What You Need to Know About Cura Tree Supports
One amazing support structure found in Ultimaker's Cura slicing program is Cura Tree Supports. Tree supports are shaped like trees, with a single base that branches into limbs. They offer the advantage of being quicker to remove, resulting in cleaner models because they come into less touch with the print. The one drawback of these supports is the extra time it takes to slice the model compared to the others.
Why Is Tree Support Crucial to 3D Modeling?
By design, regular supports are usually linear or geometric in shape, making them ideal for printing simple structures. Tree supports, in contrast to more conventional ones, provide the impression of having a "trunk" and "branches" to evoke the organic structure of a tree. The most obvious advantage of tree supports over ordinary ones is the significantly cleaner final print they produce because they don't touch the print in nearly as many spots.
To hold up the model's overhangs, tree supports use a branching structure reminiscent of a tree, complete with a main trunk and lesser branches. Starting from the base and working your way up to the branches, this structure makes removing them from the model a breeze. They support the design from beneath instead of the side, so there's less material to remove, and there are fewer contact points with the model compared to other supports. The primary motivation for their development was a desire to address the problem of excessive material use in 3D printing supports.
Cura Tree Benefits
The maker community has been rapidly adopting Cura tree supports due to their many useful features. First, we'll examine some of the most significant advantages that tree supports provide.
1. Minimal Resources and Printing Duration
Developers of the open-source Cura program initially proposed tree supports as a means to lessen the support-related material waste. Tree supports are nearly fully hollow and taper in breadth, thus they need far less material than regular supports, therefore their work was effective. As a result, material costs and waste are both diminished. Additionally, compared to traditional support structures, tree supports are quicker to print, and they use less material overall. To directly compare standard and tree supports for a specific print job, you can utilize Cura's built-in print time and material support consumption calculators.
2. Improved Surface Smoothness
Using tree supports instead of more conventional ones can also increase the 3D print's surface finish quality. The structural design of tree supports is such that they make as few points of contact with the 3D model as possible, which is why they provide this advantage. The 3D-printed item may only come into contact with the tree's supports at the very tips of the branches that hold the overhangs in certain instances. As a result, tree supports shouldn't degrade the quality of complex or finely detailed 3D printing and necessitate little post-processing.
3. Simple Removal of Support
Having few points of contact between the tree supports and the 3D-printed model makes support removal easy. In some cases, standard supports may adhere to the 3D-printed object, making its removal difficult or even necessitating the use of pliers. In contrast, tree supports encase the print in a protective shell that has few points of contact. The good news is that you can usually take them off the finished print by hand without worrying about damaging anything.
How to Activate Tree Supports in Cura?
Select "Tree" from the "Support Type" drop-down box to enable tree supports. When you do, you'll be able to slice the design and view the supports' appearance on the model in the preview. You should know that slicing could take significantly longer than with other supports. You shouldn't be surprised if the progress bar is moving slowly because this is a drawback of these supports.
Cura Tree Support Settings
If you want to use the default settings and get the results you want, you can do that after you enable these supports. Here are the most important options that you can adjust to make them work for your design.
Support Placement
Touching the Build Plate and Everywhere are the two choices available. Choose "touching build plate" to have the supports rise from the build plate; they will not touch any other part of the model save the parts they are supporting. They will touch everything if they choose everywhere.
Branch Diameter
This determines how thick the branches of the tree are. Supports made with a thicker branch diameter are stronger, but they are also more material-intensive. A reasonable starting point for most models is the default branch diameter setting in Cura, which can be anywhere from 2 to 5mm.
To be sure, it will need some tweaking based on how complicated your model is. For models with straightforward overhangs and bridges, you can further minimize material use by adjusting the branch diameter option to a smaller value. However, keep in mind that weaker branches might not hold as much weight. In order to construct stronger supports that can withstand the weight of intricate overhangs and bridges, it may be necessary to select a bigger branch diameter setting in your design.
The material you employ will grow in size, but it will be worthwhile because it will ensure that your design is well-supported. You can play about with the default settings until you find one that works for your design by adjusting them in relation to your 3D model.
Trunk Diameter
This is what you'll use to figure out how big your 3D print's primary support structure is, which is like a tree trunk with smaller branches that reach out to hold up the components that hangover. Expanding the trunk diameter, like with the branch diameter, will make your design strong but will necessitate more material. Prioritize stability over material utilization while deciding whether to raise or decrease the size.
When to Use Cura Tree Supports?
First, tree supports are great to have if the printout's aesthetic quality is paramount. There are fewer points of contact between the tree support and the 3D-printed object, making removal easier and reducing surface defects.
Second, tree supports are hollow shells, so they often require less material than other types of supports, which is great if you're looking to cut down on filament use. Tree supports printed with a low infill density offer an additional stability option. In the long term, you can save money on materials and reduce waste by using less material as supports.
Third, if you're printing a part that needs very precise dimensions, tree supports are a must-have. Due to the necessity of removing regular supports from time to time, manufacturers are required to smooth down the surface of the component afterward. The dimensional correctness of the component is susceptible to post-processing operations like sanding. The removal of tree supports does not impact the part's tolerances and requires little to no post-processing if any at all.
Best 3D Printing Software
There are many 3D printing software available that can prepare designs for 3D printing, and a good example is SelfCAD. It is an easy-to-use 3D design software that you can use not only to create 3D models but also to edit meshes and slice designs. It comes with interesting 3D modeling tools like freehand drawing and sketching that you can use to create designs from scratch.
There are also easy-to-use selection modes as well as various modification tools to help you modify your designs based on your requirements. It has an image-to-3D feature that makes it easier to turn photos to 3D models. You can also import STL files and modify them based on your needs.
The software features a built-in online slicer that one can use to prepare designs for 3D printing. The video below shows how to slice STL files and generate the Gcode to send to the 3D printer.
Maximize Your 3D Printing Potential with Cura’s Tree Supports!
Knowing what tools are available to you when it comes to 3D printing is vital regardless of your level of experience as a maker. Tree supports are a new feature in Cura slicer, but they offer a lot of benefits that manufacturers might not know about just yet. But now that you know what to expect from this article, you should be ready to maximize the use of automated tree supports when it comes to printing.
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