thing!  Sorry about that!  

The spool holder for the Replicator 2 is at http://www.thingiverse.com/thing:76274

Thanks.

Joseph

On Fri, Apr 19, 2013 at 3:39 PM, Gernreich <gern...@gmail.com> wrote:

Is the spool holder on thingiverse?  I don't see it on your website.

-Gernreich

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[Scott Jones]

Thanks for sending the samples.... just want to check the colors.

Red, Orange, Yellow, ?, Green, Blue, Powder Blue, ?, Black, ?, white, ?, natural

[Joseph Chiu]

I now have the Replicator (Original) spool holder up on Thingiverse as well.  

I've started to catalog them in a central location: http://toybuilderlabs.com/spool-holders/

[Joseph Chiu]

That should be red, orange, yellow, yellow-green, blue, powder blue, pink, black, cool grey, white, glow-in-dark, silver, natural -- in that order.

I now have gold PLA as well.

[Darrell jan]

Heh, I just asked him that same question yesterday. Except I forgot about soft PLA. Short answer was no in the near term, but I should let Joseph answer the details himself.

On Saturday, April 20, 2013 10:12:36 AM UTC-7, ddurant34 wrote:

Any plans to include materials like IMPLA or wood/nylon/etc?

 
On Tuesday, April 16, 2013 10:43:35 PM UTC-4, Joseph Chiu wrote:

[Darrell jan]

Joseph,

Thanks, by the way, for the useful advice the yesterday. It turned out my vertical rods were indeed a bit loose. Maybe they came that way, or maybe they got that way from months of pulling things off the bed. 

I will have to get around to posting pictures of the glow in the dark (GITD) PLA. It seems to require a lower temperature. I usually print PLA at about 190C, but with the GITD PLA I was getting a "foamy" effect that I've heard others talk about. I got noticeable improvement at 175C. Also tried 170C which started fine but then air printed. Maybe 173C, or maybe I'll need to adjust the temp during the print.

Regards,

Darrell

On Saturday, April 20, 2013 7:50:05 AM UTC-7, Icepick wrote:

I just ordered 3 rolls. White, Blue, and Silver. I If possible, It would be great if you could include in the shipment, a small cutting sample, like the one posted in this thread. Sometimes, it is hard to get a true idea on what a color looks like on a comp screen. As I have recently had some bad luck with a white purchased from a different vendor (It looked like a string of pearls on the entire roll), I am looking forward to trying out your filament. 

-IcePick

On Tuesday, April 16, 2013 10:43:35 PM UTC-4, Joseph Chiu wrote:

[Joseph Chiu]

I have not done a whole lot with the GITD, but you're right - that filament was one of the meltier ones.  I even have a print that looks like ABS with a long acetone vapor treatment! I generally use a strong cooling fan when printing with PLA to get the best results.  Clearly, there is more than one way to get the desirable result.

[Darrell jan]

Hmm, what happened to ddurant's question? I don't even see a "this message has been deleted" message. You can still see it in my trail below.

[Darrell jan]

OK, now I see. It depends if I'm looking at the Makerbot Users group or the 3D Printer Tips group. I didn't know that you could simultaneously post in more than one group.

[Darrell jan]

Using GITD filament from Joseph. The left most ring was printed at 190C. Very bubbly.The middle ring at 175C, much better, but a ways to go. And Yoda at 172C. Looks about as good as I get with any PLA, with 0.05 mm layers. My phone camera doesn't capture much detail in the dark, but it's there.

[Joseph Chiu]

I don't know where the final good print went right now, but this was one of my first attempts on my GITD filament when I had it running to hot...  It was stringy and oozy. Perhaps the lesson here is to not be afraid of going cooler.  In general I like running hotter because the layers tend to fuse better, and I can run faster speeds. ..

[Joseph Chiu]

Oops, clicked send before attaching the picture below.

[Gernreich]

Order #10 arrived, thanks!

-Gernreich

[Joseph Chiu]

I had a nice chat this morning with Dan this morning, including the question of GITD plastic.   Some ideas that came up is the possibility that the material that actually makes the filament GITD may itself have a much lower melting point, or that to reduce damaging its glow properties, the plastic blend is designed for a lower temperature.  One side effect of this is that perhaps there may be different cooling between the PLA and the GITD "pigment" that is causing aggregates to form as the filament is being manufactured.  Dan and I both have seen GITD plastic have a noticeably rough texture to them.

