There are a few types to plastic that are used. The most common is PLA which is what I’m using. It’s pretty tuff when your printer settings are spot on, you can refine the quality of print you can make. I soaked a throttle arm in nitro fuel for a few days and it did nothing to it.
more detail edit:
PLA filament is a polylactic acid/resin made into a thermoplastic that is actually biodegradable - when put through a hot extruder from 185-215 degrees is transmitted to a flat surface via the printing software which has the ability to manage multiple settings and multiple is no understatement.
For instance:
Infill % 100% means that there is no gaps inside the structure and is purely plastic, 20% would mean the inside structure is hollow with some sort of structure that you choose (like webbing/ribs ect). at 100% it is pretty robust, and I think it is more rigid than ABS, which means more brittle, so it may crack easier. IMHO
Resolution: The distance the extruder is moving vertically depending on your nozzle size. for instance I have a .4mm nozzle - at .2mm resolution is considered a draft, .15 would be a higher quality print with less texture in the print.
Speed: the rate at which the printer is moving, most of the time 100% is too fast for anything that has an overhang, so I start slow (like 20-30% to start a print then move up to 75% or so) this all depends on your flow rate from the extruder and your filament quality, heated bed settings, part cooling fan quality, bed adhesion, ect.
Flow rate: the speed at which your servo is feeding filament to the hot extruder head.
This is just to give you an idea of the many factors that are put into 3D printing. It is a pretty big learning curve, especially if you have a low quality printer.. you'll be fighting the what a quality print should look like if the printer isn't accurate.
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