How to 3D print climbing holds

Can you 3D print climbing holds?

Yes. Crimps, edges, pinches, slopers, footholds, and jugs all print well in PETG and climb well on a home wall or a board. Hold companies prototype shapes this way now, and some produce them this way. The rest of this page is what we have learned printing our own.

What you need

A printer

The Bambu Lab A1 is the one to get. It is cheap for what it does, it works out of the box with no tuning, and it has the best reviews of any printer in its price range by a wide margin. If you want an enclosed printer for ASA or nylon later, the Bambu Lab P1S is the same thing with a door.

PETG, not PLA

Print holds in PETG. PLA is the default filament on most printers and it makes a fine-looking hold, then it cracks at a screw hole the first time someone pulls hard. It is stiff and it shatters rather than bends. PETG gives a little, its layers stick to each other properly, and it costs the same. CNC Kitchen’s tests show the difference if you want the numbers. Our pick is Polymaker PolyLite PETG; on a Bambu, Bambu PETG HF is tuned for the machine.

Dry filament, if it needs it

PETG absorbs moisture, and a damp spool prints stringy and bonds worse. A fresh spool prints fine, and we have gone a long time without drying anything. If prints go stringy or a hold snaps along a layer, dry the spool at about 60 °C for six hours in a filament dryer and it comes back.

Get a hold file

Free climbing hold STL files are scattered across Thingiverse, MakerWorld, and Printables, mostly one-offs with no notes on how they printed or climbed. The pile is a library of them in one place, each with its creator’s print recipe, photos on a wall, and reviews from people who printed it, all free to download.

Or shape your own. The crimp lab, sloper lab, and jug lab build a hold from a few sliders, show it on a 40° board, estimate the filament, and export an STL with the screw holes already in it. No modelling needed.

Slicer settings that matter

• Walls: 8. Walls carry the load; infill mostly holds the walls apart. We run eight. Six is the floor.
• Infill: 25 to 40%, gyroid or cubic. Go to the top of that range, or past it, on incut holds you can match or pull hard on. A sloper or a poor hold that only ever sees a push can sit at the bottom. Solid holds are not stronger, and they take all night.
• Fuzzy skin on, for grip. PETG comes out slick without it. We use a point distance of 0.3 mm and a thickness of 0.4 to 0.5 mm, rougher than the slicer default. Where to find it in the slicer. The texture notes on each design page say what its creator used.

Everything else, layer height included, can stay at your printer’s default profile.

Mounting

Everything the labs make, and most printed holds, are screw-on. Use #10 star-drive wood screws long enough to go through the hold and well into the wall, and stop at snug: a screw cranked into plastic splits it. Mount a new shape low and hang on it before you trust it high up.

Do 3D printed climbing holds hold up?

Yes, printed the way this page says. People have had the same printed sets on boards for years, and when climbers on Mountain Project load-tested theirs, the screws gave out before the holds did. The failures that get reported are PLA cracking at the screws, damp filament delaminating, and screws cranked in until the plastic split.

Look at holds now and then for cracks around the holes and retire any that show one. Read the recipe and reviews on the design page: they say what worked for the people who printed it, and that is worth more than any general rule here.

Short answers

Best filament for 3D printed climbing holds?

PETG. Polymaker PolyLite PETG is our pick. ASA if you have an enclosure and a sunny garage. Not PLA for anything you pull hard on.

How long does a hold take to print?

A crimp or foothold, one to two hours. A hand-sized jug or sloper, three to six. A set of ten is an overnight job on one printer.

How much filament does a hold use?

Roughly 30 to 60 g for a crimp and 80 to 150 g for a jug, so a 1 kg spool is a wall’s worth of small holds. The labs show the estimate for the exact shape as you change it.

Can I sell holds I print?

Only if the design’s licence allows it; each design page shows its licence. Holds you shape in the labs are yours.

Ready to print something? Browse the pile or shape your own in the crimp lab.