Any advice printing tpu ?

[peter247]

I've tried it hot and cold on glass , 3d lac / and clean with ipa , and a 20mm brim ,but each time it wraps at the edges, cooling fan off , 50% and fully on .
I can get it printing at any speed with the hemera ,but that is no good if it wraps it's self from the bed.

[cosmowave]

@peter247 which sort of TPU are you using?
I normally use Ninjaflex, and i never had problems with wraping.

[whosrdaddy]

I do not have glass but I use bed temps around 70°C, this is on a PEI like material.
Much depends on the hardness of the TPU, as a general rule of thumb the harder, the more temp it needs.
Don't forget to disable retractions (but I guess you already know that)

[peter247]

@cosmowave just a generic TPU flexible , but not super flexible .

[Egon.Net]

@peter247 I got a flexible (Winkle Tenaflex) that was PP/TPE, and didn't adhere to ANYTHING. I finally got it to adhere to packaging tape, and later on I started using Magigoo PP. Have a try with packaging tape and tell us how it went!

[peter247]

@egon-net What about blue painter's tape ? , not used that for a long time on my printer

[64bit]

I personally have found that TPU prints best on those cheap crappy black surfaces that everyone replaces as their "first mod" to their 3d printer. I swapped to a steel/PEI plate a long time ago, but when I started with TPU i put the cheap black textured surface back on and I have never had a part curling issue.

[peter247]

@whosrdaddy Yep , I think you could call it hard , when you print at 40% infill it is solid.

[peter247]

@64bit I'll try one of the sheets which came with my flashforge creator pro.

[mrehorstdmd]

TPU likes thick layers and relatively slow print speeds (I keep it down to 50 mm/sec), retraction off. Reduce filament pinch pressure in the extruder. You can clean up the hairs after the print is finished. It sticks well to a 60-70C PEI bed surface. I don't use a cooling fan with it at all.

[peter247]

O.K try again .

First I'll try it Hot 80c , must hotter than my 50c I set it too like PLA .
Than try tape or a covering if that doesn't work all at 50mm/s , which is 13mm/s first layer .

[Egon.Net]

@peter247 said in Any advice printing tpu ?:

@egon-net What about blue painter's tape ? , not used that for a long time on my printer

Nope. It didn't work. It had to be polypropyplene tape, like the typical transparent packaging tape.

[peter247]

@egon-net I know what you mean now the brown / shiny polypropyplene packing tape

[Egon.Net]

@peter247 said in Any advice printing tpu ?:

@egon-net I know what you mean now the brown / shiny polypropyplene packing tape

Yes, that tape! That worked for me. All the other materials I tried were like printing eggs on a teflon pan.

[danielkrah]

@egon-net i am using the Zimple Ziflex PEI powder coated sheet.
it sticks relatively good with a brim.

[Egon.Net]

@danielkrah I already use a PEI sheet, but there's no adherence at all. I end up with the adhesive tape, and it kinda works.

[rjenkinsgb]

I've only done a few bits for experimentation.

I just used Pritt (white glue stick for paper) and that worked fine, temperatures 70 & 240.

[cosmowave]

I print Ninjaflex TPU without any problems on glass and carbon.
Never had a problem with sticking. Mostly it sticks to much!

[Phaedrux]

@cosmowave said in Any advice printing tpu ?:

Mostly it sticks to much!

This has been my problem as well. Little bit of glue stick to act as a release agent.

[SJI]

I was originally using buildtak sheets, printing the same item repeatedly in the same location on the bed, got about 20-30 parts. Each part takes 9 hrs to print.
I then switched to garalite G11 3mm sheet 16months ago and still haven’t had to touch up the G11 surface. Best money spent