Introduction
Since starting this journey I have been increasingly aware of the amount of plastic that even my modest operation generates. And so I have been looking for ways to reduce this, while not increasing costs to customers or sacrificing quality.
Obviously the irony of doing this when my business is called the plastic clinic and sells plastic models, is not lost on me.
I obviously cannot cannot completely remove plastic from the product itself, but after some consideration, we have decided to focus on four key areas to improve the sustainability of our operation.
These are:
Packaging
Product lifespan
Reducing waste
Product material
Packaging
We are pleased to announce that we have already removed all plastic from our packaging. Bubble wrap has been replaced with tissue paper. Sticky tape has been replaced with paper tape, and plastic bags for small components have been replaced with paper bags. So far these changes have slightly increased our costs (Eg the paper tape is around four times the price of the plastic sticky tape we used before), however we have so far been able to absorb these costs and have not had to increase our postage and packaging rates (In any case many customers qualify for free delivery).
Product lifespan
One of the reasons I am less concerned about the plastic in the products themselves, is because (hopefully) the miniatures I print will be kept and cherished for a lifetime, or passed on to other collectors who will re-use them etc.
One thing I am keen to avoid is my products sitting unpainted or unused, in a box somewhere for years. Let's face it as hobbyists this is an all too common story. So to incentivise customers to make use of what they have before ordering more, we have in the past offered discounts to customers who send us photo's of their previous order once it is painted.
Reducing waste
3D printing, does produce waste. Broadly this falls into three components. The supports which need to be printed with the model to support it during printing, other materials used in the printing and cleaning process (most notably IPA), and misprinted/damaged models that cannot be sold.
While we cannot stop printing supports with our models (otherwise the prints would all fail), we have taken steps to address the other two.
Periodically we offer sales of our 'seconds' - damaged models and slight misprints which cannot be sold as 'new'. Most of these are completely useable except for a small defect here or there which could easily be repaired, or else the model could be used for conversion parts etc. We would rather see these bought and used than just sent to landfill.
We also re-use all of our IPA used for cleaning models after printing. We have developed our own process for removing resin from the IPA after use and rendering it useable again for cleaning resin residue from minis. While this process is imperfect and the IPA becomes saturated with other chemicals (such as pigments) which cannot so easily be removed, it allows us to recycle the IPA many times before eventually having to dispose of it.
Product material
There are many varieties of photocuring resin out there. As standard we use "ABS like resin", however on request we can also use "biodegradable resin".
Currently we mostly use 'ABS like' resin, this is at the premium end of the market and has superior properties in terms of both print quality and durability. In particular it performs well for thin components such as spears and swords, allowing them to flex without snapping.
There are also plant based, biodegradable resins on the market, which I have also used. These have the obvious advantage that all the supports printed with the models (and even the models themselves), will decay once sent to landfill. On paper they perform slightly worse than premium resins when it comes to sharpness of fine detail (although I would defy most people to spot the difference, especially from the other side of a gaming table), and they are noticeably more brittle so spears and swords etc will be more prone to snapping. On the other hand in my experience their performance is pretty comparable to other 'standard quality' resins which many 3d printers use.