Sep 30, 2026 · 28 min · 11 segments
Multicolour 3D printing looks like magic: one machine, one nozzle, and a figurine comes off the plate already painted. This episode opens the lid on how that actually happens, from the filament…
Well, we should probably ground this in how the base technology operates first.
So the vast majority of desktop 3D printers are FDM machines, which stands for fused deposition modeling.
Yeah, and if you are new to the terminology, the concept just relies on thermal phase changes.
The printer takes a solid string of polymer, which we call filament, and it heats it past its melting point inside a brass or a steel nozzle.
So it's basically like a very precise robotic hot glue gun?
Yes, exactly.
That is the perfect analogy.
And then it draws out your object one microscopic two-dimensional layer at a time.
Right, it builds from the ground up.
But that filament comes tightly wound on a spool, and usually there is only one color per spool, so by default, whatever single spool you have loaded into that robotic hot glue gun is the single color of your final dragon.
Right, and to break that limitation without, you know, buying an incredibly expensive industrial machine, the consumer market has adopted what we call the single nozzle filament changer.
Okay.
So the printer itself remains a standard single nozzle setup, but you add a secondary smart box that basically sits beside or on top of the machine.
Oh, gotcha.
And this box holds four or five separate spools of filament at once.
Its job is to mechanically feed whatever color is currently needed, uh, through a long tube and down into the printer's nozzle on command.
Okay, let's put some specific hardware to this concept for everyone listening.
Bamboo Lab has really popularized this recently with a system they call the AMS, or Automatic Material System.
Yeah, they've been huge for this.
It holds four spools, and you can actually daisy chain a few of them together to command up to 16 colors, which is wild.
It is wild.
In Australia, that hardware runs about $339 to $429, depending on the version.
AnyCubic has a similar box called the Ace Pro for around 252 US dollars.
Creality released the CFS, and Prusa's has the MMU3, which handles five filaments.
Well, we should probably ground this in how the base technology operates first.
So the vast majority of desktop 3D printers are FDM machines, which stands for fused deposition modeling.
Yeah, and if you are new to the terminology, the concept just relies on thermal phase changes.
The printer takes a solid string of polymer, which we call filament, and it heats it past its melting point inside a brass or a steel nozzle.
So it's basically like a very precise robotic hot glue gun?
Yes, exactly.
That is the perfect analogy.
And then it draws out your object one microscopic two-dimensional layer at a time.
Right, it builds from the ground up.
But that filament comes tightly wound on a spool, and usually there is only one color per spool, so by default, whatever single spool you have loaded into that robotic hot glue gun is the single color of your final dragon.
Right, and to break that limitation without, you know, buying an incredibly expensive industrial machine, the consumer market has adopted what we call the single nozzle filament changer.
Okay.
So the printer itself remains a standard single nozzle setup, but you add a secondary smart box that basically sits beside or on top of the machine.
Oh, gotcha.
And this box holds four or five separate spools of filament at once.
Its job is to mechanically feed whatever color is currently needed, uh, through a long tube and down into the printer's nozzle on command.
Okay, let's put some specific hardware to this concept for everyone listening.
Bamboo Lab has really popularized this recently with a system they call the AMS, or Automatic Material System.
Yeah, they've been huge for this.
It holds four spools, and you can actually daisy chain a few of them together to command up to 16 colors, which is wild.
It is wild.
In Australia, that hardware runs about $339 to $429, depending on the version.
AnyCubic has a similar box called the Ace Pro for around 252 US dollars.
Creality released the CFS, and Prusa's has the MMU3, which handles five filaments.
The rest of this transcript — segmented and speaker-labeled, so you land on the exact moment something was said
Search every transcript — by keyword, by phrase, or by meaning, across every show Radar indexes
Trends — what is surging across podcasts, measured against its own baseline
Alerts — when a name you follow appears in a newly indexed episode
No account is needed to search Radar.
