Curious about Heat-Welding CF-RN
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I'm currently printing a 8 piece Kylo Ren mask, and it's being made out of Carbon Fiber Reinforced Nylon.
The person who made a video on the mask shows a method of "Heat Welding" the pieces together to make them stay together, but he didn't use CF-RN to print it, only regular PLA.
I was curious if anyone had tried to heat weld with a Drummel Tool on CF-RN yet, since that's the common tool for heat welding PLA. PLA has a lot less of a heat requirement for it to actually melt compared to the Nylon, so i'm unsure as to if a drummel will actually work at all without actually tearing up the piece before even reaching required temperature to actually melt.Any advice would be appreciated!
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I am not sure that you can heat weld Nylon due to its higher thermal threshold. It may be that you end up gluing the pieces together with adhesives. I would use something like a 2 part epoxy rather than Gorilla Glue or super glue.
My only question is why CF-PA? I have build a few dozen cosplay models and I have only ever needed ABS or PLA. I tend to use ABS because I can bond the parts fully with a bit of MEK or Acetone (depending on which I have on hand at that moment). Those parts are plenty strong enough, hell, even the armor feels heavy like it should.
The only reason I could see the use of CF-PA is the idea that the part will be stronger, which it will be. But unless you are going to be taking a hit to the face while wearing it, I do not believe it is necessary. The cost savings on material alone is a good reason to stick with ABS or PLA.
My apologies for being direct on this one, I see this question come up every so often and I try to use my experience to give a good perspective on the core question. To be fair, I thought the same thing when CF-PA started to come out but after getting my first few models printed, painted, and displayed I did not see the need for it.
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@michael-petitclerc I'd rather you be direct and tell me what you're thought process is about it then sugar coat something and me not understand it, I thank you for that. I would've printed it out of PLA, but currently all I have in stock is CF-PA, and also given the fact that since this is my first time ever actually printing a model mask, I wanted to make sure it had a better and smoother surface finish, so there wasn't nearly as much work that needed to be done, and I did want it to have some durability as well. I may have to end up doing so with glue or epoxy, was mostly curious as to if anyone has attempted/done something like this with a high thermal threshold. Thinking about it, I could probably print Martial Arts Sparring gear with the Nylon lmao. Thank you for your advice Michael.
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I have tried "heatweld" 910 the dremel method failed but using a solder iron and a piece of filament like solder kinda works even though in my case it did not look that hot but it did a decent job mechanically. So I assume it will work at CF nylon too. I needed to turn the iron up to 350 minimum though