[Darrell jan]

Sometime I forget that you can look up almost anything on the internet these days. 

It seems that older GITD products were colored with zinc sulfide plus a copper dopant. More recently, strontium aluminate is used, and said to be far superior, though more expensive.  Either chemical is inorganic, unlike plastics, so it should have a much higher melting point. (Strontium aluminate loses its phospescent properties if subjected to over 1090C! Don't think my heater is that strong.) But, the problem may be putting enough powder into the plastic to get good luminosity, yet not so much that it overly degrades the plastic properties.

http://www.chromacolors.com/news.html

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zinc_sulfide

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strontium_aluminate

[delsydsoftware]

I just received my filament today. I haven't had a chance to use it yet, but I will say that I like the way the spools are wound already. So many other filament companies use small spools and overwind them, so you spend the first 4-5 prints trying to keep the filament from popping off of the spool and tangling. There seems to be a really good amount of space between the edge of the reels and the filament. I look forward to printing with this filament later this week. :)

[Eighty]

Got my order last night, and printed up a sample this morning.  I just grabbed a test file (sliced on MW at 200 um).  Printed very well, even with the default 230C!

 The filament varied from 1.74 to 1.76 in all the spots I measured.  Much less variation than the usual spools from elsewhere.

 

One thing I did notice, though, is that the spool hole is slightly small.  I could cram my MBI spool holder into it, but the spool wouldn't turn freely.  So I just used a different spool holder.

[delsydsoftware]

I printed a couple things with the blue PLA I ordered, and it prints really well at 200C.

[Darrell jan]

Joseph,

Is "natural" ABS also transparent?

Darrell

[TheMakerGuy]

I hope to try your stuff this weekend. I was going to try last week as I thought my current Ultimaker spool went bad but it was actually a clog in my nozzle which got worse and so I am down right now. I did receive new parts and will get it going. It never occured to me that particles could get into the bowden tube and travel up and into the hot end. I will need to blow all that crap out of the tube before I try yout filament.

[Joseph Chiu]

Hi Brad,

Thanks for your purchase!   I wish I could wave a magic wand to make your Rep 2x to arrive just as quickly! :)

The spoolholders for the Replicator and Replicator2 are listed Thingiverse.  You can find them through my website: http://toybuilderlabs.com/spool-holders/  - I don't have a 2x to measure the size of the spool holder cutout - but I expect one of them to work.  They are basically the same, but with different width tongues, because the original Replicator has a narrower slot that the holder went into.

Thanks!

Joseph

http://toybuilderlabs.com

On Thu, Apr 25, 2013 at 10:33 AM, Brad Warren <ryl...@gmail.com> wrote:

Joseph, do you know of an .stl for a spool holder that fits these?

[Mark Rudolph]

Joseph,

I printed off the spool holder at  http://www.thingiverse.com/thing:76274 listed as "Replicator 2 (Possibly 2X?)" on toybuilderlabs. You can take off the possibly 2X part, because it doesn't; the slot on the 2X is too narrow. A little "3D editing" with a pair of wire cutters made it fit though!

[Scott Jones]

I tried to print the spool holder and I canceled it at 78% when I realized it was way to big to fit the slot on the back of the Rep2.

The hole on the back of the Rep2 is 37 mm wide the tab on the MB spool is 33 mm wide.  At 78% I cancelled at 42 mm.

After looking at what I downloaded...and I guess my fault for not checking your model is 45 mm wide.

This is the one I downloaded....http://www.thingiverse.com/thing:76274 did I do the wrong one?

[Joseph Chiu]

Scott, I apologize - I had relied on the customizer to size the holder.   I have withdrawn the design files from Thingiverse, and am now pointing everyone (Replicator, 2, and 2X) to the same design: http://www.thingiverse.com/thing:77261

I will send you a private message about reimbursing you for the wasted print.

Joseph

[Scott Jones]

I know it's kinda basic and is also a sample file...but here is the Stretchy Bracelet in your black PLA.

Printing at 240 made it shiny..... my niece really likes it.

[TobyCWood]

I'd betcha it'd be just as shiny at 200C...

[Mark Cohen]

I have used the white 3mm PLA. This worked fine in my Ultimaker.

On May 1, 2013, at 11:01 AM, iamloremipsum3d <iamlore...@gmail.com> wrote:

 ordered yellow green on Friday, it came Monday!   Seems to print really well so far.  Printing at default settings.  The only issue I had was printing the holder, the tab is too thick for the Replicator 2, but I just carved it down with a knife.  I look forward to ordereing more, especially if the shipping will remain so affordable.


