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I can't get G29 to run BLTouch on my Ender 3 V2 I installed a BLTouch probe on my Ender 3 V2 and am able to manually generate the probe matrix and store it in the printer memory, but I can't figure out how to get Cura to run the probe for every print. I have included G29 in my start code, but the printer doesn't run the probe. Here is my full start code: M201 X500.00 Y500.00 Z100.00 E5000.00 ;Setup machine max acceleration M203 X500.00 Y500.00 Z10.00 E50.00 ;Setup machine max feedrate M204 P500.00 R1000.00 T500.00 ;Setup Print/Retract/Travel acceleration M205 X8.00 Y8.00 Z0.40 E5.00 ;Setup Jerk M220 S100 ;Reset Feedrate M221 S100 ;Reset Flowrate G28 ;Home G92 E0 ;Reset Extruder G29 ;BLTouch G1 Z2.0 F3000 ;Move Z Axis up G1 X10.1 Y20 Z0.28 F5000.0 ;Move to start position G1 X10.1 Y200.0 Z0.28 F1500.0 E15 ;Draw the first line G1 X10.4 Y200.0 Z0.28 F5000.0 ;Move to side a little G1 X10.4 Y20 Z0.28 F1500.0 E30 ;Draw the second line G92 E0 ;Reset Extruder G1 Z2.0 F3000 ;Move Z Axis up When I inspect the G-code directly, I can see that G29 is getting transpiled into M501 ;load bed level data M420 S1 ;enable bed leveling is this correct? If not, how do I stop the transpilation?

This sounds like a firmware issue to me. I copied and pasted G28 ;Home G92 E0 ;Reset Extruder G29 ;BLTouch Into my start code, and it worked fine. I have an Ender 3 V2 and a BLTouch (BL, not 3D.) If you haven't updated your firmware, that's definitely why. This is the start code I am using (in Ultimaker Cura) ; Ender 3 Custom Start G-code G92 E0 ; Reset Extruder G28 ; Home all axes G29 ; Auto bed level G1 Z2.0 F3000 ; Move Z Axis up little to prevent scratching of Heat Bed G1 X0.1 Y20 Z0.3 F5000.0 ; Move to start position G1 X0.1 Y200.0 Z0.3 F1500.0 E15 ; Draw the first line G1 X0.4 Y200.0 Z0.3 F5000.0 ; Move to side a little G1 X0.4 Y20 Z0.3 F1500.0 E30 ; Draw the second line G92 E0 ; Reset Extruder G1 Z2.0 F3000 ; Move Z Axis up little to prevent scratching of Heat Bed G1 X5 Y20 Z0.3 F5000.0 ; Move over to prevent blob squish How are you manually initiating the bed level? G-code command? (If so, which command/commands) or on the printer itself? If you haven't already, I suggest you try placing the line G92 E0 ;Reset Extruder before the line G28 ;Home. I'm wondering if it is possible that this is somehow interrupting the process. Are you on stock firmware? If so, I would try using firmware for the BLTouch, from the manufacturer. *You can find a guide on how to do a firmware update here is an external link. You shouldn't have to change anything in the configuration if you download the pre-configured BLTouch firmware.

Ender 3 first layer of ESD PLA printing on raft fails I was asked to print something with ESD PLA and the first layer, on a raft, is coming out like this: Nozzle temperature was 220 °C and I'm using the default Cura draft profile. Can you provide any tips on how to get a good print with this?

The gap between the raft and the first layer is too large (you need to switch to expert mode in Ultimaker Cura to see the values of the option before you can change them) and the hotend is too hot (normal PLA generally prints at 190 °C, ESD PLA prints at higher temperatures; you could aim for 210 °C as a start), This makes it difficult to precisely deposition the first layer on the raft as the nozzle drags the hot filament causing inaccurate first layer deposition. Furthermore, PLA generally doesn't require a raft to print the part. The Creality Ender 3 has a rough bed (like a BuildTak surface), you could print directly onto the bed surface. Source states: Extruder Temp: Typically 210-220°C. ESD PLA is a filled product and has a higher melt viscosity vs. unfilled PLA. Therefore, it is sometimes necessary to print at higher temperatures than your standard PLA to allow the resin to flow properly. This implies that a hotend of 220 °C mot not be hot enough, in that case the filament is too cold and viscous and gets dragged because the gap is too large.

Wrong temperature on extruder 2 Firstly, I just bought a G2S mini pro from Geeetech and it is my first 3D printer (therefore I'm 100% newbie in this area). The first extruder seems to be ok, the temperature varies from 23°C to 201°C and if you touch it you can see that it is hot. However, for the second extruder, the temperature is shown with more than 400°C: The cables are connected correctly and the firmware is updated. Do I have to return the printer? Or is there another solution?

If you have access to an IR thermometer, it would be interesting to verify what the actual temperature is. I doubt the hot end actually reaches that temperature, but: if it actually does, then it could actually be dangerous, as most extruders are designed for temperatures well below 300°C. The problem would likely be in the firmware in this case. if it stays cold, then probably is a problem with the temperature probe or its cables/connectors being broken. Most printers use thermistors as temperature probes, and thermistors let less and less current pass through the higher the temperature is, so: no current would be interpreted as the hot end being "extremely hot" and the firmware would not heat the hot end further. if it is hot but at another temperature than the one displayed, then it could either be a problem with the probe over-reading or a firmware bug (e.g.: the temperature is shown in Fahrenheit, or the firmware mis-process the signal from the probe). Either way: thermistors and cables are cheap to replace, while problems with the firmware may be fixed only if you have access to the code. If you just bought the printer in a physical store, I would simply swap it with another unit, rather than fiddling with it, though.

Which outdoor filaments for unheated beds? I am searching for 3D printing filaments, that are suitable for outdoor purposes, but printable on unheated beds. I will mostly use it for sensor node enclosures (should withstand temperature up to 50°C/120°F) and car accessories (70°C/160°F). If it requires annealing, it should have low shrinkage, since I will be printing parts that will fit into each other.

PETG is good for your project. You can also print transparent ABS on unheated bed with ABS juice.I tried transparent ABS in outside environment and it work fine.I live in India where outdoor temperature reach to 45C in summer.It is easy to print small parts.ABS juice may or may not work with large parts depending on your ambient room temperature.Ambient room temp should be above 30C for ABS on unheated bed.I suggest you to use a enclosure for printer if you are in cold area.

Prints are now sticking too well to the bed. What to do? I'm a beginner. I've a Printrbot Play with a heated bed add-on. I'm using it exclusively with PLA. It worked great initially, but then I took the nozzle out and put it back in, and the Z calibration was lost (and I didn't know the calibration was a thing). As a result, I started having issues with the piece warping up and not sticking to the bed in the corners and around the edge, when the piece was large and flat. I've installed the heated bed. I used Kapton tape. All these made it perhaps a little better. Finally I started tweaking the Z axis calibration (the fine adjustment for the initial distance between nozzle and bed) and that made it perfect. No warping anymore. But now I have the opposite problem. When printing pieces with large flat surfaces that are siting flush with the bed, it's next to impossible to tear it off at the end. I went back to using plain blue tape instead of Kapton, but it's still sticking too well to the bottom of the piece. I tried to pry it off by pushing a knife under the piece, but that has put a few scratches on the bed. Obviously I don't want to continue doing that. What can I do? How to prevent warping, while also making sure the piece does not stick too hard to whatever is underneath? EDIT: The accepted answer was very good and I don't want to mess with it by adding my own "answer". So here it is: I ended up adding a glass plate on top of the bed, with a heat conductive layer between bed and plate (it's a funny looking, rubbery, chewing-gum-y material that conducts heat). Now I just apply glue stick on the glass and print. Works great. Large pieces come off on their own sometimes if I let them cool down to 30 C or lower. I had some issues with the Z calibration sensor due to the plate, eventually got solved, but that would take too long to explain here.

Options to check (in order of probability of occurenece and success): Z-calibration Maybe you should perform calibration again. It's possible that nozzle is now too close which causes the filament is spread on the heatbed, which causes that the bottom surface is "too flat". It means all separate filament tracks are spilled and they create "glass flat" surface. You did mention that the model sticks too much even to kapton. It suggests z-calibration. Temperature calibration Check if the temperature is not too high. Reducing it a bit can reduce sticking. If filament is too soft then material sticks usually better (causes the same as in #1) Heatbed cleaning If your HB is scatched (even not visible scratches) then it's possible that previous printouts left little grains in such scratches. Cleaning HB could then help. Are you using glass? if yes - change glass side to check this option. Eventually replace glass with new one. Heatbed surface If your heatbed is scratched then filament can penetrate such scratches and increase sticking. Filament Did you change filament vendor? If not then maybe your filament had changed during a time/humidity/sun/cigarete smoke. This is very doubtful option but who knows. What methods you can use to detach model Paper knife I also have the same problem when I use paper glue stick. Some vendors produce such sticky glue that I affraid to break a glass (which I use of course). When this happens I use a paper knife. Glass is scratchproof enough. Be careful - if your model suddenly detaches releasing knife... just be careful. Unmount HB or unmount glass first of course. Hammer I know people use hammer to detach sticked model. I would suggest this method only for big and relatively simple elements. Especially for solids (fully filled with the material, without any grid/honeycomb inner structure). One short hit in the same surface as the HB. Be careful of course and unmount HB or unmount glass first. Fridge As HB material and filament have most likely different thermal shrinkage factor it might help. And guess what - unmount HB/glass first ;)

How can you calibrate extrusion multiplier value in Slic3r WITHOUT changing printer settings in memory? Most tutorials ask you to change the printer settings using the The command M92 E420 will set the new value which can be saved to memory (so that it is available after a printer power off/on cycle) using M500. But I just want to modify the Extrusion Multiplier in Slic3r's settings. It's default at for each filament, and I'd like to modify this by adding a profile for each roll I have after calibration. What's the best way to do this? If I measure extruding 100mm and checking how much is left, what is the formula used to get the new EM value?

Divide the amount overextruded by the desired amount. If you wanted 100mm but got 101mm, that's 1mm extra, or 1% over. Use an extrusion multiplier of 0.99 (1% under) to compensate - AND THEN DO ANOTHER TEST to confirm. This modifier will be used by Slic3r to generate E values in your gcode without flashing anything. I recommend saving this recipe with an intuitive name, like Acme Green PLA.

Why isn't any color showing up in my .3mf file in Windows 10 3D Builder So, I made a 3D picture of a cute mouse using Microsoft Paint 3D and exported it as a .3mf. Why didn't the colors match when I opened the file in Microsoft 3D Builder?

Per the 3MF Specification, colors in the .3mf files are sRGB. If you are looking at gross color defects, I would look a the raw codes generated in the 3mf to make sure they make sense. If you are talking about subtle color differences, that is much more complicated. Color have always been a tough thing to define as it is affected by whether the it is emissive (like displayed on a screen) or reflective (like a physical object). The way it is perceived is affected by ambient light, surface texture and more. I worked on a project once where Marketing wanted all the colors to match (on the screen, on paper, on plastic, on on fabric) and it was a mess.

