Do you want to learn how to 3D Print? The 3D printing guide will show you all the basics of using a FFF/FDM printer. It will take you over the types of 3D printers, 3D Printing Materials, and troubleshooting print quality problems.
A 3D printer uses a digital file to make an object. There are many different types of 3D printing technologies. The two most popular ones seem to be FFF/FDM and SLA 3D printers. FFF printers work by extruding layers of plastic from their nozzle and stacking them in layers. FFF stands for fused filament fabrication. SLA printers work differently. They print objects upside down by lowering the printers build plate into a vat of resin where a laser hardens it layer by layer. I will mostly talk about FFF 3D printers in this guide because I have no experience with SLA 3D printers.
FFF printers print with a spool of plastic called filament. There are many kinds of filament to use including PLA, ABS, PETG, and Nylon. PLA is recommended for beginners because it is easy to print with, doesnt need high temperatures, and doesnt have fumes. If you are looking to buy PLA you should stay in the $20 range because usually anything that costs less is low quality.
Printing starts with a 3D model. You can either make one yourself or download it for free from a website like MyMiniFactory or Thingiverse. Once you have your model you need to load it into a slicing software. A slicing software converts 3D models into instructions that printers can understand and use to print your model. You can also change the settings in the slicer to make your 3D prints look different. I recommend PrusaSlicer, its open source and works well. Ultimaker Cura is another free option. After that you can then put the sliced model onto your printer.
To design your models you need a CAD program (Computer Aided Design). There are two kinds of cad software that we use for 3D printing, organic and parametric modeling. Organic modeling is used to design natural looking things like a person or animal. Parametric modeling is used to create parts like gears and cases. If you would like to use a free sculpting program I recommend using SculptGL, it is browser based. If you are going to use a parametric modeling program I recommend Tinkercad for beginners because it is free and simple to use. More Industry standard and complex alternatives include FreeCad and Autodesk Fusion 360. Tinkercad is very basic and mostly drag and drop, I wouldn't recomend it for any serious work. Its for babies.
If youre going to buy a 3D printer you should consider the amount of money you want to spend. You want to make sure that you buy a good printer or you might have a bad experience. If you want a low cost printer the Ender-3 might be a good option. The Ender 3 costs around $180 if you order it from China. Keep in mind that you might have some trouble with low cost printers. If you want to spend more then the Prusa Mini+ seems to be a great option for beginners, it costs around $400.
Well, in my experience trouble shooting my 3d printers is a little finicky. I've messed with my Ender-5 so much that it probably works worse now, My prusa mini has always printed well, so I don't mess with it very much. If your printer is printing bad there are a few easy things you can try.
You can also change settings in your slicer. You need to be carefull what you change because its easy to make everything worse. Calibrate stuff like e-steps, you can change that in your printers e-prom. You can also check if you have old firmware and update it. You can also try upgrading your printers hardware.
Thanks for reading this! if you have any tips to share you can email me and I can add them.
This work is licenced under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International Licence.