PLA filament gives you an opportunity to 3D print things on your own. There are a lot of objects available online that you can download on your computer and then instruct your 3D printer to start printing it accordingly.
These 3D prints can really enhance your aquarium marine life and make it more colorful and exciting for the fishes as well.
In this post, we’ll specifically talk about if the PLA filament is aquarium safe or not.
Let’s find out!
PLA Filament Aquarium Safe
In order to know if PLA filament is safe or not we need to talk about what exactly it’s and how it’s made.
PLA stands for polylactic acid and it’s made from natural food items like corn starch, sugarcane or tapioca roots.
Based on this fact, it’s completely safe for the aquarium and you can put 3D models inside your aquarium.
Here are a few things you need to take care of before using PLA filament inside the aquarium:
#1 – Temperature
Make sure the temperature always remain on the healthy side otherwise it might ruin the PLA filaments. If you purposefully control the temperature of the aquarium yourself make sure it’s normal in nature either not too hot or too cold.
If it’s too hot, the object that’s made from the PLA filament might change its form or, if the temperature is cold the fishes might get irritated which is mostly the case.
#2 – Go For Food-Safe PLA Filaments
While most of the filaments available in the market are okay to use even for fishes but if you go a step ahead and pick the food-safe filament options than it’ll be better for you.
Here are the couple of options that you can consider for your need:
- VOXELAB 3D Printer Filament
- HATCHBOX PLA 3D Printer Filament (Black)
- HATCHBOX PLA 3D Printer Filament (Orange)
#3 – Waterproof The Models Before Using In Aquarium
It’s really important that you waterproof the 3D models first before using them inside your aquarium. The thing is, these PLA filaments are biodegradable which means it can be decomposed and this is especially true when it comes to water.
Waterproofing the objects also give a better look to your models. Here’s a good product that you can consider:
Things You Can Print Out
Aquarium is a theme, so you should be focusing on things which makes the aquarium, aquarium.
A few ideas are:
- Grass
- Flower
- Mermaid
- Rocks
- Pots
- Toys
- Figurines
- Lego
Wrapping It Up
So yes, PLA filament is completely safe to use and will not affect the quality of living for the fishes. If you take care of the above 3 compulsory steps you’ll rarely get into any trouble.
The good part is that, the PLA filament itself is not toxic at all to the fishes. You just need to protect it from the water and the rest is not a problem you need to worry about.
