3D Honeycomb Infill

[scottsask]

Hello,

Slic3r has support for 3D Honeycomb infill. It's interesting and quite great for reducing the material needed for large prints that need structural integrity. Do you think you could implement it in Simplify3D?

[wfcook]

I would like this also. It seems to reduce warping relative to some infills, too. And it allows for better transmission of shear strength through a part that cannot be oriented on the bed in way that makes the currently available infill patterns efficient.

[tenaja]

How is this different from the honeycomb infill we currently have?

[wfcook]

It looks like this:

[wfcook]

There are some details of the development of this infill at https://engineerdog.com/2015/03/08/3d-p ... l-concept/, and some actual mechanical tests of it at https://engineerdog.com/2015/09/02/mech ... endations/.

The thing to remember is that while it isn't as efficient as a normal honeycomb in the case where you are able to orient the cells properly, it has the potential to be more efficient when you can't do that because the part requires a different orientation for manufacturing.

[bray.christopher]

+1

[citrik]

I'd also really like to see this feature. Pretty much what's keeping me from switching to Simplify3d for all of my prints. The structural integrity is really nice with this infill pattern.

[CompoundCarl]

The structural integrity is really nice with this infill pattern.

In the tests I have run, this 3D honeycomb is actually quite a bit weaker than the other patterns that are already offered. So if you're looking for structural integrity, my test results showed you would be MUCH better using one of the patterns already included in S3D like grid or triangle.

Seriously, they performed MUCH better. The 3D pattern was actually quite weak.

[dorsai3d]

Yeah, I saw some fuss about this recently because type A implemented it, right? Theres almost 0 layer bonding on the 3d infill patterns that I saw, which is going to drastically decrease the strength (just like rectilinear is worse than grid for strength).

[citrik]

The structural integrity is really nice with this infill pattern.

In the tests I have run, this 3D honeycomb is actually quite a bit weaker than the other patterns that are already offered. So if you're looking for structural integrity, my test results showed you would be MUCH better using one of the patterns already included in S3D like grid or triangle.

Seriously, they performed MUCH better. The 3D pattern was actually quite weak.

Do you have any data to share on this? So from my experience the traditional alternative fill shapes that are currently available only add strength in one direction. Just to check we're on the same page, technically I'm asking about tessellated truncated octahedrons, not really hexagons. This is what the layer by layer print looks like... Every line segment is firmly attached to the others, there are no gaps.

tesselation of a truncated octahedron

Lots of details on how it's built in Slic3r here - https://github.com/alexrj/Slic3r/issues/1646