Silicone Hot End for 3D Printer: Difference between revisions

Understanding the market

A non-trivial cost of building a 3D printer is buying the hotend. In some parts of the world, the cost of importing hotends is prohibitive. Without considering the cost of shipping to remote areas of the world, a low-end hotend described as the "most affordable 3D printer hotend yet" retails for almost $32^[1]. A hotend cast from silicone and nichrome wire in a printed PLA mold would significantly increase the availability of hotends in remote areas.

Project goals

This project seeks to design a 3D printed mold in PLA to cast a silicone based hot end, into which a nichrome wire can be inserted as a heating element.

Considerations include:

• Design of mold
• Choice of silicone
• Design of casting process
  • Inserting silicone
  • Nichrome wire placement
  • Channel for filament

Design

The male and female molds were designed in FreeCAD to replicate an existing hot end design. The first iteration of hot ends were cast, but ultimately failed due to very long cure times and large trapped air bubbled. The improved method of producing the silicone body involves painting a thin layer of silicone onto the male mole and letting it cure. Then, the nichrome wire is wrapped around the barrel, and the thermistor affixed with silicone. From there, a pin is used to make a small hole at the end of the barrel in order to insert a 0.5mm pencil lead piece on the end of the mold to keep the channel for the melted filament to pass through at an even diameter. The whole piece is then painted in multiple thin layers of silicone, waiting for it to cure between layers in order to produce a hot end that fits in the female mold.

Parts

• Silicone
• Printed male and female mold
• Nichrome wire
• Thermistor

Tools

• Soldering gun and solder
• Pin
• 0.5mm pencil lead
• Electrical tape

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References

Contact details

Raclark (talk) 14:43, 12 November 2015 (PST)