New nonstandard method for measuring physical properties of homemade polymer filaments for ffd 3D printing

The large advance in fused filament deposition (FFD) 3D printing technology is becoming a challenge for the introduction of new materials used in the process. The standard destructive mechanical testing of materials uses large amount of raw filament. As desktop FFD 3D printing becomes an everyday occurrence and 3D printing filament extrusion, a DIY makers practice, establishing a method for physical characterization of parts using only small amounts of homemade filament is of interest. This research is focused on introducing a new nonstandard method for evaluation of 3D printing filament with samples of less than 50 mg material . In this work we test the new method by comparison the results acquired for standard everyday 3D printing filaments. It was found out that the results obtained with this method are in correlation with the results from the standard tests used in everyday practice. This is of interest because it allows fast characterization of exotic filament blends with very small amount of material for research purposes, reducing the costs of production, and the possibility to implement fast changes in the filament blends. (author)