Have you ever asked yourself, 'Which filament do I want to print with today?' Because most LulzBot users ask themselves that question every day!
We recently released our updated filament guide, which now features nine different types of materials in addition to traditional plastic filaments like PLA and ABS... In other words, choosing which filament to print with just got even more difficult!
One of the most exciting filaments in the LulzBot filament guide is called Ninjaflex (pictured on the left), also known as TPE (Thermoplastic elastomer). Ninjaflex is an elastic plastic with a wide range of applications. Ninjaflex is so flexible that our team had to design an entirely new extruder called the Flexystruder, optimized to print flexible filaments with the high print quality our community expects.
3D printing with flexible materials is easier to show than tell, so watch the YouTube video (embedded below) and let your imagination run wild with the possibilities for this new material.
We are proud to say the Flexystruder is a LulzBot-pioneered product. You can rest assured it is wholly open hardware (meaning the source files have been publicly shared to be freely read, copied, and/or modified). It's also designed with our past generations of 3D printers in mind, not only past generations of the TAZ (our current model), but also our AO 3D printer and even other RepRap 3D printers.
We are so intentional about maintaining an open development philosophy because we want everyone to get in on the fun, rather than being locked out by closed systems, planned obsolescence, and other anti-maker philosophies. Equally importantly, open development makes us better by pushing us to always innovate.
The Flexystruder is available in the LulzBot online store here, as are nine different colors of Ninjaflex are available here! If you have any questions, let us know! You can reach our sales team at sales@lulzbot.com or give us a call at 1-970-377-1111 Ext. 600.