May 15, 2022: NI3DP Part 11 – New Learnings

Part of the fun at FnordCon was playing with (and showing off) the minis and terrain that I had not just painted, but made, myself!
 
A few new lessons for the Tome of 3DP Knowledge . . .
 
The best way I have yet found to purify used alcohol is to put it in a sealed clear plastic bottle (milk jugs work fine; big soda bottles are perfect); leave it in the sun for a day to cure the dissolved resin; leave it in some out-of-the-way place for a couple more days to settle; and then pour the newly-clear alcohol through a filter. The plastic bottle is no longer recyclable; throw it away.
 
It is sometimes easier, with blocky builds like miniature bases or Hexscape pieces, to remove the supports before curing. Try it! (With a delicate build like the skeleton figures, you'd still need nippers, and those seem to work best on cured pieces.)
 
If there are any windows at all in your printing room, some UV is leaking in . . . and it may be worthwhile for you to wipe the edges of the printing plate and/or flexplate before it even goes in the wash.
 
I have noticed that sometimes the Amazon price for a half-liter of resin is less than half of their price for a full liter. So check before you buy!
 
Scraping failed prints off the FEP film gets easier with practice. If you use your finger to push up the film from beneath, right at the edge of the solid resin, it's easier to get the scraper under it. Don't use the corner of the scraper – that's likely to make a scratch! Use alcohol to clean the bottom of the film afterward, of course.
 
For a very tiny and very stubborn bit of stuck resin, I used a single-edge razor blade. Very gently. Once. And it worked. But I'm not actually recommending this, because it could easily have destroyed the film. I just figured that if I couldn't get that resin off, I'd have to change the film anyway.
 
In the quest for a good adhesive for resin parts, I've come to hot glue. Pretty effective. Less convenient, because you have to warm up your glue gun, and the hot glue makes strings when you pull the gun away. But it holds well.
 
I'm now setting my build plate in a slanted tray to drip, rather than just holding it over the vat, and that has really reduced the number of errant, toxic, sticky droplets.