Fillament review - IC3D Open source Black ABS

I got a chance to play with some of the new IC3D Open source ABS filament that Lulzbot recently announced and is selling now (Open Source 3D Printing: LulzBot and IC3D Team Up for First-Ever Open Source 3D Printer Filament - 3DPrint.com | The Voice of 3D Printing / Additive Manufacturing) and I’m going to say nice things about it. In full disclosure I did get this filament for free but not for review purposes particularly.

That being said, I’m writing this because i’m actually really quite impressed with how well it prints even compared to Village plastics or Push plastics ABS. You know me, if I thought there was something that needs to be improved, I’d write about it here, But this stuff is great as is. It comes in a nice box, well heat sealed with heavy plastic and a packet of desiccant. I ended up with 2lb rolls, but it looks like they do offer larger rolls as an option.

You can see a work sample here, the Lid of the control box in this project is made of it, the other parts are not.

I printed this using my Modified Taz, using my standard ABS settings at a temperature of 240 on a 105c bed. This was a large flat part, and I experienced no lifting with my aluminum core bed, which is normal. What really impressed me though is the corner definition. Usually with push and village plastics filament I tend to get small lumps in corners and occasional minor ringing on particularly fast prints. This time I was printing with my rapid settings, and it came out just as crisp and as clean as if I had printed it with my higher detail settings. It barely drips at all during start, and seems to be adheared as well or better between layers compared to both push or Village plastics.

The surface finish is a bit more matte, but that’s something that doesn’t bother me. if I want something really shiny I can always break out the Push stuff or vapor treat it.

About the only negative I can think of is that any leftover nozzle residue seems to carbonize a bit more readily that village plastic stuff, but with a nozzle wiper or regular care that shouldn’t be an issue at all, and it’s really to a minor degree compared to regular abs. I can’t tell you if it smelled any better or worse than regular ABS printing. It didn’t seem to at any rate.

Dimensionally it did fine, the lid matched up with the box printed from Push plastic ABS perfectly.

Price, I don’t know, I didn’t compare.

Anyways, I’d be willing to recommend that you give this a shot if you print ABS, I’d recommend it as a good starter ABS filament, one for every day use, and one for detail work. If you have any questions about it, I’d be happy to answer them if I can. I’ve tried pretty much every type of ABS out there, and this is up there as probably my favorite so far with the limited amount of printing I have done with it. I plan to use it for some larger pieces for the new ROV next.
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