0

I am using an Intamsys FunMat HT, which has a "ceramic glass" bed. I'm not sure what "ceramic glass" means, the stuff behaves like borosilicate in the way it either chips or shatters depending on how I abuse it -- so lets just go with "borosilicate bed". It has a glossy side and a frosted side, and as I have permanently damaged the frosted side, I am trying to save the glossy side with a bed surface.

I am trying to attach a sheet of Ultem PEI (McMaster link), using (3M 468MP) tape for printing Ultem 1010 filament. The 3M tape is rated to 149 C for "days, weeks" (per the datasheet), and up to 200 C for "minutes, hours". My print bed runs at 160 C, and I was printing an Ultem part on it. In under an hour, the adhesive had begun to delaminate under just the curling forces of the PEI sheet itself, save nothing of the part attached to it. The adhesive itself seemed to be peeling apart.

The bed had been baked in a convection oven at 100C for 12+ hours, and was prepped with soapy water followed by Windex and a dry-scrub with paper towels. Is there a better transfer adhesive I can use that will offer strong bonding of PEI to a glass substrate, and survive prolonged exposure to 160C temperatures?

note: I am not sure this is a duplicate of this 3dpse post, because I think I cleaned the bed well enough, and in this case may just be exceeding the thermal capacity of the adhesive.

Bryan Boettcher
  • 141
  • 6
  • I think most adhesives are a mixture of thermoplastic materials. That means that they became soft above a certain temperature threshold. I think you might have found such threshold. Also I have never seen PEI sheets for such high bed temperatures. Their maximum is usually around 100 °C. You could try using a CA glue which is extremely stable and non-toxic. However since the glue is not elastic I think the PEI sheet will delaminate from the glass anyway due to different thermal expansion of those materials. – TurgonTheKingOfGondolin Jan 07 '21 at 12:43
  • Have you tired polyimide (Kapton) build surfaces? They easily withstand your temperatures, but are easier to damage mechanically than PEI. – Perry Webb Jan 07 '21 at 15:11
  • @PerryWebb: I have, and they don't have enough adhesion for printing Ultem on. I need to use PEI (or an equivalent alternative). The adhesive on most Kapton tapes fails at the temperatures I'm printing at, even if the tape itself is fine. – Bryan Boettcher Jan 07 '21 at 15:50
  • I haven't used it, and certainly now at 160°C, but 3DLac is an adhesive speced as working from 5°C to 180°C. However, it seems you still have the issue of being too hot for PEI. – Perry Webb Jan 07 '21 at 16:41
  • 3DLac worked too well, that's why the matte side of my glass bed is unusable now, because it pulled huge chunks of glass off with some ABS. – Bryan Boettcher Jan 07 '21 at 17:06

0 Answers0