3D Printing Filament for Australian Schools

Almost every guide to 3D printing in Australian schools is really a guide to buying printers. This one is about the consumable — which filament belongs in which classroom, what it costs across a term, the ventilation rules that actually apply to each material, and how the purchasing works. Choosing a material is also an assessable design decision, which makes it curriculum content rather than just procurement.

Start with one material, not a catalogue

The most useful decision a school can make is to standardise on a single material for the overwhelming majority of student printing, and add a second only when a specific project needs it.

That material is PLA. It prints at low temperature, has low odour, does not need an enclosure, sticks to almost any build surface and tolerates the settings a Year 8 student will hand it. It is the classroom standard worldwide for exactly those reasons, not because it is the cheapest.

The variant worth considering as the house default is PLA+ — PLA compounded with toughening additives, so student parts survive being dropped, passed around a room and taken home in a bag. It prints on the same profile and costs a few dollars more per kilogram. For a program where breakage is demoralising and reprints cost lesson time, that is usually the better economics. Our PLA vs PLA+ guide sets out the difference.

Which material for which year level

A sensible progression maps material capability to what students are actually being asked to design, and to the supervision the room can provide.

The boundary that matters most is the last one. ABS and ASA are the point at which the hardware and the room have to change, not just the spool. A school without an enclosed, ventilated printer should not be buying them, regardless of year level.

Ventilation and safety, material by material

Generic advice to ensure good ventilation is not useful to a teacher deciding whether a material can run in an occupied classroom. This is the practical version.

The short rule a department can write into a risk assessment: PLA, PLA+, PETG and TPU may print in an occupied, ventilated classroom; ABS and ASA may not. If a senior brief genuinely requires ASA for UV durability, run it outside class time in an enclosed machine in a separate ventilated room.

Two practical additions for any 3D printing space: a printer positioned so students are not leaning over the build area, and a rule that no one reaches into a machine with a bed at 90°C or above. The heated bed, not the plastic, is the realistic burn risk in a classroom. Schools should always follow their own jurisdiction’s work health and safety requirements and their employer’s risk-assessment process — the table above is material guidance, not a substitute for either.

What filament actually costs per class, per term

How much does 3D printing cost is usually answered with printer prices. The line item that recurs is filament, and it is easy to estimate properly.

Start from typical print masses. These are indicative for the kinds of objects school briefs produce, at common wall and infill settings:

A 1 kg spool therefore yields roughly 100 to 250 primary-level prints, or around 20 to 40 Year 9–10 prototypes. Work it through for a real unit: a class of 30 students each printing one 40 g part, plus a 20% allowance for failures and reprints, is about 1.44 kg — so two spools per class per project.

At 3DMA’s current pricing that is $14.95 per kilogram for Core PLA and $19.95 for Ultra PLA+ High Flow, which puts the consumable cost of that project at a few dollars per student. Filament is almost never the constraint on a 3D printing program; printer availability and lesson time are. Budget it generously and keep spare stock, because a program that stops because the store room is empty loses far more than the spool would have cost.

For term-based stock-ups and a quote against your actual numbers, use Bulk Orders.

Linking material choice to the Australian Curriculum

Filament selection is not just a purchasing decision — it maps directly onto assessable content in Design and Technologies under Version 9 of the Australian Curriculum.

In the Knowledge and understanding strand, the Materials and technologies specialisations sub-strand covers the properties and characteristics of materials. A student who can explain why PETG and not PLA belongs in a part that will sit in a car, and cite heat resistance to justify it, is demonstrating exactly that content.

In the Processes and production skills strand, material choice threads through several sub-strands:

• Investigating and defining — identifying the environment and loads the part must survive
• Generating and designing — proposing a material and justifying it against alternatives
• Producing and implementing — selecting settings appropriate to the chosen material
• Evaluating — testing the finished part and judging whether the material choice held up
• Collaborating and managing — managing shared printers, shared spools and print-queue time

A small, reusable assessment task falls straight out of this: give students a part brief with a stated environment, require a one-paragraph material justification citing at least two properties, print it, then test it against the brief. Our Materials Guide works as the student-facing reference for that task. Teachers should always check the current curriculum and their own syllabus documents for the exact content descriptors that apply to their state and year level.

Failed prints: the hidden budget line

The cost of a failed print is rarely the plastic. It is the double period a student loses and the printer hour the next class does not get. Two causes account for most of it in schools.