Getting E1 Thermal Runaway errors, even after replacing the heating element on Tevo Tarantula Earlier today I successfully completed a small print (less than 1 hour) on our Tevo Tarantula. When it came time to print the next one, I started preheating for PLA and got an "E1 Thermal Runaway" error. I replaced the heating element with a backup and got no error on preheat. With an estimated 5+ hrs printing time, the print got about 1 hour in before it quit with another "E1 Thermal Runaway" error. This is with a brand new heating element, the third in about as many months, and I don't do much printing at all. Is this normal for the elements to be so shoddy or are there settings I need to be changing? I still have the first 2 elements that I thought had died but maybe that's not the issue at all so I'll hang onto them in case I'm overlooking some code to change in Marlin. I've tried connecting and reconnecting both the wires for the heating element and for the thermistor. I've tightened and loosened the screw holding the thermistor in the heating block. While it did heat up momentarily, the error popped up again after less than a minute: 23:40:57.529 : echo:DEBUG:INFO,ERRORS 23:41:04.974 : PID Autotune start 23:41:37.274 : Error:Heating failed, system stopped! Heater_ID: 0 23:41:37.274 : Error:Printer halted. kill() called! How can I find out what is wrong?

1 PID Tune Changing the thermosensor or the heater cartridge is a big change in the system: each of these items has internal errors differing them from each other item. If your thermosensor has a different standard resistance by a small way than the one before, if the resistance of the cartridge is different, then the chip gets readings it does not expect. This is why a change of either of these components (or to a different heater block size/material for the matter) one should run a PID tune, teaching the chip how the new sensor/cartridge behave. To do this, connect to your Printer via an USB Cable and run a software that can send raw gcode. I prefer Repetier Host, but other software also works. I like to follow the instructions of the e3D v6 assembly manual, but the video by Tom (Thomas Sanladererer) and the RepRap Wiki have excellent explanations too. Send M303 E0 S200 C8 wait for finishing send M301 with the values you just got returned. One example might read M301 P17.28 I0.63 D118.87 sent M500 to update your EEPROM If this doesn't help, we might have a bigger problem, so let's go troubleshooting! Hardware first, then Firmware. A few useful hints that Thomas Sanladerer found when he was checking his printers for fire hazards: A shorted out thermosensor (closed loop, 0-Resistance) triggers Maxtemp A burnt out thermosensor (open loop) triggers Mintemp A non-connected or burnt out (open loop) Cartridge triggers thermal runaway, as does any other error with the cartridge that leads to abnormal heating. 2 Check the Hardware Hardware can fail, we all know that. But luckily there are only 5 items involved that could fail: 2.1 Check all connections If the heater cartridge is not connected properly, that will result in a Thermal Runaway Error, as the thermosensor does not detect any change. A non connected thermosensor will trigger a mintemp error, a shorted thermosensor will trigger maxtemp error. 2.2 Check the resistance of the heater cartridge A broken heater cartridge can have two results: either it conducts no electricity at all (for example if a lead is broken), or it acts as a jumper and has no resistance at all. To check this, use a multimeter and measure the resistance in Ohm by connecting it to the leads of the cartridge while it is dismounted. A broken circuit in the cartridge triggers Thermal Runaway, a shorted out cartridge can break the board in worst case. A pictoral guide for analogue Multimeters. My e3D light6 in my 12 V TronXY has a resistance of about 5.2 Ω. The Value you will get depends on what kind of heater cartridge you use. For reference: e3D Heater Cartridges are documented to be around 4.8 Ω for 12 V & 30 W, 3.6 Ω for 12 V & 40 W, 19.2 Ω for 24 V 30 W and 14.4 Ω for 24 V 40 W. If your Value is given as infinite or near 0 Ω, your heater cartridge is broken - Though having 3 defect heater cartridges seems unlikely on first glance, unless something shortens their lifespan considerably. 2.3 Check your supply voltage Now comes a thing that can be dangerous for you will measure a live circuit. Be aware that you are working with live current when you do this. Do NOT bring your fingers into contact with unshielded wires! Set your Multimeter to check the Voltage. Connect the test probes to the output of the power supply that runs into the board. Power up the voltage supply. It should read close to 12 or 24V, depending on your machine. 2.4 Check the voltage given by the board Again, this is measuring live current and can be dangerous. Use maximum care not to fry yourself! If your Power supply is working, then it might be the board that is not allowing the current to get the heater cartridge. So we need to measure if it gets power. Since I=U/R, and we have established that R is not 0 or infinity (see above), we can establish if there is I by simply measuring U, which is the voltage. Mount the tips of your multimeter into the clamps that should take the leads for the heater cartridge and set it to measure the Voltage. Make sure they have contact. Connect the machine to power and start it up. Order it to heat up the cartridge. It should show a voltage that is similar to your supply voltage (12/24V). 2.5 Thermosensor The Thermosensor might trigger an error if it is faulty but not entirely broken. A broken thermosensor should trigger MINTEMP for a broken open and MAXTEMP for a shorted out sensor. The only way to test this would be to measure it against items of known temperature, for example using the bed sensor as Benchmark. 3 Check the Firmware 3.1 Thermosensor settings In some cases, the temperature tables of the thermosensors are not compatible and one has to change the settings for that in the firmware. One of the best rundowns I know is in the e3D light6/v6 firmware manual, if you need more help than this. In the Marlin 1.9 you do this in Configuation.h, under the header Thermal Settings. In my Ender 3 this is done in line 289: #define TEMP_SENSOR_0 5 That means, that my temperature sensor 0 (the one in the hotend) is of type 5, where type 5 is defined in the block above. The relevant line 256 of my file reads: * 5 : 100K thermistor - ATC Semitec 104GT-2 (Used in ParCan & J-Head) (4.7k pullup) The most common choice in Chinese hotends to use this very 4.7-kiloohm pullup thermistor table, and the actual specific table for most of these is reasonably close to the 5. Other thermosensors can be reasonably overlapping, but in case you change the style of thermosensor, it is generally advised to change this value accordingly1. Always run a PID tuning after changing the thermosensor table! 3.2 Thermal Runaway Protection The settings for the Thermal Runaway Protection might be worth a look. Maybe it is a little trigger happy? Configuration_adv.h contains a block titled Thermal Settings, containing when to trigger the emergency shutdown. For my Ender3 it reads like this: #if ENABLED(THERMAL_PROTECTION_HOTENDS) #define THERMAL_PROTECTION_PERIOD 40 // Seconds #define THERMAL_PROTECTION_HYSTERESIS 4 // Degrees Celsius From your error log, I guess that your printer has the second line as 30 seconds. It would be technically safe to increase this time to up to 120 seconds, but I strongly suggest not to go over 60 seconds. 1 - I had switched the whole hotend on my TronXY X1 for an e3D light6, and it only needed a PID tune, but in theory I should have also swapped the Firmware to reflect that - but, as said, luckily many Chinese printers use the table 5 even if they are not using the sensor. Table 5 was made for the thermosensors used by e3D.

Non-Heated Beds affect on 3D Prints I'm looking to buy my first 3D Printer, on a tight budget of $250. Unfortunately, this printer that I found on Amazon comes with all the bells and whistles, except for a heated bed. I want to know if this would affect printing severely, as I have read that the plastic/ filament cools down rather quickly, and that it results in Printer "fails". I'm actually a bit nervous with this buy, as I don't want to spend $250 on a printer that produces 90% print fails. An example of the printer I'm referring to is the Cube 3 Printer, Grey by 3D Systems.

Yes. That said you can view it as an intro into 3d printing. Once you know you are really into it you can buy a higher end machine, or hunt craigslist / ebay / facebook groups for a used one. What the heated bed will allow you to do is print more than PLA, and certain formulations of no warp ABS. The Makerbot uses no heated bed, instead in addition to being PLA only it does what we call a raft. That said one of my 6 printers is a makerbot and it still gets warping if the print is on the edge of the plate. You can also add a heated print bed later. If your electronics allow for it. That said.. Just buy one with a heated bed? I know you can get one close to that price point. Heated beds cost 7 dollar. However as pointed out by Tom, there are other costs such as a more powerful heated bed. Still one should be able to get a printer in that price range or close to it with a heated bed. To be more clear. You will not have a 90% fail rate if you use PLA. However your prints will often have some heat warping and you will HAVE to use a raft. from http://www.reprap.org/wiki/Glossary Raft A technique used to prevent warping. Parts are built on top of a 'raft' of disposable material instead of directly on the build surface. The raft is larger than the part and so has more adhesion. Rarely used with heated build surfaces. For the small area models, it is very useful to prevent warping via adding a raft for the model before slicing it. It can also help with with precision parts by removing the slight first few layer distortion caused by the heated bed.

My Monoprice Select Mini v2 isn't pushing out filament and it isn't the nozzle The printer isn't pushing out filament. I'm using the filament that came with the printer, and I know it's not the nozzle. I've tried to get the metal piece surrounding that goes from the Bowden connector to the extruder off, but I can't seem to. Are there any ways to fix this?

The push to release connection on the top of the heat sink may be secured with thread lock adhesive, but you should not have to remove it. Push the blue ring downward while pulling upward on the bowden tubing. It may be necessary to work it up and down while you push down on the blue locking fitting. I have to use a pair of pliers to hold the blue ring down while wiggling the bowden tube up and down, as it is rather tiny. Once you have the tubing removed, check for high friction in the now-released bowden tube. Push filament from the extruder drive mechanism and observe how easily it passes through the tube to the open end. If you do not experience clogging, the problem resides in the heat sink/heat break/heater block area. It's not uncommon for the nozzle to have an excessive gap between the heat break and the nozzle. This will allow for cooled filament to jam, preventing normal feeding. From the Prusa support site: Notice that the collet is visible in the photo and appears to hold a longer section of PTFE tubing. It should enter your heat sink until it bottoms against the recess cut into the metal. If it does not, you have the possibility (slim) of jamming in that locations. Notice also that the nozzle is not flush against the heater block. The heatbreak is threaded into the block with the nozzle slightly lower than flush. This ensures a proper flow from the entry point to the nozzle. If it is not properly secured at either end, the heat break can bulge with filament that cools and creates the jam.

Arduino Mega voltage regulator overheats with RAMPS board This is my problem: I'm assembling a 3D printer with the RAMPS 1.4 board and Arduino Mega. I have assembled the structure and the electronics (set drivers, placed the jumpers, connected stepper motors...) and have uploaded Marlin firmware (configuring: thermistor, endstops...) on the Arduino Mega. I've tried to connect, via USB, to the computer and using the Repetier software I have commanded the printer which did do some movement. The printer worked perfectly. After a few tests, however, I've noticed that the Arduino was restarting several times and at one point I saw a component on the Arduino board burning. Searching the internet I saw that the burned component was the voltage regulator. I heard also about unplugging the screen because it consumes a lot of current, that passes through the voltage regulator, thereby heating it up. I then proceeded to buy another Arduino Mega. I also checked the voltage of my 12V 360W power supply and it is correct. I always powered the Arduino with USB and RAMPS 1.4 was connected to the power supply from the two terminals. When the new Arduino arrived, I connected the whole (without connecting the screen) and tried. The printer worked very well until it started giving the same problem as the first Arduino board. Someone can tell me if I have done something wrong, or is it the RAMPS board that does not work properly? EDIT: I read that the endstops can cause this problem. I have these endstops: 1 PZ di Alta Qualità Finecorsa Meccanico Per rampe Reprap 1.4 stampante 3D Con imballaggio indipendente kit fai da te and I connected the black wire to GND, red wire to 5V and the green wire to SIGNAL.

