Will this filament work with my printer?
The answer is probably yes. Below we have listed all the reasons a material might not work in a certain printer. If you have gone through this list and made sure that none of these apply, then you should have no trouble.
Heated Bed
If your printer does not have a heated bed, then you are limited to only printing PLA. Basically all other materials require bed heating. Without it, all but the smallest prints will warp significantly and peel themselves off the bed.
Maximum Printing Temperature
The recommended printing temperature of your filament must be below the maximum printing temperature of your printer. Recommended temperatures for each of our filaments are listed on the product pages and in our filament guide. Consult your printer's manufacturer specifications for its maximum temperature. If in doubt, or if your printer is only advertised as being able to print PLA/ABS, then assume the maximum temperature is 240 °C. If you wish to modify your printer to increase the maximum temperature, allowing you to print a wider range of materials, then you may consider installing an all metal hot end.
Flexibles
Flexible materials, like Ninjaflex or TPU, should only be printed using extruders that are specifically designed to handle them. If your printer is not specifically advertised as being able to print flexible materials, then you can assume it will have a lot of trouble doing so. If you wish to try anyways, here is a trick that may help. Our recommended setup for printing flexible materials is the Lulzbot TAZ + the Flexystruder. You may also be able to modify your machine by installing a Bondtech QR extruder.
Metal and Carbon Fiber Infused Material
These materials contain particles of metal or carbon fiber, which are highly abrasive. Printing with these materials will quickly wear through the standard brass nozzles on most machines. In order to print these materials you will need to install a hardened steel nozzle. See our guide on changing your nozzle.
Spool Size
Although the material itself may work in your machine, different filament makers use different size spools and some may not fit on your printer's spool holder. If this is the case, you will need to find some other way to hold the spool outside of the machine. An easy solution is to put it on a Lazy Susan. Here are the dimensions of our PRO Series spools. MatterHackers will not accept filament returns because the spool does not fit on your printer's spool holder.
DRM
Certain printers will only let you use filament made by the printers manufacturer. These printers use chips in the filament cartridges or spools to prevent you from using unauthorized filament. We do not carry filaments for any of these machines. If you wish to use third party filament in them, you will either need to hack the printer to make it possible or buy a different printer that does not have any such restrictions. Printers that require DRMed filament include...
- XYZ
- Cubify/3DSystems
- Stratasys
- Sindoh
The Ultimaker 3 uses RFID chips in the spools, but this is purely for identification purposes and does not prevent you from using regular unchipped filament.