Jankiest 3D printing tips that actually work

Sometimes you just need the part, even if the process is compromised. In this video, we go through the dodgiest 3D printing shortcuts and hacks that actually work. These may get you through in a pinch, but I would not recommend them long term.

Please own up to which of these you’ve tried, and add anything good/bad ones I’ve missed.

0:00 Introduction

0:44 Fixing it with fire

1:39 Old school part cooling

3:31 Derelicte enclosure

6:01 Who needs CAD?

7:23 G10 bed on a budget

10:04 Colouring in support

13:15 Joining spools of filament the jank way

15:39 Conclusion

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[Moose]

The sharpie trick was amazing. This is something you could easily integrate into a 3d printer's

[SkateSoup]

"But don't worry, we can move the bar lower." 🤣

[corvus_erinaceus]

Oooooh, I like this one because I am a proud owner of The Janky Ender 3 Pro (which still works despite all upgrades I commited to it). So... My list:

1. You heard of "cold pull", now introduce "hot push" to unclog heat creep. At first, heat up hotend to 280C and disable hotend fan so heat can transfer up to cold zone. It softens clogged plastic enough for it to be pushed out. Push in some cheap 1.6mm weed wacker string. When plastic starts extruding, turn on hotend fan and continue pushing weed wacker string until it starts extruding clean. Turn off hotend heater, while still pushing weed wacker string. Push it until it stops melting. Wait for hotend to cool down and do a cold pull. Now hotend should be clean enough for the next clog.

2. Replacing the nozzle is a well documented procedure, but I was getting leaks anyway. Probably hotend wasn't hot enough so I detached hotend assembly from printer, removed heater cartridge and thermistor, gently heated it with propane torch up to "not glowing yet" and tightened it up. No leaks since then.

3. Filament dryer can also dry socks.

4. Jon from ProperPrinting showed in his lamp build video cool technique to increase mass of printed part for cheap. Pause printer before it starts covering infill, pour in sand, resume printing.

5. Mainsail/Fluidd don't know how to "start printing job later". Or I didn't update for too long? Anyway. G4 pauses for 1 hour.

Thanks, bye!

[anthonystownsend]

I am a firm believer in a janky cardboard enclosure. The thick cardboard that comes on new bed mattresses is perfect. It's thick enough that you can hot glue it together, I actually hot glue the cardboard to an old hardwood coffee table I put my 3d printers on. It works so good, I even use some packing tape to make hinges so I have cardboard doors on my cardboard enclosure, it's so janky it's awesome.

[roderik]

For a cheap way to dry your filament:
You have a nice heated surface already! Just stick the spool on your heated bed, set an appropriate temperate, cover with cardbox box or similar. and go.

[aa.design.excellence]

“If you’re going to do it you might as well do it right, with fire” man is an honorary Floridian.

[spookdome]

That sharpie thing honestly should become a built-in feature, it's incredible.

[kevinkunst]

"I discovered there's a spider living on my Rat Rig and I'm going to leave it there... [begins outro]" LOL that was gold

[HuntersOA]

Here is my janky one :D When I had issues with ABS lifting in corners, I used a knife to cut a piece of glue stick. Shoved it in, and used a torch to soften the curling part. Than used the spatula that came with the printer to push down the curved part into the glue stick. I did this now on a few occasions and works like a charm if you only have 2-3 layers above the bed and the print started to curl already.
Janky as hell but work :D

[BradGreer]

For what it's worth, every version of Cura I've ever used has a checkbox for "union overlapping volumes", which works exactly like the hack but without any fuss whatsoever.

[TadaGanIarracht]

I print out a bunch of 2.75mm PETG rods of different lengths. Then I hot glue them as crossbraces from support to support. It works amazingly well for printing tall skinny things...

An example: Basically if you want to print something like a harry potter wand straight up and down you would add 2 tall rods beside the wand in the slicer, they can be round or square doesnt matter. Use print by object and make the rods hollow with a nice brim so you arent wasting as much material. Now when it is a printing you can pause the print every few inches and hot glue some crossbraces on no problem.

Be careful to apply the glue outside the printer and get rid of any stringing, you dont want your part cooling fan to suck in the wisps and it stays liquid long enough that you dont have to apply it directly inside the printer.

