3D Printing Questions Ironman Specifically but Ill take any help

[Miiraclez]

First off sorry if this is in the wrong section (ive been a member for years and years but i dont post much obviously).

I built an EVA foam ironman suit a few years ago and I LOOOOVE IT. Ive switched over to a more professional helmet and wired the lights servos etc.

Im considering buying a 3D printer and trying to take things to the next level of detail and have something more legit. I have zero knowledge of 3D printing so I have a few questions.

What printer are you using and what is a good solid base to have as far as printing size? Id imagine the bigger the better and im thinking somewhere around the 8x8x8ish range I dont really want to spend more than a grand and obviously the cheaper the better

How much would an entire suit cost to print? excluding straps, harnesses, hinges etc just raw materials and filament (rough ballpark figure).

I dont imagine id have a hard time putting this all together. I did quite well with my first foam build and its really just all about taking it slow and following the builds on this site.

My main questions are: Are these suits comfortable at all? can you move in them comfortably? can you dance in them? can you sit down in them? or is it something much more rigid that you have to essentially take to an event - suit up - and then take it off before you get in the car and go home? I only weigh about 160 at almost 6' tall so im not a big guy at all.

Are these suits hot? They're pretty air tight and given that they are made out of plastic and reinforced with fiberglass *or id like mine to be* is it breathable at all? I know the foam gets pretty hot and theres a lot more empty space in the suit around the hips and other joining areas. I live in south carolina so even wearing this out in october for Halloween it might still be 60-70 degrees and i dont want to be dying

overall what was your experience? how difficult is the 3D printing method? any tips? where did you get your plans from?


any and all information would be very welcome. I apologize for bombarding you guys with all these questions but im very interested in undertaking this project soon and i would love to hear from people that have completed suits using this method or are in the middle of making them and i figured it would be easier to start a thread rather than messaging a bunch of individuals.

This forum has always been fantastic and I had a lot of help on my first build and expect only the same from all the fantastic people here this time around

much thanks and respect!

 

[devildog12]

I personally have 2 printers, a Flashforge Creator Pro and Flashforge Dreamer and love them both. As far as the cost of printing an entire suit, your looking in the ballpark of around `$200-$300. You could even possibly go lower than that. That depends on how much filament your gonna need and the cost of the files of your suit. Filament usually runs in the ballpark of around ~$20-$30 a roll (2.2lbs) and depending on the suit and how fine the quality of the print is really going to dictate how much your suit is gonna cost. As far as finishing it, we usually resin or XTC (which is a resin made for 3d printed stuff) the inside and then use glazing putty or bondo the outside, sand...sand some more, sand again then paint. Depending how fast you wanna get it done, you could print 24/7 straight (with no messed up prints, which is highly unlikely--you'll have one or two) for a little around 2ish weeks and be done. That would then leave you with the bondo-ing and such. As far as finding a printer under $1000 with your build requirements in mind, you could easily get a Flashforge Creator Pro from Amazon $899 or like a lot guys here on the forum here have, a wanhao i3 which runs i believe less than $500. Wanhao just released a plus version of that i3 model with even bigger build dimensions. I have no idea on the price though. Some good places to buy suit models from are do3d.com and mzx on etsy both produce excellent files however mzx has better prices and lower selection. do3d.com has a bigger selection and higher prices. Hopefully I've answered some or most of your questions and let me know if you have more.

 

[ubcs86]

I agree with all that Devildog said. I will also add: be ready to throw away a perfectly good print because the scale is off. Search the forum for "make human". I wish I had found that before I started my project, but wasnt made aware of it 2 years ago. You can make a perfectly scaled 3D model of yourself and then import the parts you are going to print and see how they fit without having to actually print anything out. Also, don't be afraid to take a heat gun to the parts and work it a bit to get the perfect fit and clean up pinch points. With that being said, I have changed my focus when printing armor parts to the number of shells vs the infill. Shells = wall thickness, infill is the volume of the hex pattern on the inside.

My suit is uncomfortable. I have only donned the entire thing 1 time, and it wasn't 100%. Since then, I've been working on fixing it up and making it more functional for the movement, etc. By the end of my build, i was rushing. I built it slowly for about 7 months while modeling/converting files, etc, then went full tilt, all day every weekend and after work, for about 3 months leading up to a big halloween party. The LONGEST part for me was prep and paint. My lack of comfort was entirely in the legs and some in the arms because I didnt use rigid hinges to connect the bicep and forearm. For the legs, I didnt scale properly when printing. I had to trim the thigh at the top, and heat gun and pull open around the knee. For the calf, I had to heat gun and open up around the ankle, and also the top of the calf. I had rigid hinges between the thigh and calf, but i couldnt bend my knee more than 45º, which doesnt let you sit down easily. Stairs were tricky! If you look at most Iron Man armors, the body type is long and lean, with ZERO glutes and small waist, and a small head. I can't stress enough the use of Make Human to save you trouble.

