1. What is ABS-L? Back to Top
ABS-L is an acrylic resin used for 3D printing. It is NOT brittle as regular acrylic material. It is strong and tough when properly structured, and flexible when thin.
But it still will break if bended too much.
The material is printed in a resolution of approximately 250dpi, or 0.1mm thick layers, to give a smooth model with sharp details.
Sometimes layering effect appears on sloped areas of the model which is a characteristic of 3D printing.
This material can be cut, sand, filed easily. It accepts regular model paints readily and can be glued with instant glue/super glue/Cyanoacrylate glue.
2. How does this material compares to the nylon material we used to use? Back to Top
ABS-L has a smoother surface after painting and the details are sharper than nylon.
3. This is how we paint our models. Back to Top
i.). |
You can use rubbing alcohol to clean the model. If you feel some tackiness on the surface of the model, this is because of uncured acrylic resin. The easiest way to get rid of the tackiness is to put the model under the sun for an hour or so. The resin is cured by light. |
ii). |
You can apply regular modelling primer as a base coat. Here we demonstrate painting without primer. We used Tamiya Acrylic Paint as the base coat:
You can use water based paint or enamel. |
iii). |
To smooth out most of the layering, we used multiple layers of paint. First paint the model with brush strokes running parallel to the layering to get the paint inside the groves. Then brush perpendicular to the layerings to wipe away the paint on the ridges.
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iv). |
We usually use Tamiya transparent acrylic paints as the second coat because they seem to be thicker and has a better "filling" power. The third will be the base colour of the model.
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v). |
Then we add whatever detailing required, and apply weathering if needed.
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