3D Printer Dehydrator Chamber Heating

youmagine

This project kicked off 11 months ago, shortly after MRRF 2018 wrapped up. The core idea revolves around repurposing a sub $50 food dehydrator as a chamber heater. A ton of posts exist detailing the use of dehydrators for drying filament, but none mention using one as a chamber heater - until now. During my testing phase with this method, I discovered it doubles as an effective filament dryer when the filament is stored within the same enclosure. Since switching to this chamber heating technique, I've encountered no issues with delamination on ABS parts. The temperature stays consistently between 90-100F, which appears to be the ideal range for preventing rapid cooling and shrinking that causes delamination in ABS prints. Printing at heights of up to 200mm with 2mm wall thickness has been trouble-free, eliminating common ABS woes like warping off the bed or experiencing delamination issues. When it comes to PETG parts, while not strictly necessary, this method seems to improve bed adhesion on German PEI embedded Aluminum beds. For printing PETG on this surface, a bed temperature of 90c and a glue stick over the PEI provide excellent results. However, PETG has a tendency to stick too well to the PEI-Aluminum bed, causing some loss of PEI due to excessive adhesion issues. In terms of heat effects on electronics, I've encountered no overheating problems despite enclosing the entire printer within the heat source - and often leave the dehydrator running continuously. To aid in building the enclosure, Fusion 360 models and dimensional drawings are available for download. The mounting system is designed to fit an Elite Gourmet EFD-1010 135 Watt dehydrator perfectly. With this setup, all my ABS-related frustrations have vanished. Mark your calendars - this innovative design will make its debut at MRRF 2019 on March 29-30.