Another great bit of jank i seen was using thoae flat button style magnets to hold down brims and also you can pause the print about a half inch or an inch into it and place magnets inside the supports.


I am printing out a 40hr kroq-Gar statue where the supports all swoop in at extrememe angles from outside to catch things in the middle. These would absolutely break or fail if I didnt employ the magnet and hotglue jank.

Youd be surprised how tall and skinny you can make things while getting literally perfect results even at 0.08mm where the nozzle is constantly rubbing.

[codylund]

For the color in supports segment. Gluestick is PVA. Pla sticks to it enough to lay down, but it prevents layer adhesion, so the support will still pop off.

[KeithOlson]

1. To hold something in place so that you can remove it later, pick up some PCL (Polycaprolactone). It turns into a moldable putty at 60C and becomes sticky at 65-70C, yet becomes as tough as nylon when cool. If, for example, a support comes loose, you can use hot glue to stick it to the build plate, then heat some PCL up to 70C in hot water, followed by mashing it into the support and print. After the print is done, dipping the part with PCL stuck to it in some more hot water will allow you to remove it easily without deforming the print. It is also great for low-friction surfaces.

2. I once made a woodgrain print by using a dark-brown sharpie on only part of some wood filament. I coloured a section of it darkly, but haphazardly. It worked pretty well, all things considered, with darker brown streaks along the layer lines/etc.

3. Instead of learning a complicated CAD app to make a model, figure out the absolute basics of OpenSCAD and just keep trying things over and over until your model looks good enough. (There are also *LOTS* of code snippets you can steal from the cheat sheet/Stack Exchange/etc.)

4. Sample rolls of filament can placed in a 3lb coffee can that is stuck to the frame of your printer by magnets. It will work just fine and never, ever tangle.

5. You can make a gluestick mount for your extruder, use it to 'print' the first layer of your model with an offset to match the position of the holder, cancel the print, remove the gluestick, then print the model as you would regularly.

6. Placing a cake pan upside down over your leftover pizza on the (heated) bed works great for a hot breakfast.

7. There is no law that says you can't use compressed air to cool parts down. YMMV. Obviously.

8. There is no law that says you can't use your sister's closet for an enclosure, with all of the filament hung on the rack where her clothes used to be. YMMV. Obviously.

9. There's no law that says you can't use your mom's Vitamix to grind down your waste prints. It will be fine. I'm sure of it. I'm sure it will come off with a dental pick. No, I won't scratch the polycarbonate. Nothing. Nothing happened. Everything is perfectly fine. IT'S FINE! THAT SCRATCH WAS THERE ALL THE TIME!

[pirobotbeta]

I used a 'retired' CPAP machine as parts cooler.
The air-flow was constant-pressure, but that was adjustable.
A hose from the CPAP to the hot-end did the trick.
The 'water-test' was fun...at full pressure, the air-blast almost emptied the coffee-cup!
This was cooling for a Tevo Little Monster delta printer....so long ago...

[henninghoefer]

Janky tips:
1. If applying glue stick to the bed is too tedious for your liking, you can just use hairspray.
2. For 3D scanning, you don't need the expensive scanning spray to make a part matte - you can just use dry shampoo. It stinks, but it's dirt cheap and leaves a matte dust.

[GEERTIOHULST]

Another janky habit I have is to move my printhead to push parts from the bed remotely, so that they fall out and a new print can be started. This works especially well with camera setups like in Bambu printers and octoprint setups

[unidahl]

I've often joined leftover filaments with a translucent ptfe tube. After pushing the melted ends together, pull them a little and the weld will thin out again, so you can get closer to a perfect 1.75.

[michaelbujaki]

Here at the bad idea factory, to print ABS on my Prusa Mini in an enclosure heated to 70C. The parts on the printer melted. I now had a Prusa Mini with a bunch of twisted parts. By reheating the parts, I was able to straighten them enough to reprint new parts. Using those, I was able to reprint a second batch of new parts that was actually straight.

[TheChillieboo]

I was totally expecting a waste of time “life hack” video, more than one of these I didn’t know and will use ! Thanks!

[BoBoable]

You could improve the spool joining technique with even more jank: just leave the PTFE tube on the fillament! It’s not going to block anything.