I finally got a filament drying box and I’m using it prior to and during prints. It seems to be helping. I’m a bit of a color queen, so I keep a pretty big backlog of different filaments. I’ve been storing them in vacuum bags but the vacuum bags often seem to lose some of their vacuum after a few months; the whole process is a bit of a pain. Is this really worthwhile or as long as I’m using the drying box can I forgoe the vacuum storage? If vacuum storage is still a good idea, are there better bags I should be looking for that don’t lose some of the vacuum after a few months or is that pretty standard?
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I live in a subtropical area.
Short answer: YES!!.
I now religiously use a filament dryer, VAC bags and loose silica beads that I bag my self into DIY teabags and then redry in the oven.
I also make sure to dry new filament for 24hours before using it the first time…
Since I started doing this for PLA and PETG, many of my previous my print issues dissapeared…
Airtight storage bins + silica beads = win.
I printed a few of these: https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:4820432 And bought a few of these: https://a.aliexpress.com/_ExBOJ6F Then store everything in vacuum bags after print. Works great for me!
That’s pretty cool! Can’t imagine it fits in every spool though.
After reading these comments and thinking about it, I’ve ordered some silicon sealed cereal containers and some 100g color indicator dessicant packs. Decent dessication seems more important than fussing with bags and vacuums. After investing in the bags and now all these cereal boxes and pricey dessicant packs, I’ll admit I’ve thrown way more money at this issue than I had expected to, but hopefully it’s an easy to use long lasting solution to protect my filament library.