I've solved unsoldering the diode(D1) on RAMPS. This diode provides to power the arduino board with 12V. If you have a chinese arduino this will probably cause some problems. I hope this will help someone.

Square and parallel infill patterns I don't know how to word this right now but I am going to try my best... moving on! So I was playing with my slicing software (Craftware) and I was looking at two infill patterns, Square and Parallel. When looking at strength, print quality, and time does Square really benefit a whole lot over parallel? I ask because Parallel does not use near the filament and has less contact points on the model. I provided pictures of both to give a visual. Can I use parallel and still get super strong and good looking parts? Parallel infill pattern Square infill pattern If I didn't include something or not making sense ask in the comments and I will answer/edit as needed. Thank you!

... does Square really benefit a whole lot over parallel? That would depend by the definition of "a whole lot", of course! :) Strength Generally speaking, the variable you want to operate to tweak the overall sturdiness of your part is not the type of infill, but rather its density. According to the literature I have access to, sturdiness grow fast until about 60 % infill, then the gains become progressively more marginal. Different types of infill modify the way the part reacts to stresses. The two you showcased, for example, are strongly anisotropic: a part with those infill will resist a lot more to stresses along the Z axis than along either the X or Y ones. Also, relative to the squared infill pattern, my experience is that parts with a parallel infill pattern typically have a bit more give when squashed. In case you wonder: cubic, cubic subdivision (and solid) infills are those regarded as offering the most equal resistance along all axis. However, the way the infill will affect rigidity and sturdiness of a part is as much dependent from the type of filament and the shape of the part as much as from the infill settings, so - if you are after precise numbers - you should most definitely run some tests. Time That depends entirely from the part shape and size. Typically, a printer will spend most of its time printing the shell. This is due both to the settings (you want to go slow on the shell to increase quality) and to physics, the shell typically requiring many more changes of direction (and thus accelerations and decelerations) than the infill. So, even if the parallel infill requires about half the work of the squared one (50 % faster), in a small print with a sparse infill, the total time spent doing infill may be 10 %, thus the net gain would be only 5 % of the total printing time. Quality This is very printer-dependent. For me, when printing with two shells, I can't tell the difference on any infill. For the top layer, the quality is affected more by infill density than type (with the filament sagging slightly between walls if the infill is very sparse).

Ender 3 Pro distance between nozzle and bed too large Even when trying to level the bed, the max I can get the bed to the nozzle is pretty large. I cannot level any higher (please see pic).

Your springs are WAY too much compressed. Turn them loose into the "UP" direction till you are almost at the bed and then level your bed.

What air filtration options exist for enclosures? Given the emissions that 3d printing gives off (ABS = styrene and other chemicals, PLA give some off, etc), what options are there to filter the air in the enclosure other than venting the air out of a window? More information on the chemicals 3d printing emit: http://built-envi.com/portfolio/ultrafine-particle-emissions-from-3d-printers/ It looks like activated carbon filters would be a strong performer for ABS (styrene) and PLA (lactide): https://www.sentryair.com/activated-carbon-filter.htm Are there better filtering materials or processes for filtering the air in an enclosure? Here's an example filter setup: This fan mount: https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:780001 60mm fans and this filter: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00XNI5SY4 And sandwich the filter on the fan using this fan grill: https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:11906

My residential materials expert referred me to these links (3D Printing Fume Extraction Solutions, and ABS 3d Printer Nanoparticle and Chemical Exhaust Air Filter) and thinks that you're pretty much on track with the idea of using activated carbon. We both primarily print with ABS with my Replicator Dual and what's worked enough for me (in the past 5 years) is to keep my printer next to a window or vent in my den at home. The window is obviously a good ventilation option, but the variability that it creates in the ambient temperature screwed with my prints. Later, I moved my machine into its own hutch, which, if it is an option, would greatly help the overall environment for both the machine and any stored filament. We'll keep poking around, but hopefully that helps in the mean time.

Printing non-commercial model to make money If a customer sends me a non-commercial 3D model to print, am I allowed to charge money for the 3D printing process? I understand I cannot charge anything for the model nor offer it as a part of my business. I cannot download the model myself, print and sell it, but if the customer downloads it and sends it to me for me to print it, is it a violation of the license or not?

Intellectual property law is complex, so you might want to consider getting proper legal advice. However, to respect the original designer's intent you need to look at what their license permits and try not to find a loophole in the process. There is nothing to stop you asking the designer (in public or private) to clarify their intent. The biggest 'non-commercial' restriction reason is to protect the design idea, and stop someone mass-producing a clever design for profit. This applies irrespective of the original designer's intent to monetise their work. Another big reason might be to 'hold back' the time invested in the design. Maybe the designer wants to share something they spent a lot of time on, for individuals to appreciate rather than profit from. The designer would presumably gain reputation as a result of wider knowledge of their work. Sometimes, a design inherits licensing restrictions from a 3rd party (even maybe from the design tools used). For example, Fusion360 can be used for free by small companies, students, or for hobbies and personal learning, but has restrictions on commercial, professional or for-profit use. In that case, you would need to ask clarification from the tool provider. The case you describe is complicated. You can't sell the printed part, but a 3rd party can probably contract you to print the part (or rent time/access to a printer). However, your contract rate can't include any element of value derived from the model. Assuming there is no explicit license condition, you should be OK if you charge for your direct costs. As soon as you include time, profit, or any modification to the model, you are on less solid ground. To consider a non-obvious use-case of the Fusion 360 license, a student may well not have their own printer (particularly for an exotic material, or living in university accommodation). Can they contract a fabrication company to commercially produce or evaluate their model for the purposes of education or not? I don't expect you will find a definitive answer to this question since there are too many variables. Creative Commons have a page about their Non Commercial license which identifies some things to consider when you interpret a license. As noted in the comments, you can divide your time and professional contribution (and thus billable items) into several steps. By providing a model, the customer skips step 1: making the digital model preproduction (slicing) printing postproduction (cleaning off support) A clear license would refer to all of these.

High-viscosity gel/polymer to suspend conductive material while it is being printed I currently doing research on 3d printing on circuit boards. The technique we are using is to put a conductive material, I.e ceramics/metal in a gel/polymer, to print the suspension and then when is complete to sinter away the gel/polymer. The problem I am having is the suspension needs to be thixotropic. Furthermore it must have a high viscosity i.e 500 cpa under low shear and to quickly drop to low viscosity as the shear increases So far the closest thing I have been able to find is in this paper but if you look at the graphs none of them have a high enough viscosity and more importantly the drop to low viscosity under increasing shear is too shallow. I have tried to use models like the ones in this paper but I am finding it quite difficult. Does anyone have any suggestions to find more materials like the one I require? Thanks

The material you are describing sounds very similar to the material used for Metal Injection Molding except that you want to print the material rather than molding it. A company called MarkForged is making a printer called the Metal X that uses this technique of printing & sintering to produce solid metal parts. Here is a article describing more details about the printer. It sounds really cool. If you investigate papers around those processes you may find what you are looking for since they are so related to what you are trying to do.

Print of fine hole seems to twist My model is a keycap for mechanical keyboards. There is the cap itself, and a stem with a hole in the form of a cross, which fits the switches themselves. I print in the same position as it is intended to be used, top up. This means that the stem and the cap are not connected until quite a few print layers. To prevent the stem from falling off during the print (it has a small footprint), I created connectors in the first layers, to hold it in place. The issue: it seems like all my prints have a rotation of the stem, compared to the cap. It probably rather is the cross-shaped hole, or its walls, that are not completely symmetrical. I do not think it is only the edges against the printing bed that are the cause, since I have trimmed them with a scalpel. The rotation is always in the same direction. The twist is detectable when watching the keycap with the switch, and more so with keycaps on switches on a keyboard plate (you can see that the edges of the caps do not align. They do in my CAD program): I use Cura as my slicer, layer height 0.06 mm, and ABS. I attempted a slow print (30 mm/s), which didn't help. The first work-around that comes to mind is to measure the twist and compensate for that in my model. But I believe that since the problem is in the printing process, the problem would best be solved in the slicer. What could possibly be the issue? Is there an option is Cura to compensate for this? Short of the work-around mentioned above, what are other steps I should look into?

This looks like a shift rather than a twist. Looking closely at the "+" opening, it doesn't look as much twisted as it looks as if the top and bottom halves are sheared, with the top half shifted slightly right and the bottom shifted slightly left. The horizontal part of the plus seems aligned on the left and right halves. When you press-fit the keycaps, you will "average" the displacement forces and the keycap will twist. I am suspicious of a backlash problem in the X axis (left to right). Perhaps the belt isn't tight enough, or some part shifts differently. It could be in the rails, the belt, a loose drive pulley, the hot end being slightly loose on the carriage, or any uncontrolled movement. It could be a high-friction x-axis which causes spring wind-up in the drive system. I recommend carefully examining the printer for any excess friction or movement, and taking action to fix that first before tweaking the model to compensate for what can not be fixed. If it is a twist, use more cooling. If the photos have misled me, and the vertical "+" shaft if actually twisting, you may need to use higher cooling. The drag of the filament as the head traces the perimeter can create a torque on the shaft, and if the plastic is not sufficiently cooled it could be dragged around. I consider this more of a theoretical problem than a real one, and have not yet seen it in practice. This is a beautiful design This is a wonderful application of 3D printing. With a multi-material printer it would be tempting to label the keys similar to old-style multi-shot keycaps.

Ender 3 V2 upgrades and addons I am very new to 3D printing. I am looking to purchase the Ender 3 V2 but before I do I would appreciate some advice on what I should purchase as the upgrades/addons for it. I'm not sure as to what I would need for the V2 since most websites are for the original Ender 3 so I don't know if the V2 already has that upgrade/addons or not when compared to the original. I would rather get all the upgrades/addons and the Ender 3 V2 at the same to save on shipping and all.  Pretty much the only upgrade/addons I have constantly seen is the auto bed level.  So if anyone can help out a first time 3D printer noob then that would be great!

