Flexible PLA Plus

[ScubaToneDog]

Has anyone tried this Flexible PLA Plus from Ataraxia Art? FPLA+ is supposed to be more flexible than TPU filament and easier to use. Can be printed via Direct drive and Bowen extruders. Shore hardness is 89a, while most TPU filaments are generally in the low to mid 90s. Its also half the price of TPU!

Here is a good article from CNET about it.

I want to try it out, but they are all out of black. Anyone try this stuff?

 

[James79]

I haven't, but now I'm intrigued. Not a fan of the price though.... I use Priline TPU (95a hardness, only costs about $24 for a 1 KG spool), and have a direct drive extruder.

Watching to see if you hear back!

 

[ScubaToneDog]

I haven't, but now I'm intrigued. Not a fan of the price though.... I use Priline TPU (95a hardness, only costs about $24 for a 1 KG spool), and have a direct drive extruder.

Watching to see if you hear back!

WOW, that's a really good price. I usually find it for $20 for .5kg. I'll have to try it.

I have 2 printers. A MonoPrice Maker Select with a direct drive, and an Ender 3 with a Bowden. I like the versatility of what each machine brings to the table.....and I'm a bit of a dork too.

 

[hotpocketdeath]

I haven't, but now I'm intrigued. Not a fan of the price though.... I use Priline TPU (95a hardness, only costs about $24 for a 1 KG spool), and have a direct drive extruder.

Watching to see if you hear back!

$36 isn't bad for high quality filament. I usually pay $27 for 1kg for my Fusion Filaments HTPLA+ (3D870). That stuff is worth it. Prints like a dream and very strong stuff.

I've seen much more expensive filaments

 

[ScubaToneDog]

$36 isn't bad for high quality filament. I usually pay $27 for 1kg for my Fusion Filaments HTPLA+ (3D870). That stuff is worth it. Prints like a dream and very strong stuff.

I've seen much more expensive filaments

Haven't tried the HTPLA+. My understanding of its claim to fame is that its heat treatable. With heat treating there is some warping and expansion involved so its not ideal for parts needing any kind of tolerance or accuracy. How do you use it?

 

[ScubaToneDog]

Oh Boy! Black FPLA+ is back in stock! Just ordered a spool. It comes next week.

I will Print a Benchy and report back my results. Hope its everything they say it is.

 

[hotpocketdeath]

Haven't tried the HTPLA+. My understanding of its claim to fame is that its heat treatable. With heat treating there is some warping and expansion involved so its not ideal for parts needing any kind of tolerance or accuracy. How do you use it?

Without heat treatment, you can print "as is" and retain all the dimensions just fine, and it's still very strong and prints like a dream.

Heat treatment doesn't really warp it or cause expansion. But it does cause it to shrink a little. Some parts I printed with it that get heat treatment are my fan duct on my printer, silverware separator from my dish washer, etc. You can compensate for the shrinking pretty easily. I usually just print the model at 102% and when it shrinks down, the dimensions are pretty darn close.

When I had a PETG fan duct, after about 6 months or so, I did see some warping starting to occur. But after I switched to a heat-treated HTPLA+, it's been going strong for almost 2 years now and no signs of warping. Still looks the same as I first installed it.

Non-heat treated, all the printed parts on my MK3 are made from the stuff.

 

[ScubaToneDog]

Well, it came. I did a quick print test last night to get a baseline to establish settings for temp, speeds and feeds. I started with regular PLA print settings, 205 on the nozzle, 20% fan speed, no heat on the bed. I did back down the print speed to 50 as recommended. I use glue stick for bed adhesion.

If you look at the attached pic's the result was pretty good for an initial run. I'm going to adjust the retraction down, turn off the fan, and bump the print speed up a little. The filament is not as floppy as TPU so it fed very well through the bowden tube.

The material itself is kinda weird. Yes, its flexible, but not like straight TPU. If you look at the pics, it doesn't bounce back like TPU. I would say its just as durable as TPU though. This would be a great alternative for anything you ever wanted to print out of TPU but didn't want to change over to a direct drive.

I'm going to play with it some more this weekend and get the settings dialed in and print a benchy. So far I'm a fan. Although the price may seem a bit high, it is comparable to other specialty filaments and the benefit of a higher precision print via a Bowden vs Direct Drive makes it worth it.