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Cake day: June 20th, 2023

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  • A lot of these depend on the model and where it’s installed (geographically and within the house). In many areas of the US, there is a drain in the floor near all water heaters as a matter of code, you can drain condensate directly to that (and unlike gas appliances, the condensate is clean and does not need treated to go in household drains). I honestly think the noise concern is hugely overblown and used as an excuse for people that don’t like change. Sure it exists, but if your water heater is in the basement or garage like the majority are at least in my areas of the US, you’ll never notice it. I also look at the cooling air as a benefit for at least half the year, I can close all the vents in our basement for the whole spring/summer and it’s super comfortable. In the winter it’s a tad chilly, but not uncomfortable. Drying the air is also great for our basement, it’s literally a dehumidifier in what’s usually a pretty damp location for many people. Ours (a rheem unit) has a flimsy plastic air filter you vaccuum off once a year as well so not really a huge deal. I think most are like this.

    I agree that folks should do their homework and understand what they are getting. Heat pump water heaters are great, but are overpriced at the moment. Even with electric company rebates and a tax credit it cost more than a decent gas replacement would for us. It’s likely to only pay off because we have solar and so don’t really pay for electricity for a large chunk of the year. But I expect costs to come down over the next 5-10 years as these become the go to for most electric installs (and with fewer new gas hookups in new and renovated buildings that’s like to be most installs). Once these hit that $700-$1000 price point there’s really no good reason most people shouldn’t default to installing one.



  • YMMV of course, and will highly depend on how many people are in your house and how you use hot water, but a 50 gallon heat pump water heater easily supplies a dishwasher and two long showers with 1/3 of a tank of available water left in our house (and I take pretty hot showers that are not always as short as they should be). Sure, it takes an hour or two to fully recover but we aren’t ever looking to use much more hot water at one time. If you have a household of four, it may be a bit more of a problem, but then you can easily schedule other hot water uses to happen “off peak” like a dishwasher.


  • Idk, I DIY swapped out old gas water heater for an electric heat pump water heater heater and it was super straight forward. If you have the plumbing and electrical skills to add a circuit and move your hookups (since on most gas water heaters they are on top and most heat pump water heaters they are on the sides top and bottom), you probably have the skills to safely disconnect and cap off the old gas line. Just be sure to use pipe dope that is rated for gas, and check with soapy water once you pressurize the line again for leaks.





  • So yes, most guides will tell you you need to wear a respirator while working with the resin, but personally I find it really depends on the type of resin I’m using. Generally if I’m just filling the vat then starting a print I won’t bother, same if I’m just removing my print from the plate and getting it ready to post process. But if I’m cleaning up and emptying the vat or I have a bunch of prints I’m working to clean and cure I’ll wear my respirator. Gloves are an always though.

    A few additional items you’ll want:

    • a silicon mat to work on to make clean up easier
    • paint filters an a funnel to strain the leftover resin when you’re done printing and want to store it for later
    • a plastic putty knife to scrape failed prints from the film (also good for removing your print from the build plate)
    • high quality isopropyl alcohol (better than 90%, any less and there’s too much water which makes cleaning not work as well). I pick mine up at the local big box home improvement store (Home Depot, Lowe’s, Menards, etc) in gallon cans. Find it in the aisle with cleaning stuff and paint thinners.
      • you’ll want to put some isopropyl into a bottle just for cleaning your equipment and work area. I use a spray bottle that I also use for cleaning the build plate on my FDM printer.
    • extra film since you’ll likely scratch yours after a few failed prints

    I found it takes some practice to get the prints setup and sliced for good printing, way more than when I later got into FDM printing, expect failed prints. Supports are much more necessary than on FDM prints, but the fact that it’s upside down doesn’t really make a difference since it’s still printing bottom to top, you just need to be careful of islands as you print since it’s all printed a full layer at a time. This also means the only thing that increases print time is height, something that is the full area of the build plate but only 1cm tall will print faster than a 10cm long needle printed straight up and down despite being way more volume. So fill up that build plate with multiple models to save time.

    It does require a lot more post processing than FDM, like at least as much work as prepping, slicing, and actually printing. I can take something off my FDM printer and it’s ready to use, I need to account for at least 30-60 mins of work once my resin prints are finished to clean them, cure them in my UV box, remove supports, and then clean up the vat and printer. I tend to batch print for this reason, getting 3-5 sets of items ready to go and then running them back to back over the weekend. This means I only need to clean the printer up once.

    You’ll want to print (likely on your FDM printer) an adapter to allow your build plate to be hung at an angle to allow resin to drain into the vat once a print is done. This will waste less resin when you clean.

    This is all just off the top of my head and written on mobile, so apologies for and autocorrect mistakes. Feel free to ask for clarification on anything.