IMHO, it's probably better to get the printer as-is first. This way you can get familiar with the printer and 3D printing in general before you get overwhelmed with all the extra introduced variables from your upgrades. The new model already has loads of features that were considered upgrades on the older model and you can already get very nice results. Upgrading your printer is a part of the 3D printing hobby, and you'll probably never be done with it :)

BLTouch not leveling I installed a BLTouch V3.1 on my Ender 3 which is using Marlin (bugfix 2.0.x) off a Skr mini e3 v2.0. I updated the firmware using a teaching tech video. I'm having trouble when using bed leveling. It homes everything correctly, and then moves outside the bed before the probe repeatedly deploys and retracts, without the head moving at all. I attached a link to a video here: Bed Leveling Problem I have a feeling it must be something in my config files from looking at other answers here but I really don't know. I attached my config files as well. Configuration.h , Configuration_adv.h I have the BLTouch plugged into the z-stop for the black and white cords. I didn't need to cut any wires or anything since mine came with the endstop connector piece attached, and the other wires in the Zprobe section (Blue, Red, Yellow) to (GND, +5V, PA1) respectively. As for the firmware, I got it directly off the Marlin site: marlinfw.org/meta/download. Any assistance would be greatly appreciated. Additional information: I have connected my printer to PronterFace and recieve the following error when sending a G29 Reset. >>> G28 SENDING:G28 >>> G29 SENDING:G29 Error:!! STOP called because of BLTouch error - restart with M999 [ERROR] Error:!! STOP called because of BLTouch error - restart with M999 Error:Probing Failed [ERROR] Error:Probing Failed

You are mixing and matching a few older techniques. That's understandable, because "older" means "as of three months ago." But there is a better way now: as of version 2.0, the SKR mini has a full, working port for the BLTouch. You do not need to plug it into the z-stop, and you can and should retain your existing z-stop switch. So: Power down your printer and get access to your board. Roll back your hardware changes by unplugging the BLTouch and reattaching the z-stop switch. Plug the bltouch into the port labelled "z-probe", which is next to the display port. Starting from the pin nearest to the stop switches, the pin order should be Brown, Red, Yellow, Black White. Optional: instead of the step above, cut the DuPont connectors off the BLTouch cables and crimp a single XH-5Y connector in their place, then plug that into the board. Download the official BLTouch firmware from SKR mini: https://github.com/bigtreetech/BIGTREETECH-SKR-mini-E3/blob/master/firmware/V2.0/firmware-bltouch.bin Install that firmware: Rename the file to "firmware.bin", unplug any USB cables from your printer, copy the file to a MicroSD, insert the MicroSD into your printer and power it on. ...and then it should work.

Some steppers only rotate one way on RAMPS 1.4 I have a RAMPS 1.4 tester code for Arduino MEGA, only need stepper motors and drivers connected. The code in a working setup moves steppers in both directions but in my setup does something wrong: Extruder 0 , Axis X/Y only moves in 1 direction all time. Extruder 1 , Axis Z works fine in both direction I changed stepper drivers but always Extruder 0, Axis X/Y were moving in same direction all time.Tried 2 differents RAMPS 1.4 shields with same results in tester code, Sprinter or Marlin. I have the code if someone wants, it works fine in other setups. What could be the problem?

As towe said, it could be a dir pin ( can be checked by metering the dir connection), but in my experience this behavior has usually been a limit switch issue (as 0scar pointed out). Try seeing if you have a limit switch setting somewhere that expects normally closed (assuming no limit switches are connected). There is also another possibility that has to do with microstepping on some drivers, but i'm guessing you are going for a rudimentary no microstepping test right now (and have configured jumpers appropriately).

How can I get PLA or PETG to stick to a glass bed permanently without adhesives? 3D printing gurus, I've read on several forums that people have had issues with printing with PETG or even PLA on glass and it sticks so well to the glass that chunks of glass rip off due to thermal stresses from the glass/plastic bond thermally contracting at different amounts. I'm looking for a way to actually increase the adhesion to that point (or beyond) so that I could get a watertight seal on a plastic to glass interface. A lot of the forums mention that these problems occur when the extruder head is too close to the glass build plate and thus "bonds" the plastic to the glass somehow. Is this the case or are there other methods (with just the filament and the glass) that could make this happen?

There are seven factors that I can think of, that contribute to the adhesion of the first layer onto bare glass: glass cleanliness: dish soap and hot water, dried by patting down with quality kitchen paper is what seems to work best for me. Beware of fingerprints. glass roughness: a common way to increase adhesion to glass is to rough-up its surface by scratching with some fine sandpaper. This works best if you take care of sanding in multiple directions (so that you have grooves crossing each other). I suppose an experiment you could try is printing on frosted glass (the side that has been sandblasted or etched of course). tuning of the bed: your bed should be super-flat and perfectly leveled. Use an indicator gauge if you can. filament chemistry: that is not only to say that certain plastics, like PLA, stick better than others, but also to say that certain brands work better than others (as the additives each manufacturer adds to the plastic influence how the strength of the interface with glass). printer settings: typically a slow speed, no active cooling and a bit of overextrusion work best. area of the interface: the larger the area of the interface, the better. But also: for large uninterrupted interfaces, problems with curling begin to appear. temperature: each filament has it's own sweet spot, but typically some heat make prints stick better. However this is true until the print is in progress, once the print is done and the printing bed cools, prints tend to separate by themselves, so in your case you may want to print with a cold bed (which is totally feasible with PLA). All that said, this would not be a complete answer without a strong warning: any functional part which integrity depends on this kind of adhesion is bound to catastrophically fail very quickly, if working at all. For one this "assembly" would be extremely susceptible to change in temperature. While I read too of broken glass due to too good bonding, I only recall this having happened to people using some sort of substance on the glass. Usually the differential in shrinkage is exactly what makes the print come off the glass (a common tip for stuck prints is to put them in a freezer). Secondly, as soon as some air (or other fluid) will begin seeping between glass and plastic, it will take very little for it to separate the two completely. It's a bit like using a crowbar: as soon as there is a crack you can stick the tip in and use for leverage, it is very easy to pry things open. Finally, be aware that managing to print watertight shapes with FDM printers is relatively difficult. You can help your luck by extruding at slightly higher temperature than required. It's difficult to advise on alternatives solutions without knowing what you are trying to achieve, but I would be very surprised if there was not a better alternative. :) EDIT: the "nozzle too close to the bed" is the wrong way to achieve what you factually achieve with setting the flow rate so as to overextrude during the first layer: you want to increase the pressure of the molten plastic beyond what you normally would do so as to really "squish" it on the glass.

HDPE as the body of a 3-D Printer? I've been working on my own DIY 3-D printer recently, and I've been trying to experiment a little with different materials for the body. Someone suggested using HDPE (high-density polyethylene), since it works well on a CNC machine, which would make creating a number of prototypes easy. I know HDPE can also be used for filament, but I've never tried it before. Does anybody have any input on HDPE, or other potential materials for the body? I'm trying to avoid using wood, as I've had some poor experiences with it.

The main consideration when building the body/frame of a 3D printer is the stiffness. The stiffer the material, the less the frame will deform under load, and the more accurate and repeatable your results will be. UHMW has a Tensile Modulus of Elasticity around 120,000 psi (http://www.polytechindustrial.com/products/plastic-stock-shapes/uhmw-polyethylene) Aluminium has a Modulus of Elasticity around 10,000,000 psi (Mott, Applied Strength of Materials, 5th Edition, depends on the specific alloy) Aluminium is around 100 times stiffer than UHMW.

SVG to STL conversion to make symbols recognisable for visually impaired users I work on communication devices for people with disabilities that prevent them from speaking. This can be anything from a board with symbols on, to a relatively sophisticated app. Some potential users also have sight issues and have to distinguish symbols by feel (these particular users have cognitive disabilities and so braile isn't useful) . Currently the solution is to, by hand, stick items onto the buttons. Like this: This is effective, but takes a very long time. There exists open symbol libraries like this, that include nice svg images like this one (not uploaded, because SO doesn't like svg, but here's the screenshot: A friend converted some of these images into 3d prints like so: This was amazing, and useful, but I understand quite time-intensive for him - and there are thousands of these symbols. Here's what I want to know: given that SVG is a relatively simple structure and the symbols are very simple, what are the steps for writing the script that says: "Take the svg, map it to a plane, raise everything that is black by 2mm, everything that is gray by 1mm and add height for the rest of the colours according to this table" ? Bonus points for something that I can reasonably get going on a set of 10000 svg files and come back to later...

If you install inkscape, pstoedit and ghostscript version 9.21 (not the latest as pstoedit is incompatible) you can get the file into a format that openscad can import using two commands in a cmd file "C:\Program Files\Inkscape\inkscape" -E "traffic lights.eps" "traffic lights.svg" "C:\Program Files\pstoedit\pstoedit" -dt -f dxf:-polyaslines "traffic lights.eps" "traffic lights.dxf" then in openscad linear_extrude(3) import ("traffic lights.dxf"); will import gives me With a thickness of 3mm - you can see the model needs some scaling but its seems possible although - I can't see an option to scale based on color -

How long can you leave filament in the extruder Just one quick question about the filament. Can I leave the filament in the extruder for a prolonged period of time while the printer is off?

Most filaments you can leave in the extruder indefinitely without any ill effects. There are some filaments that need to be stored away from moisture, particularly Nylon, because they absorb moisture from the air and don't print well if they contain a lot of absorbed moisture. However, this isn't an inherent issue with having the filaments in the extruder (if you had some setup that protected the filament from moisture while in the extruder, that would be fine as well - but in most cases it is more practical to store such filament in an airtight box). Most commodity filaments (ABS/PLA/PETG) don't suffer from this as much (PLA supposedly also absorbs moisture but I haven't noticed this to be a problem, perhaps it depends on the conditions of the room in which your printer is kept) so they're fine to leave in the extruder.

What do you use to keep your blue tape from lifting? I have a few issues with the blue tape, which I'm trying out for the first time. The tape seems to warp, bubble and lift from the aluminum plate when it heats and cools and during printing. I put some clips on it, but not sure if this is standard. It also seems the print is lifting off the tape itself (bottom left corner). I applied some magigoo glue to it. Maybe I shouldn't have done that. I feel like this print isn't going to make it... I'm printing with a Monoprice Select V2, with AmazonBasics ABS with 100 °C bed and 250 °C extruder temperature, at 15 mm/s initial layer speed and 60 mm/s print speed sliced with Ultimaker Cura.

The tape probably would stick better to the Aluminum bed than the BuildTak clone sheet you have as it would have had more surface area to bond to. What I found that works best is to print on the bare aluminum bed using a PVA based spray, this can be hairspray or a specific 3D printer product like 3DLAC, or just glue stick. I ditched tape after day one (for reasons you mention) and solely print on aluminium or on glass without a problem, sometimes it sticks too well and the bed needs to cool down to room temperature before I can remove the print. This has been described as an answer to: Should you use hairspray on a metal bed 3D printer? . Removing the BuildTak clone sheet may be quite laborious if a very sticky adhesive is used (it took me a long time and lots of solvents to remove the goo/glue from a PEI sheet I used once) it is better to try and print on the BuildTak sheet, maybe use PVA based (hair)spray or glue stick. Furthermore, ABS is more difficult to print than PLA or PETG. Printing ABS is difficult because of the relative large shrinkage when the filament cools. It therefore requires careful heat management (no part cooling, no draft, enclosure, etc.). This filament needs a good surface to build on and requires brims, "mouse ears", adhesive spray or glue to get the first layer to stick and not curl up. Tape at temperatures of 100 °C will become soft and loose its power to stick. Kapton tape might work better.