-Brian

[Joseph Chiu]

Thanks MacGyver!  I appreciate the shout-out on your thing page! 

On Sun, May 5, 2013 at 9:39 AM, MacGyver <bdwel...@gmail.com> wrote:

I just received the 3 rolls I purchased from him too.  So far the prints have been wonderful.

http://www.thingiverse.com/make:37545

[Jetguy]

I feel bad, I still need to print a project with the blue that I got. The problem is, it's such a nice filament, I don't want to waste it on some standard object.

I also have some GITD too that is in the same status. It's so expensive, I hate to use it.

Then the absolute worst one of all PVA. I don't dare crack open the sealed bag for fear of the entire roll going bad in the humidity.

[Joseph Chiu]

I printed the entire Advent Calendar set by Peter Leppik back around Christmas, and brown and tan would have been nice to have on at least two presents, plus the base pieces for the tree... So, I totally understand the desire to have those colors.  
Sadly, we don't have tan or brown available at this time.  It is one of those not-quite-popular colors that I would like to carry eventually, but I don't have an ETA when we could do that.

On May 9, 2013 6:32 PM, "66tbird" <joh...@q.com> wrote:

Any chance of getting Tan 1.75mm ABS?  MBI has no plans to restock.

[Joseph Chiu]

Thanks for the positive feedback guys! It is very much appreciated!

On May 11, 2013 8:59 PM, "mathisyourfriend" <mathisyo...@yahoo.com> wrote:

Printed all day (~11 hours worth when this print ends).  No problems at all.  Measurements were all within 1.74-1.76mm.  I'll be ordering more soon.

On Tuesday, April 16, 2013 10:43:35 PM UTC-4, Joseph Chiu wrote:

Hi everyone,

As many of you already know, we've been selling ABS and PLA filament for some time through our online store at Tindie.   

Now, I am pleased to announce our very own online store: http://toybuilderlabs.com 

We have plenty of PLA and ABS filament in stock, with a good selection of colors.  The filament is available in 1.75 and 3.00 mm nominal diameter, and is spooled on wide-core plastic spools.

Thanks,

Joseph Chiu

toybuilderlabs.com

[MacGyver]

That's a very nice print.  What is it you are trying to make?

Thanks,
MacGyver

[Jetguy]

Here is a copy http://www.thingiverse.com/thing:37126

 

I'm moving the original files to a new home away from thingiverse. I'm not telling anyone to not use them or post them, it's just a decision that I had multiple versions and it was way too confusing for folks. Rather than deal with that mess, I pulled them down and will post a much more refined version.

On Saturday, May 18, 2013 7:46:28 PM UTC-4, mathisyourfriend wrote:

Please tell us more about the ultimate ToM.  Are there files I can download?

On Saturday, May 18, 2013 6:00:24 PM UTC-4, Matthew Stonebraker wrote:

Oh, and as an additional note, I was able to use this lovely filament on my brand new custom made Ultimate Thing-O-Matic, courtesy of Jetguy. Out of the box and printing beautiful parts like the one shown without a single headache or failed print. Toybuilderlabs filament+this printer are gonna do big things together.

On Saturday, May 18, 2013 5:37:06 PM UTC-4, Matthew Stonebraker wrote:

Finally got around to using some of your lovely natural ABS. Absolutely no trouble with it and very excellent dimensional tolerance. As a result of my good experience, I'm going to order some PLA. I wish you had some translucent colors, but that's okay.

[Dan Newman]

On 26 May 2013 , at 7:58 PM, mathisyourfriend wrote:

> I like the blue so much I just ordered more. I made the owl test print in it. I lowered the temp and increased the fan as it went up. 187 C with the fan about 1/3 of the way on the slider (Creator) seems good so far (M2).
> Is there some sort of correlation between darkness and print temp?

With PLA, you can get different degrees of crystallization with
different temps. I'm used to some of the translucent PLAs being
a slightly lighter, more sparkly color at higher temps for instance.
Is that the effect you're seeing?

Dan

[Joseph Chiu]

Thanks for the update Mathisyourfriend! 

On Sun, Jun 9, 2013 at 7:35 PM, mathisyourfriend <mathisyo...@yahoo.com> wrote:

Just finished a 4hr 45min print with that same spool of powder blue.  No problems.

