The solution for dart frog breeding is here!

Since I started working on this project some years ago, I noticed a big confusion among some interested people thinking that Tad-Pools were 3D printed. This came in repeatedly, and on every occasion, I took some time to explain the reasons why 3D printing wasn't the right manufacturing process to make them and why I chose injection molding from the beginning instead. As a product designer, the difference is very clear to me because I have studied and worked on this in university and past jobs, but not all dart frog breeders may know those reasons. So, as an effort to share that knowledge among the dart frog community, I want to explain my thoughts on this subject here. With 3D printing machines becoming increasingly common, one can think that it is possible to print everything we want regardless of its application. For prototypes or decoration objects it is perfect, however, for technical products like Tad-Pools which need to fulfill several specific functions, this is not always the case. There are 4 main reasons that make injection molding the right process and 3D printing inappropriate for frog breeding products in general. Here is why: 1. MATERIALS need to be stable. Unfortunately the most common plastics used in 3D printing nowadays (ABS, PLA, etc.) are not suitable for being in contact with living things. There can be bacterial developments in their surfaces and toxic chemical exchanges between some of them and the frogs / eggs / tadpoles as they are in contact for a good amount of time in the hot and humid environment of our vivariums. So the plastic must be food grade to be safe for the frogs in the long term. That's why Tad-Pools are made of food grade HDPE, which does not allow bacteria to grow and does not leak any chemicals into its surroundings and, by the way, it can be easily recycled nowadays too ;) 2. SURFACE FINISH needs to be smooth. Bromeliads and other tropical plants in which frogs love to lay their eggs are flat and smooth. Some Ranitomeya even lay their eggs on the flatest surface available: the terrarium glass itself. So, a textured surface is not natural for the frogs to lay their eggs and unfortunately all 3D printing processes leave some grooves on the parts because they are made by stacked layers of material. That's why when I printed my prototypes, I had to surface treat them with acetone to obtain a smoother result. But this was just for validating the attachments and the functionality of the product with the frogs. These processes would have been extremely difficult to do on a large scale and more chemicals would have been used, and all that for a non-food grade plastic anyway... So I used this method only for prototyping purposes and went for a nice metal injection mold to achieve the plant leaf's smoothness that was required. 3. COLORS need to be as natural as possible. In order for the Tad-Pools to blend in with the vivarium decor and appeal more to the frogs for breeding they need to be precisely colored. An injection process allows me to mix pigments to achieve unique and precise shades. Meanwhile in 3D printing there are limited filament colors available on the market, sometimes they are not very natural looking and it's impossible to mix them as well. 4. Production TIME and COST. Each Tad-Pool takes only a few seconds to be injected, while 3D printing some parts may take hours. The cost per part for 3D prints is higher than for injected parts. So the decision was easy to make from the beginning. 3D printing was not adapted at all, the Tad-Pools needed to be made out of injected food grade plastic to be frog safe, precisely colored, affordable and perfectly smooth ;)