Can I use external stepper motor power and USB connection I have a RAMPS 1.4 with Arduino Mega 2560 with 2 steppers connected to an external power supply using Polulo stepper drivers. The steppers are for X and Y axis movement. This external power supply is set to 12 volts and power is applied. I have configured the marlin firmware also. Can I connect my setup to my PC using USB when the external power is also on? If i connect the USB while the external power is off, do the motors take power from USB? Will this will burn my board?

The motors are powered from 12/24V external power supply, so the motors will not be powered. the ramps Schematics shows the connection diagram and the power is provided via the VMot pin/12V.

How is E value calculated in Slic3r? I want to know the math behind how Slic3r calculates E values. $E_{value}$ represents amount of filament in mm (unless volumetric extrusion is selected) that has to be fed into the hotend to obtain a road of specific extrusion width. Consider an example with following parameters: Nozzle diameter = 0.6 mm Layer height = 0.35 mm Extrusion width = 0.61 mm (for external perimeter) Length of the line segment (distance of the deposition path) = 98.2 mm Diameter of filament = 1.75 mm First part of the question: How is $E_{value}$ calculated for this case? Second part of the question: How is velocity of extruder motor calculated for this case? The Slic3r manual has limited information on flow math but is not comprehensive. Let's assume volume of plastic fed in equal volume of plastic comes out $$Volume_{in} = \pi\times{(\frac{d}{2})}^2 \times E \times x = \frac{\pi\cdot d^2}{4}\times E \times x$$ Where, $d$ = diameter of the filament $x$ = extrusion multiplier $E$ = $E_{value}$ to solve for $$Volume_{out} = (A_{road} \times L)$$ Length of path, $L$, is obtained from start and end coordinates Area of the road, $A_{road}$, is calculated according to this link (Slic3r flow math; Section: Extruding on top of a surface). The formula for area of the road according to Slic3r manual is: $$A_{road} = (w - h)\times h + \pi\times{(\frac{h}{2})}^2 $$ Where, $w$ = Extrusion width $h$ = layer height Seems like I am missing something. Math doesn't yield me same result as Slic3r $E$ value. Many of you have marked this question duplicate. I know the first question is similar to what has asked before (calculating E value) but the answer doesn't match actual E value in G-code. Also there is a second question on how to calculate extrusion speed given an E value I have added G-code from actual Slic3r with the same settings as above to check the math. The advance extrusion width settings in slic3r are as shown in the picture below: The settings are from a Prusa config for 0.6 mm nozzle Consider a 100 mm x 100 mm x 5 mm part (X x Y x Z dimensions). Following is the output G-code from Slic3r: ; generated by Slic3r 1.3.0 on 2019-06-04 at 16:36:24 ; external perimeters extrusion width = 0.61mm (6.55mm^3/s) ; perimeters extrusion width = 0.65mm (10.54mm^3/s) ; infill extrusion width = 0.70mm (15.25mm^3/s) ; solid infill extrusion width = 0.65mm (8.78mm^3/s) ; top infill extrusion width = 0.60mm (6.43mm^3/s) ------ Values of parameters defined in Slic3r ------- first_layer_acceleration = 1000 first_layer_bed_temperature = 60 first_layer_extrusion_width = 0.65 first_layer_speed = 30 first_layer_temperature = 215 first_layer_height = 0.35 max_print_speed = 100 nozzle_diameter = 0.6 external_perimeter_extrusion_width = 0.61 ------ some initialization lines above -------- G1 F1800 G1 X78.400 Y169.100 E8.21483 ; perimeter **G1 X78.400 Y70.900 E8.21483 ; perimeter** G1 X176.600 Y70.900 E8.21483 ; perimeter G1 X176.600 Y169.010 E8.20731 ; perimeter G1 X177.175 Y169.675 F10800.000 ; move to first perimeter point The above code snippet refers to the perimeter of the very first layer in the print. Let us consider the highlighted line in above G-code. According to equations we have above, the values of the variables are: $d$ = 1.75 $x$ = 1 $E$ = $E_{value}$ to solve for $w$ = 0.61 $h$ = 0.35 $L$ = 169.100 - 70.900 = 98.2 Area of the depositied road is: $$A_{road} = (0.61 - 0.35)\times 0.35 + \pi\times{(\frac{0.35}{2})}^2 $$ $$A_{road} = 0.187211 mm^2 $$ For calculating $E_{value}$, We use volume equality $$Volume_{in} = Volume_{out}$$ $$E_{value} = \frac{A\times L \times 4} {\pi\times d^2 \times x} = \frac{0.187211 \times 98.2 \times 4} {\pi \times 1.75^2 \times 1} = 7.6432 $$ The $E_{value}$ in the G-code is 8.214 This is a big difference isn't it? I know about the die swell effect and expansion of molten plastic at the tip, but there seems to be no uniform compensation factor for this!

To answer your first question: Your calculations are not wrong, they are correct for a normal layer (uncorrected) layer. These calculations should get you very near the solution. The problem is that there are default modifiers at play that modify the extrusion process which become apparent when you change them or look at the hoover hint in the advanced printer settings section. E.g. see the image below of the "Print Settings" graphical user interface; specifically look at the hoovering hint: The hoovering hint tells you that there is a 200 % modifier at play. What! a default modifier without me knowing? Well...., if we had looked at the Slic3r Manual (The Important First Layer) a little better, we read that: Fatter extrusion width. The more material touching the bed, the better the object will adhere to it, and this can be achieved by increasing the extrusion width of the first layer, either by a percentage or a fixed amount. Any spaces between the extrusions are adjusted accordingly. A value of approximately 200 % is usually recommended, but note that the value is calculated from the layer height and so the value should only be set if the layer height is the highest possible. For example, if the layer height is 0.1 mm, and the extrusion width is set to 200 %, then the actual extruded width will only be 0.2 mm, which is smaller than the nozzle. This would cause poor flow and lead to a failed print. It is therefore highly recommended to combine the high first layer height technique recommended above with this one. Setting the first layer height to 0.35 mm and the first extrusion width to 200 % would result in a nice fat extrusion 0.65 mm wide. Tada! There we have the modifier from the screenshot; 200 % (this is expressed as a percentage over the layer height, and causes that an additional filament scale factor bigger than 1 is at play; the $x$ in your equations). To answer the second question: That should be rather straight forward, you know how long the path is and at which speed the head is moving (either at constant speed, decelerating or accelerating) and how much of filament you need to deposit, at the end point all filament needs to be deposited so you can calculate how fast the extrusion needs to be to accomplish that. If you calculate back from a volume of 8.214 mm2 and solve for unknown $w$ you see that this yields $ w = 0.65\ mm $, and that is exactly what is stated as first layer width in your Slic3r settings; I quote: first_layer_extrusion_width = 0.65 P.S. When you look into the source code of Slic3r, if you dig deep, you find that extrusion width is bound by minimum and maximum values, it could well be that that is causing the value to differ from 0.70 mm (200 % of 0.35).

Delta Printer: Slighty incorrect print alignment on the build plate After building a Delta printer, I noticed that my whole prints are slightly tilted around the Z-axis in comparison to the slicer (e.g. Cura). There is no twist layer wise. This means, the prints themself look actually perfect. I just don't know what could be the reason of the rotation. I do not believe it is a build issue of the printer, because I tried to keep the printer frame pretty stiff and symmetric. Could it be, that the Auto-Calibrate Feature of Marlin can add such a rotation? The picture below illustrates the problem. I expect the black alignment of the print and get the orange one. Note that the print is still a rectangle with ~90° corners.

I figured out that the reason is probably a slightly translated slider construction. Instead of using a proper centered slider as shown in red, I used a slider construction like illustrated in yellow. When all sliders are translated on each tower like this, the print should be tilted by the same amount. This seems to have no influence on the general shape of the object. However, for my next printer I will use a proper centered uni-body slider.

PLA and bed heating? I've read different things about PLA and heat-bed. Some say it is not needed, others recommend 60-70°C, but not for the first layers. For larger objects I often have the problem that the object does not stick to the blue-painters-tape-covered aluminium print plate. Instead the print "curls" up on one or more corners. To reduce this effect, I'm using a brim between 5 and 10mm. Depending on the size of the object the brim works quite well. Will heating the bed also improve the print quality by reducing the amount of heat warping / curling?

I actually find it's not needed for PLA. I generally have it heated to 40 °C and use blue painters tape along with some hairspray (I prefer Tresemme as it smells gorgeous). I've experimented with a glass bed, and Buildtak but I find blue painters tape is the key. I overlap the blue tape ends to the bed so it sticks, then spray the hairspray onto the tape. Also bed leveling is super important as are your print settings. What you want for the first layer is to have it essentially "pushing" into the bed. That way it gets good contact and wont curl up during the print, though it can be a challenge to get off later. TL;DR for PLA you dont need a heated bed, its more about the surface and 1st layer height.

Is there a way to invert motor direction with GCode instead of Firmware in Marlin Is there a way to change the direction a motor goes with GCode instead of reconfiguring Marlin firmware?

You can use M92 to change the axis steps per unit to a negative value, which causes it to move in the opposite direction. I.e. if normally your X axis has 160 steps per mm, using M92 X-160 will invert all of its movements. However, this is more of a hack than a real, intended solution. It would be better to (if you are concerned with the homing direction) change the configuration to have the printer home in the other direction. Unfortunately, this can only be done by changing the firmware and not through G-code.

PID tuning and different filament temperatures Since I have lots of PETG, I ran tuning to 230 °C (average temp for my filaments). What is it good for, in terms of temperature ranges? For the same printer configuration, and just different filaments, will I need to run it again and again? Let's assume that I'll be printing between 200 °C and 240 °C.

PID tuning can be performed multiple times and the results saved for future use, since the question is about "what are the usable ranges for PID tuning", based on my experience a slightly suboptimal tuning will not make the temperature oscillate more than 2-3 degrees, which is more than enough for most traditional filaments if you have a 30-40 °C temperature range you can likely keep a tuning in the middle and be done with it an accurate tuning is needed if you run the hot end at its maximum rated temperature: mine was rated 250 °C and without a good PID tuning the temperature was overshooting by 2-3 degrees, which was enough to trigger a over-temperature safety shutdown. Using the printer at 245 °C would have resulted in no issues even with sub-optimal PID tuning. Of course, people with high temperature hot ends (up to 270-300 °C or more) will need a tuning for the usual range (200-240 °C) and one for the higher temperature range to obtain better prints.

