14 DAY TRIAL // There is a bad side to 3D printing. You see, even if you do get away with paying less than $500 / €370 - €500 for the printer itself, soon enough you'll feel as though the savings didn't really matter because of how much the filament costs.
A kilogram of filament can sell for any sum between $25 / €19 - €25 and $50 / €€38 - €50, which is a whole lot. Kind of puts a nasty spin on cheap 3D printers.
After all, it kind of defeats the purpose to buy a low-cost 3D printer if it botches every second or third print job. Sure, the ones who make the printers do their best to prevent this from happening, but FDM technology is not the safest to begin with.
Anyway, a man by the name of Ivan Arienamo has invented a type of PET filament (polyethylene terephthalate, polyester really) that sells for just $15 / €11.22 - €15 a kilo. Definitely an advantage.
The filament can be printed at up to 90 mm per second and is transparent, like glass. It is made from Virgin PET pellets and is compatible with most 3D printers on the market (well, FDM ones).
An Indiegogo crowd-funding campaign was launched to help fund the new filament.
The only remaining alternative is to purchase a home extruder system that can create filament at home from pellets. 1 kg of pellets costs $10 / €7.5- €10 though, and the home extrusion systems themselves are pretty expensive, at $300 / €224 - €300 to $500 / €372 - €500.
