Let's talk about lubrication : Silicone, PTFE , Wet, Dry etc ...?

Well, I have looked on Internet and found a lot of useful informations on lubrification, but I still dont know witch kind is better or worse and why ?

For now, I am using a dry PTFE lubrification everywhere.:

If some of you work in an industrial environment or have special knowledge on mécanique and lubrification, it would be great to share your experiences.here.

I know that there is not a best one for all cases, but would be great to share advantage, experience on real case, etc…

So, I will share my first opinion : one problem I can say with Dry PTFE is that it is invisible and it’s then hard to say if there is still some of it in place or not.

Super lube with ptfe ftw.

1 Like

Well the Internet failed you but thankfully this forum has a number of threads on lubricant.

Heu seems Bambulab is not more advanced than I ;p

First quote I read from your link :confused:

We have not tested other types of lubricant oil and cannot determine if they may adversely affect the Y-axis slide rail (including but not limited to corrosion and wear of bearings and steel shafts).

Quote from your link

I would prefer having advices of professional people that are expert in the domain, because as I said I did many search without being able to get a cleaver answer.

I am pretty sure that 99% of “grease” would work as this printer is not a jumbo jet, just looking for more information from an expert point of view

1 Like

I would advise against any lubricant containing silicones. Not because it doesn’t lubricate, but silicones tend to migrate and are very difficult to remove.

Imagine your buildplate being contaminated by the silcones. Your bed adhesion wil be gone forever.

I used to work in the medical device industry and we were not allowed to use silicone based anything inside our production facility for this reason.

4 Likes

I have a close friend that paints Cars for a living. Armor All products are banned in his shop for this exact reason. The silicon causes fisheyes in the paint finish if it is used anywhere near a car being prep for paint.

7 Likes

Maybe ask him about his mind on dry PTFE plz :slight_smile:

EDIT: to be honest at first I was wondering for my metal lathe, but as I dont like being in multiple forums at once, and because I was also wondering for the Bambu Lab, I have posted the question on the forum where I am the more active at the moment, wich is this one :slight_smile:

Well no other more good advice ?

One thing I find interesting with Dry PTFE is that it does not grab all dirt and so it is really easy to clean when time to re-lubricate rods come.

For the spindles (Z-Axis) I use this one on all may printers. Works very well.

But I am still wondering, if it is a good idea to put some dry PTFE on the carbon rods? :face_with_raised_eyebrow: Or any other lubricant. The bearing is just made of (cheap) aluminum instead of carbon-corresponding material :frowning: :flushed:

I use a ws2 tungsten oil on rails and ceramic nano based ptfe grease on screw

They also sell a version of ptfe + grease.
Which combines advantages of both.
I have used it previously for z-axis rod on my Ender-3 Pro (but not yet on a Bambu printer).