Whether you are new to 3D printing or an advanced designer you've come to the right place. The Hunterdon County Library's offers 3D printing in PLA for $.10/gram, Onyx Carbon Fiber for $.30/gram and Formlabs Resin for $.20/mL.  This guide provides resources for both beginners and more advanced designers to explore, learn and design.  We offer a 3D printing service for PLA, Onyx, and Resin via an online form.  

Patrons can be certified to operate the PLA Prusa printers. The Markforged and Formlabs printers are staff only operated. 

3D printing is the process of making a physical object from a three dimensional digital model. The Hunterdon County Library has two types of 3D printers; fused deposition modelling (FDM) printers and a stereolithography printer (SLA).

The Prusa and Markforged FDM printers make a model by laying down many successive thin layers of PLA (polylactic acid) filament or Onyx, a carbon fiber blend.  The material comes on a spool that feeds into a heated extruder.  PLA comes in many colors and is a biodegradable plastic, breaking down into harmless lactic acid. Onyx is a chemical and water resistant plastic that is very light and strong. 

The Formlabs SLA printer uses liquid resin and and a laser to cure the resin. SLA parts have the highest resolution and accuracy, the sharpest details, and the smoothest surface finishes of all 3D printing technologies.

Fused deposition modeling (FDM) and stereolithography (SLA) are the two most popular types of 3D printers. A few factors to consider when determining what type of printer is best for you are: print quality, materials, applications, and costs.

To give an example of quality and cost, the two frogs above were printed on our printers here at the library. The white frog on the left was printed on our Prusa MK3S using PLA filament ($.10/gram). It used 6 grams of filament, costing $0.60. The frog on the right was printed on our Formlabs Form 3+ using Formlabs resin ($.20/mL). It used 17 mL of resin, costing $3.40. The resin frog is more costly, but it's high quality finish is great for intricate and detailed parts.

Other things to consider are the different materials and applications of a print. The Formlabs Form 3+ can print clear and elastic parts, which can't be done on an FDM printer. The Markedforge Onyx Pro FDM printer uses a nylon carbon fiber filled filament with optional fiberglass reinforcement for a lightweight, chemical resistant, water resistant, and strong filament.

Here is a comprehensive guide by Formlabs comparing FDM and SLA printing: FDM vs. SLA 

• CAD       Computer Aided Design, software that produces a 3D model
• GCODE  GCODE is the file type the 3D printer uses to print a design.  
• STL        Stands for stereolithography, the file format computer aided design (CAD) programs generate.  Its a file of a 3D model.
• PLA        Polylactic acid is frequently called PLA.  Polylactic Acid is a biodegradable thermoplastic polymer derived from the starch in                       plants normally corn) that is used for 3D printing.  It comes in a variety of colors, is 1.75mm in diameter, and feeds into the printer on a spool.
• Slicing    An STL file must be "sliced" before a 3D printer can understand how to print the file.  Slicing the STL file converts it to GCODE. We use PrusaSlicer to convert STL files to GCODE for printing at HCL.
• Support   Additional removable structures that are printed to support overhangs or other parts of a model that do not make contact with                    the build plate during printing.
• Thingiverse.com   A popular site for sharing file designs.
• Tinkercad.com   A free computer aided design (CAD) software site that is very good for learning the basics of designing for 3D printing.