ASA vs ABS

jens55

Assuming that I don't mind ABS smell and the end product will not be exposed to excessive UV, Is ASA going to give me a noticeable improved print for something that needs to be dishwasher safe?

In a related question - is ASA getting less common these days? I am in Canada and usually get my filaments from Canadian outfits and ASA is not available from my regular sources so I would need to import it from the USA at a premium price.

Dad003

@jens55

Have you check filaments.ca , spool3d or digitmaker ? That is generally were I buy what I need ,

jens55

@Dad003 - Thanks - turns out that Digitmaker.ca has white ASA available.

Edit: Dooohhhh .... 1.75 mm is sold out

mrehorstdmd

I have printed objects using PETG and TPU and run them through multiple dishwasher cycles and they come out fine.

jens55

@mrehorstdmd, thanks. I have a test object in the dishwasher that is printed in PETG to see how it stands up. PETG is definitely on the table. The reason for ASA/ABS is because of stringiness and lack of detail in PETG. I have some tweaking but still need to do more but in general ABS and PLA both seem to print 'cleaner' then PETG.

o_lampe

@jens55
[OT] I have a bottle of ABS-like resin coming my way. Until I read this thread, I was only interested in it's mechanical characteristics, but now I want to know more about food safety of UV-resin.
Printing my own Sax/Clarinet mouthpieces would be nice, if there's no health risk...
I made one from water-washable resin, but it has a bad taste and is quite brittle. My front teeth will chew through it in no time.

I don't want to hijack the thread, but if someone has some useful information...

dc42

@jens55 I don't have any issues with stringing or lack of detail using PETG. Are you using the correct temperature? Is your PETG filament very old? I think PETG filaments have improved in recent years. I had great success with E3D Edge filament, but sadly they don't sell it any more; so now I use Overture PETG filament.

chrishamm

@jens55 From my experience ASA/ABS is fine for small prints but the taller they get, the worse the layer adhesion and the more frequently you get cracks while printing. That's why I prefer PETG as well, it seems to be harder, too, but that may depend on the filament brand.

One thing I found odd is that FormFutura PETG is supposed to be printed at 220C whereas my other Geeetech PETG prints nicely at 240C or even slightly more.

achrn

If your primary focus is temperature, ABS usually has a few degrees more resistance than ASA, and if it's not UV exposed I don't see any advantage to ASA over ABS. In fact I have most of a spool of ASA that I've had forever because I can't find any reason to use it - if I want temperature resitance I'll use ABS, I don't generally print stuff for external use, and PETG beats both ABS and ASA in all other respects (in my experience).

(That's a bit self-fulfilling because I never use it so I don't have the parameters dialled in so when I do try and use it I'm disappointed with the quality anyway, and then I set it aside for another 6 months.)

jens55

@dc42, good point and right on the money. The PETG I am currently printing with is Amazon Basic labled stuff and I would venture to say it's at least 4 or more years old. Not only that but for reasons I don't understand, it seems to print best at about 190C (!!!). I recently spent a bunch of time testing this stuff and was very surprised to find out I had been printing way too hot. No, it is not mislabelled PLA and I still have a pile of that stuff (in sealed boxes). So yes, it may be an issue with the filament I am using.
I only have this one brand but because a lot of people have mentioned stringiness, it did not raise any alarm flags. I will buy a roll of currently produced PETG and see how it compares.
Late edit: I do actually have some E3D PETG that I bought to try out a number of years ago but I am still working on the Amazon stuff. I will try a roll of the E3D stuff to see what I think. I must admit that I have switched primarily to PLA because it prints so much nicer and have only used PETG for stuff for outside use and where PLA just isn't suitable.
Digging through all the available filaments, I noticed that there is a high temperature (anneal-able) PLA available that I was thinking of trying out.
Thanks!

jens55

@achrn, thanks for your thoughts! I wasn't really looking forward to hoard yet another kind of filament as I have so much still to be used up but thought that maybe I should try and expand my world of filaments. With your comments, I think I will dig some more into PETG (and try something produced more recently)