If I was to do it again, I would build a hybrid suit. I would build the top part of the thigh, around the knee, top of the calf, around the ankles, the cod and butt plate, neck, and sides of the abs in foam, and print the rest. Comfort is key, and I'd gladly pass on a 100% printed suit to get the comfort out of it. Also, my suit wasnt too hot, but I was outside most of the time in Delaware, I think it was around 70 degrees and I had a lot of open joints still. If you can figure out a fan system it definitely wouldnt hurt.

 

[Leylander]

I tried to use MakeHuman once. The end result seemed like my upper body was long and my legs were awfully short. It seemed that the software was altering measurements on the go. I entered a value on the forearms f.e. and when I started on the width of the wrists, the length of the forearms changed with it.

I could have been doing it wrong, but it was not as straight forward as I thought. I measured myself and started scaling the suit using Blender and an addon that provided the ability to measure between vertices. It seems to do the trick for me now. Just the lower back part seems to be a bit thight. But that could be altered with a heatgun or some small adjustments/cuts.

And something everyone will say, prepare to throw good/bad prints in the bin. I did my share of testing and had a lot of failed prints. Mostly due to inexperience and bad prepping of the printer. I got all of that fixed and I haven't had any issues since.

Make sure you prepare everything as good as possible and don't cut corners.

 

[Domonator]

Armorsmith is supposed to be better than makehuman so hope it will help when it comes out

 

[ubcs86]

Fingers crossed armorsmith will come out firing on all cylinders.

Leylander: i had the same thing. I think if you put in an overall height first, it scales accordingly. My first model came out weird, I did it again setting the overall height, age, weight, and knowing my body fat % (program asks for muscle %), and it seemed to come out pretty well (within 1/2" over my overall height).

 

[Miiraclez]

Thank you all so much for the input. I know when i made my first EVA foam suit it was a little bit of trial and error. I wish someone had said he watch out for this or dont do that or hey this is more expensive but it works a lot better. Im half tempted to make another foam suit but they just dont look as nice (obviously) as the printed suits do. I like the idea of a hybrid suit. I do love to dance and thats one of my main concerns. I dont want to go out on halloween and look awesome but not be able to have any fun. I might try to part together what I have now with some printed pieces. Maybe print out basically what would be the front of the suit for aesthetics but leave the back of the suit all foam for movement and comfort. The lower half of the body anyways. Id imagine the back and all upper pieces would be totally fine printed. Just worried about the legs not having the ability to move and ill probably want to sit my ass down at some point throughout the weekend haha.

I suppose the other question I should have asked is How long is it taking you guys to complete these? Should I be planning for next Halloween or if i started say next week would it be possible to finish a suit by Halloween? I know my foam suit took about 3 months to complete with zero prior knowledge. i was pretty dedicated to the project to say the least and I do have the time now to dedicate to this one as well. I saw Ubcs86 talking about 7 months to complete. Also keep in mind im not getting too crazy with servos etc (for now) with exception to the helmet which is already completed and good to go.

Feel a lot better simply knowing some basics before i try to follow other builds along.

Thanks again for all the help and great information!!!!!!

 

[devildog12]

I'm working on my Mark 45, and have been for around ~3 months or so and only have the torso printed. Your time frame to completion really depends on how much you work on it. I work on mine when I'm not working on other projects. 3d printing does have a learning curve but once you figure it out, it does get easier. 3d printing still isn't "plug and play" but it's getting there.

 

[ubcs86]

My suit took 7 months because I was figuring a lot of stuff out. I chose the MK43, and the ab section was done in individual segments, and I ended up doing 3 versions of the rib/sides to get the size right before just making temporary pieces out of foam because I ran out of time. I was working very casually for a long stretch of time, and only really got after it the last 3 months. I was learning the do's and don'ts of the printer, and at one point Makerware updated with much better supports that made life SO much easier. I absolutely underestimated the time to takes to prep and paint, especially masking off areas and only painting in the right weather conditions (don't have a spray booth so outside was my only choice to paint safely). In comparison, my first helmet probably took a solid 2 weeks to get right. I had my 2nd helmet printed and assembled, and the first 2 rounds of paint prep done in 3 days. Getting used to the prep and assembly is the biggest time portion of it. By the end of the suit (legs and core) I had it down to a system and got pretty efficient with the soldering iron to weld the parts together.