Material Compatibility & Suggested Print Settings
Palette supports different filament combinations. We’re constantly experimenting to find new material combinations that work together. Share your settings or testing requests with us at support@mosaicmfg.com. Suggested Splice Tuning settings for Palette can be found here.
Optimal print settings are different for every printer, but these values should be good to start with. If you already have good print settings with a particular material (e.g. PLA), use those settings if you are combining multiple filaments of that material (e.g. PLA + PLA + PLA + PLA).
| Material Combinations | Uses | Print temp. (°C) | Print speed (mm/s) | Difficulty | Notes/Tips |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| PLA + PLA | - Multi-color | 185 - 210 | 30 - 75 | Standard | - Your normal PLA settings (temperature, speed). |
| PLA + Enabler | - Soluble (Enabler in water) | 215 | ~50 | Standard | - Your normal PLA settings (temperature, speed). - Decrease the first layer speed if you experience adhesion issues. Successful PLA + Enabler print. |
| PLA + Scaffold | - Soluble (Scaffold in water) | 215 | ~50 | Standard | - Decrease the first layer speed if you experience adhesion issues. - Infill ~15% (Can go lower if printer is good at bridging). More print tips here. Successful PLA + Scaffold prints: 1, 2, 3. |
| PETG + PETG | - Multi-color - Durable | 230 | 30 - 75 | Standard | - Your normal PETG settings (temperature, speed). - Your nozzle should be slightly further away from your bed (~0.1mm) when printing in PETG. More PETG tips here. |
| PLA + PVA | - Soluble (PVA in water) | 215 | ~50 | Experimental | - PVA filaments can be finnicky, and not all brands of PVA work effectively with Palette. However, some customers are using PVA successfully with their Palettes (example). |
| ABS + ABS | - Durable | 230 | 30 - 75 | Experimental | - While most ABS filaments are not effective with Palette, one customer has been using Palette successfully with eSUN ABS using Palette’s default splice settings. A few others are also using ABS. |
| PLA + HIPS | - Soluble (HIPS in limonene) | 230 | ~50 | Experimental | - HIPS is an affordable soluble material but requires dissolving in limonene. HIPS is pliable until it is fully cooled, so avoid removing parts until it has cooled. - Splices with PLA and HIPS look quite good. |
| PLA + PolySmooth | - Soluble (PolySmooth in alcohol) | 215 | ~50 | Experimental | - PolySmooth can be used as a soluble support material. It’s more affordable than most water-soluble filaments but must be dissolved in alcohol (Polymaker suggests 70%+; we use 90%.) - PLA + PolySmooth splices look very good. - Heat & Compression at 1 and 1. |
| PolySmooth + PolySmooth | - Multi-color - Smoothable (with alcohol vapor using Polysher) | 215 | ~50 | Experimental | - Your normal PolySmooth settings (temperature, speed). - PolySmooth splices well with Palette, but we still experience the occasional jam – it is not as reliable as PLA. We printed this vase using PolySmooth and Gradient Mode. - Polymaker recommends using a Palette Heat Factor of 1 and Compression Factor of 1. |
| PETG + TPU | - Multi-color - Functional (stiff & flexible in same print) | 235 | PETG: ~50 TPU: ~25 | Experimental & Advanced | - A Palette owner has printed in PETG and TPU. It is important to master printing TPU before combining it with other materials. TPU can be challenging to print. |
| TPU + TPU | - Multi-color flexible | 235 | ~25 | Advanced | - Your normal TPU settings (temperature, speed). - We highly suggest mastering printing with a single flexible filament on its own before combining multiple TPUs in Palette. - With the modifications detailed in the Advanced/Flexibles section below, we’re seeing great splices when combining multiple flexible filaments. |
| PLA + TPU | - Multi-color - Functional (stiff & flexible in same print) | 235 | ~25 | Advanced | - It is important to master printing with TPU on its own before experimenting with PLA and TPU together. TPU can be very challenging to print. (Note: not possible with Palette 3 models) |
| PolySupport + TPU | - Multi-color TPU with supports | 235 | ~25 | Advanced | - It is important to master printing with TPU on its own before experimenting with PLA and PolySupport together. TPU can be very challenging to print. - We’ve begun using PolySupport with TPU for models that require supports. The splices look great. We’re still honing print settings. (Note: not possible with Palette 3 models) |
Getting started: your first multi-color & multi-material prints
Places to find models & inspiration
Mosaic Prints
Multi-Filament Prints group on Thingiverse
Mosaic’s PalettePrinted Twitter page
CANVAS Painting
Palette printing with soluble supports
Printing with soluble supports requires users to assign a specific extruder for support materials. We have guides on how to do this with Simplify3D and our own CANVAS software.
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Advanced: Palette printing with flexibles (TPU, TPE)
If you’ve printed with flexible filaments before, you’re probably familiar with the challenges of using flexibles (like TPU wrapping around drive gears, finding its way into every nook and cranny, and causing jams).
Palette shares some similarities with 3D printers: it has drives, drive gears and idler bearings, PTFE tubing, and other channels through which filament passes. And, as with printing flexible filaments with 3D printers, these flexible filaments can find their way into nooks and crannies in Palette.
Early versions of Palette+ experienced these issues frequently, which led to a TPU Conversion kit that enabled users to install printable pieces to the filament path that assisted with printing with flexibles. Palette+ units shipped after January 2018 will have TPU Conversion hardware pre-installed. If you’re not sure if you need to install the conversion kit, please check if your unit contains the cooling rollers (located right after the splice block). If it does, then you would need to install the TPU conversion kit:
There’s no need to worry about printing with flexibles when it comes to Palette 2 (Pro). The hardware has been designed to splice rigid and flexible filaments and there is no maintenance needed to create flexible splices. Here’s a video of Palette 2 splicing together NinjaTek Cheetah filaments: http://mm3d.co/flexible
For additional information and tips on how to print with flexibles, we have a blog post with best practices.
Once you have your TPU moving through your Palette effectively, you can access Splice Tuning on Palette’s screen to tune and test your splices so they have the right diameter and strength. You can change the heat, compression, and cooling used in order to make the optimal splices. Learn more about Splice Tuning here: http://mm3d.co/splice-tuning
If you have any additional questions, please send us a message at support@mosaicmfg.com
6 Comments
how do I send my project to the two sd cards ie one for the printer and one for the palette
Cindy Simonson - Reply
Hi Alec, to run Palette 2 in Connected mode, you would need to add a Canvas Hub to your setup. This can be purchased from our store, or you can create your own using a Raspberry Pi and our plugins: Connected Mode Calibration Print
Jonny Yeu -
I have that same question, how do I have my Pallett 2 communicate with my prusa printer
Alec -
Hey Cindy, I see that you sent us a message at support@mosaicmfg.com, we'll being reaching out to you soon.
Jonny Yeu -
I just purchased a palette 2s from eBay. Can I still buy parts and get support for it?
Cindy Simonson - Reply