Honestly, I love 3d printing, but I still worry about microplastics in the environment.
It’s complicated but PLA is bio-degradable … eventually. Not months but years. That’s much better than the horrors you see on Blue Planet II.
PLA requires industrial high heat composting to breakdown. Otherwise it will be around as long as any other type of plastic.
I don’t have a 3D printer but if I did I would try to keep it in a basement or garage, or at least keep a window open
Uneven airflow results in bad prints. Better to set up a ventilator hood that exhausts outside.
Perhaps, but have you actually tested this for yourself?
PLA is extruded at 220C in my Prusa beastie. Once the filament is slapped on the model, I probably want it to to fuse to the previous layer really well and then cool really fast and become stable.
We need to provide working and results rather than “I think that”. My printer is quite close to a very large double doors to outside, which open and shut as required.
I have a cheapo 3d printer and have ran into this numerous enough times enough that I built a plexiglass enclosure.
I keep Ender3 V2 in an enclosure and try to keep it as closed as possible when I take out my prints. Doesn’t hurt to be safe.
I could tell you that it was a surprise for me but it’s not and I also have a resin printer. Have you smelled that? It’s the smell of cancer building up in your brain! But to be fair, so it’s cola, coffe, fastfood, processed food, cars, every material used for building and keeping your house clean and anything diet… so you know… I was already going to have cancer, at least now I got to play with some toys while dying
Edit: Just wanted to add that my BIL was 43 yo, vegan, fit, would work out and swim 7 days a week, would eat salad from his own backyard, lived in a rural “clean” area and meditate and didn’t like technologies… died from cancer at 43. I’m a fat slob that resin prints for 3 years and already outlived him
Please don’t have resin in your room. It’s nasty, and use gloves to touch (I assume you do), you can get chronic dermatitis from uncured resin
oh no I don’t have it in my room, it’s in the garage, but the smell goes all around the house
I have had dermatitis from resin in my arm (accidental) so yeah i’m aware pretty nasty stuff.
I treat it the same way I would laser printer toner, at the very least I don’t want it on my desk.
