Topic: Colorfab nGen review
I just picked up a spool of this to try it out and I didn't see any reviews here yet, so here you go.
I got a dark blue 1.75mm nGen spool from printedsolid. I started out at a print temp of 235 C on my E3D V6 and 70 C heated bed and started the first print as a simple vase. nGen is marketed as a very "printable" material but I was curious how it would actually perform. I'm not big on buzz words like eastman amorpha such-and-such polymer but I know a good printing material when I see and handle it.
The vase turned out beautiful! I was very pleased with the flow properties of this filament. It flows very smoothly without the occasional "bump" that I seem to get in my ABS prints no matter how much calibration I do. It seems to have a very suitable viscosity for printing and it leaves very very little blobs on retraction. The print felt at least as strong as ABS, and not very brittle. Also, the color saturation is very nice, even and bright too.
Next up, I did this elephant (https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:287891) to really test the retraction and overhang ability. Of course, there will also be some stringing on these types of voronoi style prints but it really was not bad and a lot less than ABS. I did have a cooling fan pointed at the nozzle the whole time (https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:839620). I have yet to try it without this cooling fan, so I don't know how much it would tend to warp up on overhangs without this.
On both prints, there was absolutely no warping on the build plate. I used a light coat of purple glue stick on glass, like I do for all my prints. I have solved my warping even on large ABS prints, but I don't expect warping to ever be a problem with nGen. The big downside is cost. At $39 for 750 grams, its more than double the cost of decent ABS. Hopefully if it becomes more popular, the cost might drop. I will probably use this for my personal prints where I want a really nice looking object but I doubt most customers or people receiving a gift would really appreciate it much more than ABS or nylon. If it could compete cost wise with ABS, I would probably use it exclusively.
Pics to come when I get home from work because either imgur is down or work finally started blocking it.