I Designed, Machined, And Assembled a Huge Custom High-Temperature 3D Printer

2018 to 2021

I’ve been building and designing FDM 3D printers since high school, and I wanted to take on what I felt is the pinnacle of DIY 3D printers: a large-format 3D printer with a heated build chamber. A heated build chamber, in the context of a 3D printer, is basically an oven. A heated build area allows for warp-free printing of ABS and PC. Additionally, it also allows you to print PEEK, PEI, PPSU, and other high-temp exotic filaments. Building a robot that operates inside an oven is tricky, since most electronics will stop working around 80°C. Through clever engineering and trial and error, I was able to develop a system of flexible thermal barriers that kept the sensitive electronics and motion platform parts outside of the heated chamber. More photos of the build can be found here.

The final specs I ended up with were:

• Temperatures: 500°C Nozzle Max, 250°C Bed Max, 150°C Chamber Max
• CoreXY motion system with 21.5x12x18in build volume, Ball screw for Z-axis
• Heated bed, heated chamber, flexible thermal barriers
• Hotend: E3D Titan Aqua, E3D Super Volcano, E3D .6mm Copper Plated Super Volcano Nozzle, PT100 Temp Sensor
• Electronics: Duet WiFi, Nema 23s
• Removable spring steel build plate held on by high-temp magnets (Samarium Cobalt - SmCo), PEI build surface

I used the following tools:

• Solidworks
• Manual mill
• Plasma CNC table
• Angle grinder, bandsaw, drill press, and basic hand tools.