Is there a viable method or company to recycle failed prints or prototypes? I’ve been keeping all of my PETG stuff in a box, still a way to go before it’s full but was curious if anyone had any experience here whether it be something diy or shipping them to a company.

  • elscallr@kbin.social
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    1 year ago

    To be honest: not really. The plastic can be recycled well enough, but there’s no good way to turn it back into a filament. There’s a few products out there that purport to, but none do a great job so far.

    • Flaky_Fish69@kbin.social
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      1 year ago

      I’ve played with extruding my own- basically using chips from failed prints and heater cartridges in what’s basically a giant hot end.

      The problem I have is consistency of diameter. my set up was a vertical extruder using 2” black pipe that had a melt zone of around six inches before hitting a tapered out brass “heat block” that came down to the 3mm nozzle.

      It was almost impossible to maintain a consistent extrusion.

      People are playing with it more now, so it’s possible I’m missing solutions

      • Voyajer@kbin.social
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        1 year ago

        That’s pretty much were I’m at with my design. As long as I can get the extruded filament to the point where my printers can reliably feed on it I’ll be happy to use it for prototypes at least.