Crafting silicone parts is not your typical day in the shop. When I set out to restore an old Ritter Model C compressor pump, off-the-shelf seals and gaskets were a non-starter - cork/paper options were not ideal. It didn’t take long to turn that little resurrection project into a bigger solution for one of the loudest gripes in the 3D printing world: flimsy OEM nozzle wipers and questionable aftermarket mods. Here’s how these parts are brought to life.
The Design: Custom silicone parts come with their own special brand of fun. It starts with dialing in wall thickness on flexible features and rounding off internal corners to keep tears at bay. Then you have to sneak in vent and drain paths while maintaining beefy enough cross-sections around holes and slots to survive endless flexing. Once that looks right on screen, the real adventure—trial and error in production—begins.
Production: After printing, each part gets a sonic bath in a blended solvent of 80% isopropyl alcohol and 20% n‑butyl acetate—twice, for good measure. Then they air dry to guarantee no solvent was absorbed during cleaning. Finally, the green parts are post‑cured in a heated UV oven and water bath to complete crosslinking, turning them into fully crosslinked silicone with true 40A shore hardness, 230% elongation at break, 34% rebound resilience, strong tear resistance, and all the other nerdy goodness.
Designing and producing silicone parts is anything but a typical shop day—or a typical 3D printing project—but the payoff is worth it.
-B.Rebel