Moisture. A spool left open on a printer in a humid classroom or store room absorbs water, and wet filament strings, prints rough and delaminates. In a school this is especially likely because spools sit out between lessons and across holidays. Store spools sealed in a clip-lid tub with indicating silica gel, and keep a hygrometer in the tub so a teacher or lab technician can see the state at a glance. Our storage guide covers drying a spool that has already gone wet.

Material mismatch with the hardware. A filled composite in a brass nozzle will quietly grind it wider, and every print after that loses detail. If a department is going to buy carbon- or glass-filled filament, it needs hardened nozzles fitted first and a note in the store room saying which machines have them.

Beyond that, our troubleshooting guide is written to be readable by a student — symptom, cause, fix — which makes it a reasonable thing to print and pin next to the printer.

Standardising across a fleet of printers

Once a room has more than two printers, consistency is worth more than variety. Three habits do most of the work.

• One material, one brand, one profile. If every printer runs the same PLA+, one slicer profile is correct on all of them, and a relief teacher or a new student does not need to know which machine is which.
• A fixed core palette. Pick a set of colours the department reorders every term rather than whatever is on special. Student projects that span several prints then match, and nobody is hunting for the spool that was half-used last year.
• Label the exceptions. Any printer with a hardened nozzle, a direct-drive extruder or an enclosure gets a physical label saying what it is for. This is the single cheapest way to stop a composite spool going into the wrong machine.

For multi-campus programs the same logic applies one level up: standardise the material list across sites so guidance, profiles and troubleshooting transfer, and consolidate ordering so each campus is not negotiating separately.

Quotes, purchase orders and term ordering

Schools rarely buy by credit card at checkout, so the process matters as much as the price.

• Quotes. Send your material list, quantities and delivery location through Bulk Orders and you will usually have pricing and a supply plan back within one business day. Volume pricing is worked out case by case on quantity and mix rather than a flat cart discount.
• Purchase orders and invoicing. Email your enquiry with School PO in the subject line and we will confirm the process and terms for your organisation.
• Term stock-ups. Tell us the unit you are running and when it starts, and the order can be timed to arrive before the term rather than during it. Recurring supply is straightforward to arrange.
• Deadlines. Include the date you need stock by in the enquiry and we will confirm feasibility before you commit.

Everything ships from Sydney, so domestic transit times apply rather than overseas freight — which also means spools have not spent weeks in a hot container, the most common reason apparently cheap filament prints badly out of the bag. See Business & Education for how we work with schools, or email support@3dma.au.

Frequently asked questions

What is the best filament for schools?

PLA for primary and junior secondary, and PLA+ once student parts need to survive handling. Both print at low temperature with low odour, need no enclosure and tolerate student-tuned settings. Add PETG in Years 9–10 when briefs start specifying heat, moisture or load. Leave ABS and ASA for senior work on an enclosed, ventilated printer.

How much does 3D printing cost for a school in Australia?

Per print, very little. Typical student parts run from a few grams for a keyring to 150 g for a senior prototype, so a 1 kg spool covers a class project with room for reprints. A class of 30 printing one 40 g part each, with a failure allowance, uses roughly 1.5 kg. At current 3DMA pricing that is a few dollars of filament per student. Printer time, not filament, is the real constraint.

Does a school 3D printer need an enclosure?

Not for PLA, PLA+, PETG or TPU — those print safely on an open bench in a normally ventilated classroom. An enclosure with filtration becomes necessary for ABS and ASA, which also should not run in a room that is occupied while printing. If your program is PLA-based, an enclosure is a nice-to-have for print quality, not a safety requirement.

Can schools order by purchase order or invoice?

Email your enquiry with School PO in the subject line and we will confirm the process and account terms for your organisation. Quotes for term stock-ups go through Bulk Orders and usually come back within one business day.

Which materials need special printer hardware?

Three rules cover the range: ABS and ASA need an enclosure and ventilation, TPU strongly prefers a direct-drive extruder, and every carbon- or glass-filled composite needs a hardened nozzle. Everything else runs on a stock modern printer. Label any machine that has the special hardware so the wrong spool does not end up in it.

How should a school store filament over the holidays?

Sealed, with desiccant, indoors. Put spools in clip-lid airtight tubs with indicating silica gel and a hygrometer, and keep them out of a hot store room or roof space — PLA begins to soften around 55–60°C and can deform on the spool. A term of neglected storage is the most common reason printing goes badly in week one.