Some of you know I'm fairly heavily into 3d printing.
Got a bunch of printers (6 at last count - 3 currently working, 2 in various stages of modification and one (resin) I'm still not sure I want to keep lol))
I'm also moderator at 3dprintboard.com
As more members turn up who have the miracle machines, and the world needs a sustainable ammo that will last past the first diana impact.
I figured we could have a thread where all the different ideas can be pooled, tested and discussed.
Things that fit the bill:
Printed moulds and what you use with them: clay, concrete, silicon etc
direct printed ammo
Anything else you;'ve used a 3d printer to create ammo with.
And if you're wondering what's prompted this today - I've just written an openscad script to generate different geometric shapes in order to see which is both the easiest to print and best to throw.
Then once I've decided on that, I'll try out different materials.
So from right to left, you have: 7 - 11 sided/faceted spheres.
As far as peinting speed goes, the angle of the first layer is crusial. if it's shallower than 45 degrees, it'll be a sod to print.
So as you reduce the facet number the angle grows steepr and the shapes prints more easily.
I think I'll probaby try the 10 sided sphere first.
Good sharp first angled facets. A fairly rounded shape and I can probably print it at the maximum speed for whatever material I'm using.
During my recent workshop clearout I came across 4 rolls of PET.
I think they were something daft like £5 a roll on some special offer.
Could work well. It's not as hard as pla, nor as soft as pet-g.
And if i remember, prints at a half decent speed.
The gold standard of any printed ammo is going to be nylon - But as I don;t have a machine that's really happy printing nylon, a close second is TPU.
Thermoplastic PoluUrethane.
It's basically indestructible in normal use.
But can only be porinted really slowly.
So once I;ve got my final ammo - and I might round the edges off on the dodecahedrons.
It shouldn't change the printability but will help it trhow cleaner.
We'll see.
So anyway, lets see what you've been making
Somewhere out there is the longer distance version of the tennis ball.