HEX Gaming Tiles FDM Test and Write Up

Still more testing to be done, once files are released and I can print the other types of tiles. I recommend taking the plunge if you use an FDM though, these look and feel awesome!

Ender 3

PLA

.stl Files

Magnets

Glue

Definitely a hard case, to print. Just viewing this STL I can see some potential snags. I would guess this was optimized for injection mold production, which makes sense given the pledge tiers mostly being for physical product. The file is not fully optimized for 3D printing. Makes sense, it's a fundamentally different style of production from FDM, but it does cause some inefficiencies. However, that doesn't mean it's impossible!

Current print time estimates are between 5 and 6 hours to print, at a "rough draft" level of detail. Fairly typical for something this size, at my usual settings.

For anyone interested, here are the basic settings;

Printer: Ender 3

Layer Height: .2mm

Speed: 60

Support: Yes

Infill: 10% Gyroid

Walls: 2

Material: Matterhacker Build PLA- Black

Special Note: I rotated this to print laying flat, since it needed MUCH less supports that way.

This is sliced with Cura 3.6.0 (Yes I know it's older, but I use Astroprint and that is the version they use. It's worked fine so far for Dice Towers I've sold and over 1000 hours of assorted other prints.)

So here we actually printed the tile. Total time was 6 hours, 20 minutes. I'm sure some folks use settings and setups that could run this faster, but with the settings I used this is what I ended up with.

As you can see in the pictures, this printed just fine. I was little worried about the bottom, but once I got the whole thing off the buildplate, I saw it had done wonderfully.

I estimate this is about $3 total, per print. (That includes more then just the cost of the PLA, so you might estimate it lower if you don't count things like the electricity to run, the maintence costs of the machine, etc.)

So while not the worst I've ever had, this did require some post processing, since it had supports to be removed. The first few pictures show all these supports, and the last two show what the print looks like with them all removed. All in all, not too much to consider "waste". Still, this could be better optimized for FDM with some small changes. Mostly, taking the large "star" shaped section of the bottom and extending the shape until it touches the build-surface. This would eliminate alot of the supports needed. (As it is, I used the Automatic Supports setting, so everything was generated for any overhangs of more then 50 degrees.)

I printed a second copy, to test how well the tiles stack. They stack wonderfully, although I tried putting some dice in them to see if they could stack that way. (Spoiler: They don't stack at all with average dice still in them.)

Since I printed these myself, I'll need to add magnets of my own to have the same functionality as the actual product THACKO is selling. So that adds a bit of cost. I'll write up a total bill and add it to this project when I do this.

These look awsome, and even the small pips by each hole printed nicely, allowing these to be used to keep track of things like spell slots, etc. When I get more finished pieces, and especially after the Kickstarter is done I can print each of the types of tile, I'll post some more here!