3D Printing

If you have have any questions about a submitted job or any other aspect of 3D printing, please contact us here. 

With applications in the health sector, aerospace, the automotive industry, and at home, 3D printing has become a mainstream service at the library. But what can it do for you? You could:

• Bring your business idea to life through rapid prototyping and design;
• Make that school project pop with custom designed diagrams and display pieces;
• Replace that missing game piece or toy;
• Complete your action figure set;
• Print a replacement part for the small appliance that's starting to fall apart;
• Practice 3D design and see the results of your work;
• And more!

How does the process work?

1. You will need to create a 3D printing account before you can submit print jobs to RPL. To do this you will need to have a valid SILS library card, an email address, and be 14 years of age or older. Please be sure to verify your email account before submitting your first jobs!

2. Log into your account and upload your print job, indicating what colour you would prefer, how many copies you need, and any other details about the job that are applicable.

3. Once the job has been uploaded, our team will assess your job to ensure that it is printable and that it meets our Terms and Conditions. We will then send you an estimate of the cost by email. You will need to approve the job and accept the cost prior to printing. We'll get in touch if we discover any potential issues.
   
   Please Note: RPL is offering free 3D printing while branches are closed due to the Covid pandemic. During this time, we will be limiting how many jobs a customer can have in our Ready for Printing queue at one time. As your jobs are printed, we will move another one of your approved jobs into the active print queue, which will display as Ready for Printing in the Job Status column of your 3D Print Admin dashboard. RPL staff will use their discretion on how best to manage the printing queue based on the volume of submissions submitted by customers, to ensure fairness to all customers. When branches re-open, all 3D Print submissions that have not progressed to the Ready for Printing status will be re-issued to customers to approve the cost estimate for each 3D printing submission and customers can cancel or approve each of their submissions at that time.
   
   Note: You must approve your print submissions within 30 days of submitting to avoid them being cancelled. Cancelled jobs will need to be resubmitted.

4. Once your job is printed, you will be notified by email that your job is ready for pick up from our Central Library. 

Printers: One Ultimaker 3 and two Ultimaker S5's.

Available Filament: PLA only - additional materials are under consideration.

Colours Available: We have a variety to choose from. Colours that are in stock are available to select as a choice when you submit a print job.

Cost: Jobs are priced at 10 cents / gram. This cost includes both bed adhesion and support.

• Note: RPL is offering free 3D printing while branches are closed due to the Covid pandemic. During this time, we will be limiting how many jobs a customer can have in our active print queue at one time. As your jobs are printed, we will move more of your approved jobs into the active print queue. RPL staff will use their discretion based on volume of submissions submitted by customers.

Reprints: Jobs that fail to print due to printer failure will be reprinted at no additional charge. If a customer is not happy with the quality of the 3D print after they pick it up and would like to have it reprinted, they must contact 3D Printing Admin and describe the issue and discuss next steps. If RPL 3D Printing Admin agrees to reprint the item at no cost. the customer must return the defective print item to Central Library to inititiate the reprint. 

Maximum Build Volume Available: 330 mm (W) x 240 mm (D) x 300 mm (H) - Be sure to account for bed adhesion when creating jobs.

Infill: By default, we print jobs at 20% infill (good for prototypes and most figurines). We will use higher or lower infill percentages on request but be aware that the higher the infill percentage, the more the job will cost because it will weigh more. Items can be printed at 0% infill (basically hollow) or at 100% infill (solid) but the results can be unpredictable.

Bed Adhesion: Always on - usually raft but we will use brim for certain jobs when warranted.

Support: Enabled with "Everywhere" selected. For certain figurines or other complex jobs we will use "Touching Buildplate" or "Tree Support" as appropriate. We are willing to attempt to print jobs without support so long as you agree to pay even if the jobs fail.

Nozzle Size: 0.4 mm

Available Print Profiles: Our Standard print profile gives preference to speed and has a layer height of 0.25 mm. Our Fine Detail profile is much slower but allows for greater detail on things like figurines - it uses a layer height of 0.1 mm. Please note that we will only use Fine Detail as long as the print time of the job remains under 18 hours.

File Types Accepted: STL only. Each job should be no bigger than 100 MB in size. Please ensure that your file uses millimeters or metric for units - not inches.

Slicer Software: Ultimaker Cura with the Mesh Tools extension (we are always on the latest version).

Recommended Software

There are a number of great 3D design and mesh software packages available on the market. RPL staff frequently uses the following:

• Tinkercad - a great place to start learning 3D design

• Fusion 360 - from Autodesk, an intermediate package that offers free licenses for hobbyists and startups

• Meshmixer - works with existing mesh files or scans to fix problems or add enhancements

Be sure to check on the system requirements for any software you install! Important: When you save or export files from your design software, be sure that it is using the correct units (millimeters). Software that is used for 3D design sometimes exports in inches or even without units at all - this can cause unexpected results.

Need Help Getting Started?

LinkedIn Learning has a large number of tutorials about 3D printing and 3D design. Here are a few to get you started:

• Learning 3D Printing

• Learning Tinkercad

• Design for Additive Manufacturing

• Meshmixer Essential Training