Using an Anet A6 3D printer in the UK... (mains voltage issue!) I understand that this is probably more of an electronics question, but was hoping that someone with experience of using an Anet A6 in the UK (or a country outside of the US/China) may be able to help... or alternatively, someone knowledgeable in electronics! I recently bought and assembled an Anet A6. I am based in the UK. On the power supply transformer of the Anet A6, there is a switch that allows you to select the input voltage from the mains. There are two options, 100 V or 220 V. When I turn my Anet A6 printer on, nothing happens... I have triple checked all connections and there doesn't seem to be anything wrongly connected or loose. I am wondering if the reason it is not working is because in the UK we use a different mains voltage 230 V (I think) and a different frequency 50 Hz (I think) to the US and China (which I assume the printer was built to accommodate)?... I am not 100 % sure on this, just a guess, I am far from an electronics expert. I don't have a multimeter to test if there is voltage flowing (not that I would even know how to test it lol). Is it likely that this difference between voltage/freq is the reason that it is not working? If so, is there anyway to fix this? I would prefer to buy something (some sort of converter) than tinker with the electronics, as I have no experience in electronics and live in a rented flat, which I really don't want to burn down (not that I would if i owned it). Any help is massively appreciated, thanks in advance! Update I have done what @Oscar suggested and also bought a multimeter to test the circuitry. I plugged my Anet A6 into the mains power supply and turned it on, but still nothing happens... the LED doesn't light up, not does the LCD screen turn on. I tested the voltage of the power supply whilst it was turned on across connections 6 and 8 in the video below (taken from the assembly instructions video, 12 mins 46 seconds): Assembly Instructions Video, 12:46 The 6 and 8 connections correspond to the output from the transformer (ie the connections that would be connected to the mainboard). There was no voltage reading at all when I measured it here with the multimeter. Does this indicate that there is a problem with the transformer/power supply, or is this expected? Or am I testing in the wrong place and there is a better place to test when the printer is on to determine what the problem might be?

The UK uses 230 V mains voltage. The 220 V designation is from the past, Europe is now using 230 V. You do not have to worry about the frequency. You should place the switch to 220 V and plug the cord into the socket. The printer should start immediately booting (cycling) the printer firmware, the LCD should light up and the cold end cooling fan will spin (annoyingly). If nothing happens, you need to check the Power Supply Unit (PSU) and all cables for proper connection (does the fan of the PSU spin if it has one, you should at least see a led light up). A multimeter is not expensive and generally very valuable to test if it outputs 12 V. That way you know the PSU is working or not, if it works the problem is at the main printer board. As these PSU's are pretty cheap and faulty, you could well have received a broken one. How to measure the voltage? If you look at the connection terminals you will find labels above them. Measuring position 6 and 8 might be the incorrect ones, this depends on your PSU. If you have exactly the same PSU as from the linked video, measuring between 6 and 8 would be correct: From the image above the connections from left to right (for other PSU units, the order may be different, I have units where the connection to the mains is on the right): L, N and ground are used for connection to the mains, COM (stands for common or 0 V) or sometimes denoted as -V is the output ground (negative, connection for the black wires) and +V is positive, connection for the red wires. You need to measure the voltage difference over COM and +V, this should be the voltage of the power supply. Ideally you measure the voltage when the power supply is delivering a load (e.g. directly connected to a strip of LEDs or directly connected to the heated bed; some faulty PSU crash in under load, this can be seen by a lower voltage than the rated voltage). If the PSU is correctly wired, your fuse is not broken, does not have a LED lighted and the voltage is zero the unit is defective.

How to enable EMERGENCY_PARSER in Marlin firmware? In the documentation of some commands of the Marlin firmware (like M112 - Emergency Stop), it says that the EMERGENCY_PARSER should be enabled to execute them instantaneously. The thing is, I didn't find any information there of how to enable that EMERGENCY_PARSER or how it works. Any help will be appreciated.

The constant EMERGENCY_PARSER is located in the advanced printer configuration file Marlin/Configuration_adv.h: // Enable an emergency-command parser to intercept certain commands as they // enter the serial receive buffer, so they cannot be blocked. // Currently handles M108, M112, M410 // Does not work on boards using AT90USB (USBCON) processors! //#define EMERGENCY_PARSER To enable the EMERGENCY_PARSER, you need to remove the // before #define EMERGENCY_PARSER and recompile the sources. Normally your printer will execute a command until it is ready to accept a next instruction. Without the EMERGENCY_PARSER set, the printer finishes the instruction that it is executing at the moment, if set, the execution is interrupted and immediately sent and thus not waiting for a clear space in the buffer.

Casual under-extruding on Ender 3 (don't know what to do anymore!) I own an Ender 3 that I bought in December 2018. I have now a problem with under extrusion that I don't know how to solve. I tried everything: I changed the nozzle, changed the PTFE, changed the filament, dismantled the hotend and controlled that nothing was blocking the flow. The problem is that it isn't a normal under extrusion: in fact, the printing starts quite well, then for some reason the filament doesn't flow anymore. If I try to push the filament I feel like there is a gap that, if I continue pushing, it's "filled" and then the plastic continues to flow normally for some time. And when it has to do very little parts of the printing, this problem occurs, and the final result is a disaster. I hope someone can help me because I don't know what to do. The photos show the condition of the printing, and I have also a brief video that explains the situation better. I added also an image of the original CAD file, so you can see how it should have been, and another project where you can see missing layers when things get "difficult" to print (but, in the past, the printer worked perfectly with such projects!) and a simple parallelepiped, that the printer printed perfectly (I assume it's because it never stops sending filament, I don't know). Thank you for your time. DropBox link for the photos: https://www.dropbox.com/sh/xav38c8tw8mgs8h/AAA7VGypWIrIR0RwB4Ih3O7ma?dl=0 YouTube link for the video (I recorded the printer printing and made a video with the most important moments such as when there is under extrusion; the video lasts 4 minutes and it can help you find the problem):

You may have a problem with the nozzle heat setting being too low for the flow rate, which is directly related to the travel speed. As a background, when you're printing fast, the stepper motor driving the extruder has to move filament more quickly. That's obvious, but what is overlooked often is that the heater may not be able to move heat quickly enough to keep up with the filament. Consider increasing your hot end temperature by five degree steps until you observe that the under-extrusion is resolved. Some colors and brands of filament require adjustment in hot end temperatures. I'm currently printing with silk-like PLA. The filament I usually use prints at 210°C while it was necessary to turn up the temperature to 225°C to prevent nozzle clog. Not yet viewed in my inbox is a YouTube subscription notice regarding "calibrating your hot end:" YouTube hot end calibration I suspect it may be of value to you in your current situation.

Marlin: Switch Y to E1 I have an Anycubic Kossel with Trigorilla Motherboard, Mega2560+RAMPS1.4. I'm using Marlin 2_0_bugfix My Y connector is not working anymore so I would like to use E1 connector as Y. I found a very good solution here but for me for some reason it's not working. I did that modification what suggested in the pins_RAMPS.h file (for Y of course instead of X), then I compiled it with Arduino 1.8.13 and uploaded to my printer. After that I flashed firmware then Y (which I plugged to E1) is not moving anywhere. I have never plugged anything to E1 before, so I think the connector port must be good and working. What I am missing, what's my mistake? What I did: #define Y_STEP_PIN 36 #define Y_DIR_PIN 34 #define Y_ENABLE_PIN 30 #ifndef Y_CS_PIN #define Y_CS_PIN 44 #endif #define E1_STEP_PIN 60 #define E1_DIR_PIN 61 #define E1_ENABLE_PIN 56 #ifndef E1_CS_PIN #define E1_CS_PIN 49 #endif

If you followed the answer to switch steppers in firmware to the letter, but changing X for Y, this should work. I've looked into the pins files for you and concluded that your proposed changes should work. This leaves you with the following questions: Is the stepper driver for E1 working? Is there a stepper driver installed? Is the cable working/not damaged? Swap drivers and cables to troubleshoot the problem.

Why are fast printed lines thinner? I have run the K-factor Calibration Pattern generator to tune LIN_ADVANCE and found that when K=0, the whole middle part of the line is thinner. I was expecting that LIN_ADVANCE would only make a difference short after where the speed was increased or decreased, as described by the first picture on this page. So from this picture, it looks as the best setting is around K=0.8 and that is also what was set as default in Configuration.h for Chiron. But when I tried the Printing Direction-setting set to 45 degrees the result was different. Then the best setting was around K=0.4. The picture below shows a second test, where I set K=0 and just changed the fast speed. The faster the thinner lines were printed. I have tested printing long lines and seen that thickness will not compensate, even after a long time. So why is my printer printing thinner lines when going fast and not using LIN_ADVANCE? Isn't the number of E-steps per mm printed line constant and not depending on the speed? Here is a zip-file with the files used and pictures. (let me know if not possible to download) ADDED 2021-02-22: To learn more about LIN_ADVANCE I made a second test today. To rule out most of the uncertainties that can affect the result, I let the bed stay heated between all four tests. Every test started at 210ºC, then 200, 190 and last 185ºC. The printer waited more than one minute between each temperature change. Bed temperature set to 60ºC. The lines are numbered in the order they are printed. Each test started by printing four lines at 20 mm/s to get "normal" nozzle pressure. Each line is 20+40+20=80mm long. Today I had acceleration set to 1200 and jerk to 8, which are higher than before (500,5). I changed because I use these values in Cura. Unfortunately, the bed is not 100% flat. LIN_ADVANCE = 0.0 LIN_ADVANCE = 0.4 LIN_ADVANCE = 0.8 LIN_ADVANCE = 1.2 What I learned from these today's test: Very little ooze when going from 190 to 185ºC. (#46 is good) At higher temperatures after pausing for a minute, the printer needed some 10 to 15cm of printing distance to get the pressure back. (#16, #17) Next time I will print every second line as a reference and test fewer speed changes. Next time I will also test higher temperatures. The lines are printed thinner at higher speed, independent of temperature when K=0. (I thought it only happened at (too) low temperature). LIN_ADVANCE setting shall probably be lower when printing at higher temperatures (affected by filament viscosity). It might be different behaviour between the grey and the orange filament. Orange looks better, but the grey one sticks better to the bed. It is fun to do testing. :) I did another test the first day, where I tested K=0 to K=0.8 and where the speed was 20+50+20 mm/s and the length was 60+180+60mm. Temp was 190ºC. It seems to show that even after 180mm of fast printing, the thickness is not recovered: The pictures above are uploaded at a lower resolution. Original pictures and the G-code can be downloaded from here.

In your case, since linear advance makes the issue disappear, the reason of the thinner lines is the same as explained in the link you provided: The section (2) simply is very long because you probably have a Bowden setup which takes more than the length of the middle section to recover. However it does recover, see the first line (k=0) in the first image. At higher (constant) speed the flowrate decreases further due to pressure in the nozzle causing a reduced supply of filament, but this effect cannot be corrected by linear advance because linear advance assumes a linear relationship between pressure in the nozzle and extrusion.

What hotend designs exist as paired all-metal and PTFE-lined versions? I know that the E3D V6 hotend exists in both the all-metal V6 version, and the PTFE-lined Lite6 version with the same mount and form factor. What other hotend designs are available like this?

