In his latest YouTube episode, Stefan from CNC Kitchen took an experimental approach and made his own 3D printing filament from hot glue sticks. Although hot glue guns work in a similar way to 3D printers, there are currently no commercial filaments made from hot glue stick material. Stefan wanted to close this gap and explore the possibilities of 3D printing with hot glue.
He started the process by shredding hot glue sticks in a food processor and then hardening the pieces in the freezer. This process made it easier to shred the otherwise sticky and flexible sticks. Stefan extruded the shredded particles into a flexible filament at temperatures between 90 and 190 °C using a filament extruder.
Despite some challenges such as clogging and the sticky consistency, he managed to carry out the first test prints on an Ender 3 3D printer. “The material was super transparent and extremely soft to the touch,” says Stefan, describing his results. However, the filament cooled down slowly, which affected the print quality – a typical property of hot melt adhesives.
As an application example, Stefan then produced iron-on patches by combining a layer of the hot melt filament with a TPU layer. The results were promising, even if there is still room for optimization.
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