"3D Printing and Black Friday" Topic

There have been several threads that mentioned 3D printing and its cost and impact on wargaming. As far as I am concerned, my 3D printers are the single best piece of equipment I have for wargaming.

I am putting on a battle next week, and I have set up the table.
- The figures are 3D printed on a resin printer.
- The bases are 3D printed
- The movement trays are 3D printed
- The village is a mixture of bought and 3D printed buildings
- The castle walls are 3D printed
- The road is 3D printed
- The river is Battlefield in a Box, but with a couple of 3D printed sections to fill in gaps
- The measuring sticks are 3D printed
- The hills are 3D printed geomorphic design
- The swamp has a 3D printed base with tufts / flock attached

Apart for the figures, everything was printed on a FDM printer.

Given sales are going on right now, if anyone was looking at getting a 3D printer have a look at the All3dp article link (If I was to buy a printer again I would get a Bambu A1).

Resin printers do fabulous figures. BUT you need to use the more expensive resins that aren't brittle (I use ABS like resin with a little bit of Sunlu Tenacious mixed in). And no one ever mentions how much workspace you need for resin printer, cleaning station, paper towels, etc. But for most wargames a cheap resin printer is good enough. And there are some bargains right now! The technology is very similar -- you are splitting hairs on support, availability, etc.

My FDM printer is running all of the time. It is producing terrain, board wargame inserts, etc. My resin printer runs every few weeks when I decide I have a new project and need some figures -- it is really easy to print far more figures than you can ever paint.

Resin printing can be its own hobby. FDM printing with the new plug and play printers is not hard. So go ahead and get a printer while the sales are on!

I'd love to get into 3D printing, but for me, I have no real room to set one up in, and resin stuff is very toxic from what I have read as well as needing the ventilation, etc. Plus the technology is "almost there" for me. Not yet, but close.
So right now, 3d printing for me by me, is out for me.

I've been printing for two and a half years and have never looked back. I am happy with the detail, happy with the production rate and happy with the durability of the figures. I have a resin printer and use washable resins. I have mine in a small interior utility room with an air purifier and the resin smell rarely gets out of that room. I have printed easily over 1200 28mm figures and uncountable 15 and 10mm, not to mention at least 300 ships.

The only issues I have is that you have to humor the printer every once and a while by re-leveling the build plate, and for some reason I have a lot of trouble keeping ww1/ww2/modern ships from warping, regardless of scale.

As with any hobby, there is some ongoing maintenance and after-market aids that help

- a flexible metal removable build plate is essential for quick turn around
- a screen protector is essential
- a supply of FEP film is a good thing, as well as Allen head screw drivers. Turning 60+ screws with a regular Allen wrench every time you want to change your FEP is worse than a colonoscopy.
- be prepared to replace your LCD screen here and there. They do burn out. Right now my current Elegoo Saturn 2 which I have had for 18 months, printing almost every day, is on its second screen, and this one is only firing on half the screen.

If you know where to look for files, you can flesh out any existing army – fantasy, historic, Sci Fi, ships, aircraft, tanks, dinosaurs, whatever.

I figure with the cost of a printer, equipment and an average of one bottle of resin per month, I am running about $700 USD for the purchase year and $350 USD the second year. To me that is a game changer considering I can print any scale any period any amount, as opposed to dropping AT LEAST $350 USD on any given Victrix, Perry, whatever army.

VSB

My sales are tailing off as customers switch. So I'll close up most of ScaleCreep in the next couple years. Won't have much of a choice really I guess. We'll see though which sales really dry up and which hold on…

No issues at all with FDM and the lines thing is massively over played they are invisible when minis are painted and on the table. Plus it can live anywhere in the house and is bomb proof, been printing for 10+ years.

use washable resins

I have a lot of trouble keeping ww1/ww2/modern ships from warping

I switched to alcohol washable resins and the warping stopped.

Don't have a 3D printer nor do I want to get one. I would rather purchase items from someone who sells them.

"And no one ever mentions how much workspace you need for resin printer, cleaning station, paper towels, etc."

My apologies, I will be sure to in future.

"it is really easy to print far more figures than you can ever paint."

That may be another problem. I think people generally print a bulk of stuff, then barely touch it again. Not the people on this board though, of course. But regular folk.

"Resin printing can be its own hobby."

Yes, well, it has been rumoured.