Glow in the dark filament

A couple of years ago I bought a roll of glow in the dark filament from the company Amolen. As I have only 1 roll, I have no idea if my experiences are indicative of the filament in general, or just a one off.

I had just finished off the last of my roll of red filament, which thanks in part to the S4 dryer, so I knew the printer was running well. Since glow in the dark filaments are known to be abrasive, I had put a tungsten carbide nozzle on the printer to protect against wear. I had done this well in advance of using the filament, so that I could rule out any issues by only changing one thing at a time.

Since the filament was a few years old, I opted to place the filament in the S4 dryer to get the filament the best possible chance to work first time. This is probably over the top, but ruling it out seemed wise.

Loading the filament was difficult. Strangely more difficult than it should have been. It turns out, there was a bulge in the filament, which I cut out. This prevented the filament from actually reaching the hotend. Once it was removed, I placed the filament in my other filament dryer to extract any and all water that might have been in the filament.

At this point, I paused. The dryer was keeping the filament dry and extracting any other moisture that might be in the filament, until I could try again. After discussing the issues with a friend, I chose to order a .6mm nozzle (I use a .4mm normally) along with looking at what I should do with my slicer settings. The advise I got was to slow the print down. At this point, I will continue with this filament, once the new nozzle arrives, as I have other jobs to print.

On a whim, I broke out my calipers and measure the Amolen GITD filament on the roll. The reading was about 2mm (I wasn't checking that accurately). I tried a piece that I had rescued from the printer when I unblocked it: 3mm. Hmm.

Strangely enough, the grey filament went on the printer and was working like a charm straight away...