GMASS Tungsten Metal ABS Filament - 1.75mm (1kg)

Hi @Arielle!

The recommended nozzle size is: 0.5 - 0.6 mm.

When using a smaller than recommended nozzle, clogs and issues are likely to occur.

About 104 m.

ABS is a amorphous, so there isn't a firm melting point, but the glass transition temperature is somewhere in the neighborhood of 100C.

180F is getting close to that, but it shouldn't have any issues with temperature.

The daily use is where you may have issues, but it shouldn't soften or deform at that temp.

This filament has a density of 4.0 g/cm³ and since ABS has a density of 1.04 g/cm³ we can solve for the percentage of non-ABS in the filament:

(4.0 - 1.04) / 4.0 = 0.74

So the ABS (non-Tungsten) portion of the filament makes up about 74% by volume, which means the Tungsten portion is about 26%.

The given density of the filament is 4.0 g/cm³. The density of ABS is around 1.04, and the density of tungsten is 19.25 g/cm³ (19.3 rounded on Google). A simple distribution using the above percentages would be written as such: ((1.0474)+(19.2526))/100. The problem with this is that the equation yields 5.7746 g/cm³ which is greater than 4.0g/cm³. What this means is that there is much less than 26% tungsten in this filament.

Assuming we use 1.04 g/cm³ as the density of ABS and our compound is 4.0 g/cm³ then we need to find the difference as Ryan Lutz has done above. The difference of the material density and ABS density (2.96 g/cm³) then must be the amount of tungsten that is present. By taking 2.96 g/cm³ and dividing it by the corresponding difference of pure tungsten and pure ABS (18.21 g/cm³), we find the percentage of tungsten we are working with to be approximately 16.25%.

For those interested, the reciprocal equation also works if you start with the denser material because the negatives cancel out: (4.0 - 19.25) = -15.25/-18.21 = approx. 83.75% ABS

All of this assumes perfect combination of ABS and tungsten to form this composite material that is available for sale here. It could possibly be more or less depending on whether the ABS is melted fully or not. Because it is an amorphous solid it is hard to gauge what temperature is best for melting ABS but most printers use 230 °C. As taken from Wikipedia, ABS is made as a combination of anywhere "...from 15 to 35% acrylonitrile, 5 to 30% butadiene and 40 to 60% styrene." Therefore, it is very difficult to gauge the reaction of all of these materials when tungsten is introduced; a substance which has a melting point of 3,422 °C.

In short, you are probably getting somewhere near 16.25% tungsten but not exactly.

Great answer, Brett. You are 100% correct; my math is wrong. 16.25% is the correct percentage by volume for Tungsten. Thanks for taking the time to explain this in detail.

Just goes to show how valid Cunningham's Law is.

You can see it being actually printed on youtube.