3D Printing MASK STRAPS "Ear Savers"

Published 2020-04-05 on Anjan's Homepage

The BC COVID-19 3D Printing Group has a list of designs they would like people to help print to ensure medical personnel are protected during the COVID-19 epidemic.

This post has two purposes:

1. Make anyone reading this blog aware of the initiative and assist with 3D printing if they can. You may have a group that needs help in your local area.
2. Share my tips for “mass producing” the MASK STRAPS “Ear Savers”

I am printing “Surgical mask ear saver” by sniffle from thingiverse: https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:4251460

NOTE: Before switching your workflow to this, please print a sample with these settings and confirm that these settings do not affect the functionality of your products. You should ask the #qualitycontrol channel on the BC COVID-19 3D Printing Group slack or the medical personnel you are making your products for.

To speed up printing, I have done the following two things:

1. Change layer height to 0.3 mm
2. Set the extrusion width to 0.7 mm.

These adjustments lowered the print time for each part from 33 minutes to 9 minutes on my creality ender 3 with the stock 0.4 mm nozzle using generic PLA.

Furthermore, I am printing 8 ear savers on one bed so that I don’t have to scrape every 9 minutes. My printer is relatively new and I was lucky enough to get a flat bed. See figure below:

If you have a warped bed, you may not be able to print all over your bed like I have.

Hopefully this helps other makers looking for the most efficient model to print. Please ask your local 3D printing group or medical personnel about their needs before printing.

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