Hotend Designes in General Lined Makerbot Mk8 & e3D Lite6 The Makerbot Mk8 seen on many Chinese machines and the E3D Lite6 are both lined hotends, which means the PTFE liner goes down into the heartbreak and butts against the nozzle. This style is very easy to print PLA with, but can't print hotter than about 240 °C. Makerbot MK10 A variant of the lined hotend is the Makerbot MK10, where the PTFE goes a bit into the nozzle. These nozzles have a larger diameter, the melt zone is very short. All Metal There are mainly two designs of consumer all-metal hotend out there at the moment. E3D v6 Stereotypical by now, the All Metal hotend typically means E3D v6. The liner ends at the end of the heartbreak, the heartbreak of the original is necked down to reduce heat creep. The design is flawed in that heat creep can't be mitigated completely. While this design can print much higher temperatures than lined hotends, the heat creep can create trouble with PLA. E3D Hermea The dreamchild of the v6 is the Hermea (formerly Hermes), which fights the problem of heat creep by drastically altering the coolend design: The heartbreak is even slimmer than the v6 and has very little area outside of the cooling block. This cooling block is fitted with a somewhat stronger fan. In theory this leads to much better cooling in the upper filament path and getting heat creep under control. However, due to the manufacturing stop induced by COVID-19, there are not too many Hermea out in the wild. Some early to mid development information could be gained from Joel and Thomas Sanladerer. Among the still few reviews I have found is Thomas Sanladerer. Slice Engineering Mosquito Hotend Slice engineering went a different way to fight heatcreep in an unined all metal hotend: The heatsink is mode away from the filament path and serves as its own structure. As a downsize, each and every part is pretty much precision machined, making it comparably expensive: without heater, thermosensor, and extruder the bare item clocks in 145$. Claimed benefits are, that the thinner filament path (as it doesn't need to be structural) from a low heat-conducting material reduces heat creep and because we have an unlined filament path it can print at 450 °C, making it one o the highest-rated hotends. Slice Engineering Copperhead Currently, the same company is working on the Copperhead, in which they introduce a dual metal construction on necked heatbreak. The name Bi-Metal for this however would be a misnomer: Bimetal is a standing technical term for a strip of metals that, when heated, starts to tilt into one direction because of dissimilar heat expansion. The correct term, which they properly use on their website is Bimetallic, not Bimetal. Because of the dissimilar thermal behavior, such a setup needs to be designed and machined very carefully, but could, help to dissipate the heat from the filament path and massively reduce heatcreep. The Copperhead as shown currently is offered for preorder with two mounting options, one of them the e3D style groove., which might allow drop-in replacement of a full hotend. The heartbreak however alone could suffice to get some of the effects, and as the website shows, it would be available as a drop-in replacement part. However, pricing and effectivity remain still to be seen. Paired?! At the time of this writing in May 2020, the combination of e3D v6 and Lite6 using the same outer form factor is pretty much unique to them and their clones. The Trianglelab Dragon hotend (a review of it here) uses the e3D v6 Style connector on a Slice Enginering Mosquito Hotend design, making it pretty much paired to the two. However the main functioning parts of the distinction is the heartbreak being either part of the cooling body and lined or a separate piece. The e3D v6 does use the same M6 threading that is also used in a Makerbot Mk8 and many Chinese clones on many machines [Some are M7, so beware!], and thus one can easily make a Frankenstein Hotend by combining the pre-mounted cooling body with a proper e3D v6 heartbreak and turn the lined into an All Metal hotend.

Two 12 V heater elements in series in a dual hotend I have ordered a dual hotend Chimera and it came with 2x 12 V heater elements (in my rush I forgot to order the one with 2x 24V). Is it possible to run these 12 V heater elements in series? I am planning on running this with an SRK 1.3 board.

No you don't want to do that. A 12 V 30 W heater has a resistance of about 5 Ω (2.5 A on 12 V). A 24 V 30 W heater is about 19 Ω (1.25 A on 24 V). Placing two 12 V heaters in series means about 10 Ω, for 24 V that means that the current is 2.5 A, similar to a 12 V circuit, the power will be 30 W for each heater. So it appears that this should work. But, the problem is that being in series, both the hotends are heated. This is not beneficial for the unused core which is prone to ooze filament and can cook filament if not used for a long time (long stand-by high temperature). Typically, unused printing cores go to a lower stand-by temperature when they are not printing. Also it would be more difficult to have filaments of different temperatures in the hotends. Furthermore, which thermistor would you use? A hotend cools down by melting filament, the temperature drop is measured by the thermistor results in the control logic adding current to the heater to compensate the loss in temperature. If you only use one thermistor (basically, from a firmware configuration perspective, the setup is similar to having a single heater in a single hotend and having the filament being changed) and using the other core (without a thermistor) to extract filament, the temperature drop will not be registered and as such not controlled. There is no default firmware solution to use 2 thermistors in a "single" heating element (in this case strand of heating elements), this will probably require some modding to the source code of the firmware. You could test this setup, but I would not use it for a long time.

My Z-axis is limited to 15 mm at height I have a Prusa i3 and I have a problem concerning my Z axis. It stops at 15 mm even the object to print is more than this. Can you, please, help me to solve this problem.

@Trish is right, it would help greatly to have more details, such as the model of printer, photos of the printer at the upper height limit, and a video with sound of moving the head against the 15 mm stop. Without those details you might answer your question for yourself (and for SE) by trying these tests and considering the results. If you have already done these things, it would help us help you if you included your results, and other experimental results, in the question. The problem could be in the mechanism or in the slicing program. Using the UI, can you raise the head above 15 mm? On the Prusa3D branded i3m3 the UI will allow you to move the Z axis hard against the top stops. If the UI can raise it, the problem is more likely to be in the slicing program. If the UI can not raise the head above 15 mm, move has high as you can and listen carefully. Does it simply fail to move with no noise? Is there a clicking or banging sound as you try to move higher? If there is a clicking or banging sound, something hard is interfering. If it simply stops moving, does the machine reset or just stop with no glitching on the UI? It is reset, look for a cable problem, such as a short circuit or wires pulling on the controller PCB. If it is just a silent refusal to move, it could be the Z-axis plug is loose and being tugged by the cable bundle to the head. If the problem seems to be in the slicing software, check that the Z-height is set properly there. If good slicing software thinks you have only a 15 mm height, it won't try to print higher than that.

Using the end of a spool I've seen several Q&As on recycling and reusing plastic from failed prints, but what have you done with the last few meters of filament? I've been keeping the ends of PLA (or sections I needed to cut) to maybe use for friction welding pieces together, but I only need so much for that. I've considered just shoving the last bit in the tube and using a new roll to push it through (so long as retractions aren't necessary). This is especially a concern for more exotic filaments where friction welding isn't useful and the price is higher for that 1m section (something like Copperfill). Note: I have a Bowden extruder. I imagine this is less of an issue with DD extruders.

Weld the fragment to the beginning of a new spool and use it that way. Most are made from metal so they aren't that easy to make at home. Here is another answer that lists other methods to weld filament including using heat shrink tubing. As you mentioned, you can use it for friction welding. Use it for pin/studs/rivets/hinges in prints. Throw it away. 1.75mm * 1Kg is about 330m of filament, 3mm * 1Kg is about 110m of filament. The leftover isn't worth much when you consider how much is on a spool.

What modifications do I need to make to Marlin if I completely replace the heated bed assembly? I have a 3D printer built from generic, scrap parts. It's controlled by a 2+ years old MKS GEN L board running Marlin version 1.1.x. I want to do a complete bed assembly replacement, including: Heated bed Thermistor Y-carriage All the hardware bits, including the z-endstop are sorted and ready to be installed. My question is: Once I replace the assembly, what kind of software / firmware modifications do I need to do to Marlin configuration for my printer to work correctly? I understand that I need to modify dimensions and offsets but I am unsure what else will I need to change within the codebase before flashing Marlin.

Dimensions if they differ, maybe endstop offsets and possibly a different thermistor type.

The first screen of Marlin 2.0 is showing some horizontal lines, appearing to be broken We are using the branch bugfix 2.0 and the first screen of Marlin is showing some horizontal lines, appearing to be broken. After 3 seconds, the boot screen appears and everything works normally. We have tried to disable the custom bootscreen: //#define SHOW_CUSTOM_BOOTSCREEN We have tried to disable the Marlin bootscreen: //#define SHOW_BOOTSCREEN We have checked the power supply. We have wrapped the "flat cable" in aluminum foil and ground everything correctly. We have deleted the "firmware.bin" and it did not solve the problem. The first time the firmware is loading the "firmware.bin", those horizontal lines do not appear, but when it is loading the "FIRMWARE.CUR" it does appear. What exactly is happening? How do I fix those horizontal lines on boot?

Something is causing your screen to get signals to display that before your board properly takes it over after 3 seconds. It is an oddly repetitive pattern. If it is software, you should not see it on a stable stock marlin release with minimal customizations to enable the LCD. Usually nothing else shares pins with the LCD, but please do double check pin assignments. Beyond software lies a realm of hardware issues: Issue could be due to bad wiring or wires running in areas where they are picking up noise as the system boots up; LCD ribbons are not particularly noise resistant. I say wiring but it could be anywhere along the circuit, including circuit boards. There is also some (smaller) chance that your power supply is providing the noise at the initial boot up in which case you may be able to resolve it by adding capacitors to stabilize the DC voltage. Not sure what check you already did of the power supply, but a DC (RMS) reading may not show anything strange on a regular multimeter even if there is a strange AC signal.

Serious safety concerns with living in same room as PLA 3D Printer? I have an Ender 3 which I primarily use for printing with PLA. I haven't branched out to other materials yet. :) I've done some research into PLA fumes and airborne particulates which seemed to mention that PLA is mostly safe, but ABS is rather dangerous to print without proper ventilation. However, I understand that there isn't much research on the topic and that there haven't been many studies. I have been keeping my printer in my bedroom, far isolated from flammable materials, which I sometimes leave on to print while I'm asleep. Should I be concerned with my health safety with respect to airborne particulates emitted by printing with PLA? Other questions ask about ABS, but here, I'm asking specifically about PLA.

You are probably pretty safe printing PLA Regarding emissions, the following recent report, Emissions of Ultrafine Particles and Volatile Organic Compounds from Commercially Available Desktop Three-Dimensional Printers with Multiple Filaments, indicates that PLA is a pretty low emitter (1/20th of nylon) and most of what it out-gasses is Lactide which is low on the harm scale. That said, everybody's nose sees things a bit different and people tolerate smells differently. Note also that we used to think lots of things (like asbestos) were harmless that we know differently now. Note also in the figure below from the report that all PLAs are not created equal. Dremel PLA produce way more nasty stuff than FlashForge PLA did. I am also sure additives, colorant, and fillers can change this a lot as PLA filaments aren't not all PLA. Regarding the fire safety issue. Note that there is a BIG difference between a kit and a "product". Since you are the manufacturer of the printer for a "kit", the packager of the "kit" is not responsible for the fire or electrical certifications of the final product. This does open the door to some risks. The biggest risks are electrical safety; but, fire safety can be an issue as well. I would say that the risk is likely higher to you personally when the printer is NOT in your bedroom as if it catches fire when you are sleeping, you will likely catch the fire faster if it is in your bedroom. From a practical standpoint, I have heard several people complain that they can't sleep when the printer is printing when the printer is in a separate room.

