3D Printing Overtime - 3D Prints outside in the elements four years later

One of the longest running prints featured on this blog is one that dates back to August 2018.   At that point in time, as detailed on this blog we needed to create a print to replace the signage that was for our evacuation area outside.  Rather than replace the existing metal signs we thought that it would be worthwhile to 3D Print signage as we could customise it for our needs.

We have updated this print several times since then.  As previously mentioned it is placed in a location where the print has been exposed outside and now has been outside for four years.   During this time while we did have the issues with the colour fading, which meant that two years ago we took the prints down and resprayed them before putting them back in place.  

There is very evident weather of the prints which have remained intact and on display.  We will in all likelihood take the prints down again in the coming year and respray them again, however we can now say with confidence despite the challenging New Zealand outdoor condition there is no evidence of any of the printing/PLA suffering from the outside exposure.

Potential projects could therefore be based around using the PLA/3D Printer to manufacture or create items that are able to be deployed or used outside confident that the print will remain functional.