On Tuesday, April 16, 2013 10:43:35 PM UTC-4, Joseph Chiu wrote:

Hi everyone,

As many of you already know, we've been selling ABS and PLA filament for some time through our online store at Tindie.   

Now, I am pleased to announce our very own online store: http://toybuilderlabs.com 

We have plenty of PLA and ABS filament in stock, with a good selection of colors.  The filament is available in 1.75 and 3.00 mm nominal diameter, and is spooled on wide-core plastic spools.

Thanks,

Joseph Chiu

toybuilderlabs.com

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[Darrell jan]

That black PLA is indeed good stuff.

On Tuesday, June 11, 2013 6:09:06 PM UTC-7, Robo wrote:

Joseph,

I ordered a single spool of black PLA recently and it arrived extremely fast.  I'm currently printing a spool holder for it.  It measures 1.75mm with a variance of no more than .02mm either way.  I'll post again when I've printed with it but this seems to be very promising stuff.

[Joseph Chiu]

Hi everyone!

Thanks to all of you that have visited us at toybuilderlabs.com (or on Tindie before that!) -- my wife (Taj) and I are working hard to make it easier for everyone to shop for our high-quality filament.  To that end, we have taken our first steps to getting our products on Amazon.com -- you can see our Amazon seller page here: http://www.amazon.com/gp/aag/main?ie=UTF8&asin=&isAmazonFulfilled=&isCBA=&marketplaceID=ATVPDKIKX0DER&orderID=&seller=A3H3SNGPNOI3BR

We would appreciate any positive feedback that you can provide for the filament that you have purchased from us!

Thanks!

Joseph and Taj Chiu - ToyBuilder Labs

On Thu, Jun 13, 2013 at 5:41 AM, Ethan Maretich <ethan.m...@gmail.com> wrote:

Thanks Joseph, just bought a couple ABS spools on the site!

[Joseph Chiu]

Ah, but you can!  That would be very much appreciated!

Under the picture of the product, there is a "share your own related images" link.  You can upload pictures through that!

On Wed, Jun 19, 2013 at 3:56 PM, Matthew Stonebraker <stoneb...@gmail.com> wrote:

It's a shame you can't post pictures in Amazon reviews, I'd love to show off this beauty to help people decide.

[Icepick]

I just put in my second order. I have had virtually no failures related to your filament (I wish I could say the same thing about my Rep2 Lol). You have one me over. :) I have found you black flows like ink, and your White show none of the issues I have found using other companies. Thank you for being there for those of us who have had bad experiences in the past with others.

[Joseph Chiu]

Thanks guys!    As a 3D printing enthusiast, and specifically as an owner of two MakerBot's, I have a personal interest in sourcing the good stuff for myself, and for the community.

Taj and I really appreciate all of your business and support!    There's quite a bit of work behind the scenes here to get the good stuff to to you, our customers.  We really appreciate the positive responses -- it tells us we're focused on the right things!

[James]

I'd been lamenting the fact that I got my HBP Friday, but had failed to order some ABS to try out with it, so finally had a chance to give you a shot. 

Still haven't actually gotten around to installing the HBP, but did order some ABS (and PLA) Friday night.  USPS has already delivered it, evidently.  No lead time + short distance shipping == fastest turnaround I've had ordering filament.  If the filament's near as good of quality as everyone says, I'll be quite happy indeed. 

-James

[James]

Tried the ABS so far - prints pretty well.  Printed a spool holder - turned out quite nice - especially after an acetone vapor bath.

My only beef so far is that the filament pretty much tries to jump off of the spool every chance it gets.  Not sure if a more recessed spool would help, or that's just how ABS is (the PLA I use tends to stay put until it's needed).

-James

[joe...@gmail.com]

Thanks for trying us out, James!

Part of the reason for this is that ABS is less dense and hence take up more space on the spool (vs PLA), bringing the filament closer to the edge.  It s a little trickier to load a fresh spool, but once you do, it should stay put, especially with our spoolholder design that brings the filament closer to the printer body and hence more inline to the feed tube.

If you are still seeing it want to twist off, you might have some residual twist in the filament.  Try this: Remove the filament from the extruder and out of the feed tube, letting the filament hang such that it is "twist neutral" and despooling tangentially to the spool.  Rewind the spool (still mounted on the spool holder) with the now straightened loose filament.  Now, minimizing slack and twists, refeed your machine.    

Joseph

-- Sent from my HP TouchPad

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