Usually, t-shirt designs are screen printed, but that’s so old school. You have to make the silkscreen and then rub paint all over – it’s clearly a technique meant for the past. Well, fear not, as [RCLifeOn] is here to bring us to the future with 3D Printed T-Shirt Designs.
[RCLifeOn] affixes t-shirts to his print build platform and boom: you’ve got 3D printed graphics. He started by using PLA which, while it looked great, wasn’t up to a tussle with a washing machine. However, he quickly moved on to NinjaFlex which fended much better in a wash cycle. While the NinjaFlex washed better, [RCLifeOn] did have some issues getting the NinjaFlex to adhere to the t-shirt. With a little persistence and some settings tweaking, he was able to come out ahead with a durable and aesthetically pleasing result.
Now, 3D printing isn’t going to replace screen printing, but it’s also not going to replace injection molding. What 3D printing lacks in speed and efficiency, it makes up in setup time & cost. In other words, if you need 50 t-shirts of the same design, screen printing is the way to go. But, if you need 50 shirts, each with a different design, you just might want to follow in [RCLifeOn’s] footsteps.
Anyways, we don’t have much on 3D printing t-shirts, but we do have other useful information on 3D printing slinkys and 3D printing project enclosures. And, if you’d rather do it the old-school way, we can show you how to silkscreen all the things.
This screams for a permanent-ink inkjet print head or paint extruder rather than trying to mix molten plastic and cloth.
Yeah no kidding. Now I’m thinking about how to design a tee shirt “plotter” with primary color dye mixing. Or just diluted bleach lines on a dark shirt.
You mean like a commercially available DTG printer?
Yeah….if only there were some way to print directly to garments using modified commodity printers…that would surely kill screenprinting and revolutionize the garment industry… https://youtu.be/E5FlwqbJsEk
Pooping plastic on a Tshirt isnt an improvement on screenprinting and its a massive step backwards from DTG printing which has been done with modified epson printers over and OVER and OVER again for years.
https://youtu.be/jzx2VQW6B84 just to be clear…black shirts too.
2D printing?
Line graphics only, nothing like sweating in one area under a big solid design. What about ironing the plastic into the weave?
wouldn’t a ABS slurry adhere much better to the fabrics than just printing plastic on top of the fabric?
How about just mounting a paint pen to you 3D printer head. People do it now with pens to draw on paper.
Did this in 2014
Print head / Tattoo gun, would force the material into the fabric.
This is the sort of silly junk that makes me question whether HaD is still worth looking at.
Plotters and heat transfer foils have been invented tho…
I don’t care what these guys think.This is cool and clever.
Using machines in a different way than intended? Great, qualifies as a hack for me! I like it.
What’s with the hate? This is sweet. How many of us have DTG printers or are going to spend the hours to build one? Vs how many of us have 3d printers? I have a printer and some ninja flex ready to go, I’m going to try this out
Indeed. And the same technique also works for making signs on a sheet of plastic and labels on enclosures and front panels.
Makes me wonder if I can use a Laser cutter. I could burn a brown design onto the T-shirt as long as it doesn’t catch fire in the process. Hmmmm.
3d Printing sounds really Cool, But does it make the shirts go up in price?
The designs are awesome. Brilliant work. Thanks Michael Uttmark.
Please give me some more details about 3d printing.
3d t-shirt printing sounds great and I am sure it does, though very curious about the washing. You must be only hand washing and extremely gently which sounds labour intensive and t-shirts can get very grimy. Just how do you clean them?
The ideas going through my head are unreal with what would look good as a 3d printed t-shirt. The obvious first one was a raptor or alien coming out of the shirt. Great article thanks.
3d Printing sounds really Cool, But does it make the shirts go up in price?
What are the minimum requirements to start 3d printing business?
What about a compromise? Making the silkscreen stencil by 2d printing, even spitting resin and quick cure
using an uv led?
Who knew t-shirt printing could be so cutting-edge? 3D printing on t-shirts look awesome and very attractive.