Lower BuildTak adhesion I'm having a similar issue to this one: I have retrofitted my printer with a BuildTak sticker. I'm printing PLA at 60°C bed temperature - currently using a 0.3 mm nozzle, but I had similar issues with the 0.4mm nozzle before. If I bring the nozzle close enough to the print surface to get a reasonable first layer, I need excessive force to remove the parts afterwards - so much force that I already have damaged the BuildTak in one or two places. If I lower the bed (the physical bed using the screws, not the temperature!) so that the parts come off easier, the first layer is very uneven and it takes 5-6 layers until the layers start to stack onto one another the way they are supposed to. What can I do to influence the adhesion of the printed parts to the BuildTak surface - especially to lower it in a controlled manner without changing the nozzle height?

Try printing with the heated printbed off. Heat makes the pla stick more to buildtak

When building the ramps 1.4 is it safe to use small wires to jump the 5A, 12V power input over to the 11 Amp input The idea is so you only need two long wires going from the power supply to the electronics boards. I'm sure I saw this done in a tutorial somewhere, but I can't for the life of me find the source. Also I just bought a kit and the build manual says to use four wires, but only two wires come with the kit, so I recalled that bit of advice in the tutorial and thought hmm either they shorted me those wires, or they just expect me to make do with two. Perhaps the jumping method is common practice? But then why have a plug on the ramps board with four inputs? Why not just two inputs and split it internally if need be?

I guess that the external split is at least partly done to force the user to utilize 4 wires. 16 Amps at 12 Volts is quite a bit of power and you don't want your wires or connectors to melt. If you use twice the wire cross section by using 4 instead of 2 wires, you also reduce the resistivity and hence heat created in the wire. Put it the other way around: Using 2 instead of 4 wires raises the risk of your setup to catch fire. Still, you can use that bridging technique, if you make sure that all your wire diameters are big enough. I would advise you, however, to cut the wires that come with your kit in half and use the connectors in the way they were meant to. For optical appeal and less cable clutter you can still put the wires into some braided sleeve for example.

What is the best technique to improve removing PETG from the print bed? What is the best technique to improve removing PETG from the print bed? PETG is known for sticking well to the bed; so well that it does not need a heated bed. If it weren’t for printing other materials, I would try printing directly on the glass bed instead of a build surface. However, the build surface may help protect the glass from excessive force. To reduce how strong the PETG sticks to the build surface I’ve reduced the bed temperature to 35 °C. It is easier to remove the skirt and brim by heating the bed up to 90 °C, so that the PETG is soft. However, if one tries to remove the printed object at 90 °C, the printed object is like to distort and ruin. I did sharpen the putty knife on the top side only. This helps, but it still takes excessive time to remove the print job and clear the bed. The excessive force on the bed from the putty knife seems to increase the need to level the bed. It also seems to affect the flatness of the build surface. I’m looking for techniques to make it easier and less time consuming to remove the PETG print from the bed. P.S. Additions after input from answers. Added keeping the initial Z-height high enough to keep adhesion to the bed from being too high. This resolved the adhesion to the bed issue, but seemed to make adhesion between layers worse. Set hot end to 230°C for first layer, then increased hot end temperature to 250°C for better adhesion between layers.

Correctly level your bed. Seriously, that's the answer. PETG does stick well, but it only gets difficult to remove if you're smashing the first layer against the bed with a nozzle that's way too close. With the bed leveled properly - using feeler gauges or test prints and a sub-0.1-mm-precision caliper - I have no trouble taking PETG prints off a buildtak-clone bed. Glass should be easier. If you already have PETG stuck to a build surface you care about and don't want to risk destroying it, try heat, or alternating heat and cold.

How does wireless 3D printing work? I was wondering how WiFi based 3D Printing works since I want to start an open source project and need some information on this. I have done some research, I have now an understanding on how the printer interprets the G-code and how it acts upon the instructions. But what I couldn't find information on is how WiFi based 3D printing works What is the communication between the slicer (such as Cura) and the board? How are the commands sent to the printer from the slicer, line by line or the entire G-code? How do I establish a connection between the slicer and the board? I am well aware of the already existent Raspberry Pi idea compatible with Octoprint but I am making a much cheaper one Thanks for any help

Slicers don't talk to the printer. Slicers analyze an STL file and generate a GCODE file, based on your parameters. A print manager sends the commands from the GCODE file to the printer board, which executes them sequentially. They are not. Commands are sent to the printer from a print manager of some sort. This varies among printers; some printers can be managed by more than one manager, and some managers can handle many models of printer. Some printer-manager pairs are proprietary and exclusive. You do not. See above. Note, some programs do have an integrated slicer and print manager. - Thanks, Trish

It is worthwhile to protect electronics with a 3D printed PLA case? PLA is flammable, but a good case can protect the main board from dirt. Is it worthwhile to protect a circuit board with a 3d printed case?

As pointed out by Ryan Carlyle, not all 3D printing filament is flammable (such as PET and PETG), and the question therefore rather becomes: Can 3D printing be used to make proper electronic cases? And the short answer to that is yes. 3D printing allows to make customized cases of all varieties. Also, since there is huge variety of materials available, you not only restricted to cases of plastic filaments - should this be of interest. Then again, it all depends on what you are protecting your electronics from. If you plan on submerging your electronics into water or throw them into a fire, 3D printing might not work for you at all. If dust protection is your only concern, however, 3D printed cases should do just fine in most cases.

My print failed and looks charred I started a print on my Monoprice Select v2 and let it run. I'm printing with Dikale PLA at 200 °C extruder and 60 °C build plate temperatures. My initial layer speed is 30mm/s then 60mm/s after that. Although the Monoprice comes with an aluminum build plate, I put on a FYSETC magnetic bed plate which says it's suitable for PLA printing between 50 °C - 80 °C. When I returned home, the print had been lifted off the build plate. I used a brim and even applied magigoo gluestick to help it stick but that didn't do the trick. I also noticed it's charred at one corner. Any idea of what this might be a symptom of? Here's what was printed

You have more than one problem going on. As for the print lifting up, that could be for a multitude of reasons. Clearly better bed adhesion is required. It also appears the printer stopped printing at one layer. Now for the charred part, I think it could've been caused by the nozzle staying in one area for too long (possibly when the printer stopped printing.). This causes the plastic touching the nozzle to overheat and burn up. The charred section can usually be pulled off pretty easily. However, since it definitely appears you have more than one issue here you should pursue some research (perhaps other questions on the site) on the matter. Hope this helps!

After installing BLTouch and Marlin, my nozzle is too high when trying to print So I have an AnyCubic i3 Mega which I added BLTouch v3.1 and Marlin (1.1.9 due to older, Atmega 8-bit CPU) using instructions and such from https://github.com/MNieddu91/Marlin-AI3M-BLTouch. Finally got everything moving in the right direction, got the auto-bed leveling (bilinear) going (did a 7x7 grid), saved the mesh, tuned the bed and extruder PIDs. Great! Add the gcode into Cura to load the settings and activate the mesh. Start the printing, goes to home fine, gets up to temp, and then it moves into position to start the print and it suddenly jumps up in Z-height above the bed several millimeters. I pause the printing via OctoPi, try and use the Control tab to adjust the height, not responding. Canceled the print. Used the M114 command to get the position. Here it is after I hit cancel. Recv: X:180.63 Y:171.85 Z:0.00 E:9.71 Count X:14450 Y:13748 Z:2120 Here it is after I use G28 to home Recv: X:-5.00 Y:0.00 Z:0.00 E:9.71 Count X:-400 Y:0 Z:0 Here is the Start G-Code settings from Cura G21 ;metric values G90 ;absolute positioning M82 ;set extruder to absolute mode M107 ;start with the fan off G28 X0 Y0 ;move X/Y to min endstops G28 Z0 ;move Z to min endstops M501 ; bltouch mesh load M420 S1 ; bltouch mesh load G1 Z15.0 F{speed_travel} ;move the platform down 15mm G92 E0 ;zero the extruded length G1 F200 E3 ;extrude 3mm of feed stock G92 E0 ;zero the extruded length again G1 F{speed_travel} G0 Y20 F{speed_travel} M117 Printing... G5 It's almost like the Mesh Z-Offset is wrong. I do have a Probe Z Offset of -4.60, set via M851. I set this, and then I did G29 to re-do the ABL. With me being new to ABL and Marlin, what did I forget? Maybe I did something wrong?

In some ways, this reminds me of the pain I went through recently. I am also fairly new to 3D printing. After you have completed the bed levelling using G29 you should have a list of mesh coordinates showing in the interface with Octoprint. (I am using Pronterface, so am not all that familiar with Octoprint) You need to save the mesh coordinates to the control board. To do this enter M500 and then M503 to check that the data has saved. If you enter G28 after using G29, but without saving (M500) the coordinates will be discarded. When you have set your Z offset, you also need to save that too (M500). Unless you bed is warped, a 7 x 7 grid (mesh) is overkill. If you are printing on glass or better still, a mirror, a 3 x 3 grid should be enough. I have a 5 x 5 due to may warped bed. Best of luck and have fun.

Can model used for 3D printing be later used for mold mass production? I am working on a project that requires an enclosure that I am thinking to prototype using a 3D printer (which is pretty easy and overall awesome). My question is simply whether this same model can be used later on for mass production (i.e. mold injection)? What adjustment (if any) need to be done to model between prototype and mass.prod. stages? What areas in design to look out for that can make model viable for 3D printing non-viable for mass production?

I respectfully disagree with the hard no answer. There are many casting methods, some of which are not compatible with 3D printed parts and at least one that definitely is. See investment casting, aka lost wax casting. (Ref 1) Also search YouTube for "investment casting using 3D printing". Formlabs, the company that makes the Form 2 and Form 3 3D printers, sells a 3d printable resin specifically for investment casting. (Ref 2). There is a whole world of casting, so I will describe, as an example, a very simple process that will make a replica of your 3D printed part. I will briefly address the steps necessary for making multiple copies at the end of my answer. First you need to add a cylindrical extension to the shape that will create a sprue. See the two models shown in the image below. Next make a foil cup a little larger than your 3D printed part and place your part in the cup, suspended by the sprue. Pour liquid plaster of Paris (POP) into the cup, covering the 3D printed part, with just the top of the sprue sticking out. Once the POP has hardened, you can remove the 3D printed part by dissolving it in an organic solvent (acetone for acrylic) or by heating the part to several hundred degrees C so it will burn out (convert to gasses). You will now have a block of POP with a void shaped like your 3D printed part plus a cylindrical hole to the outside that acts as a sprue. Once you have heated the POP to drive out any remaining water, you're ready to cast. Fill the void (via the sprue hole) with, for example, copper powder and heat it to well above its melting point. Once everything has cooled, lightly tap the POP with a small hammer or equivalent, to remove it, leaving your final part plus the sprue. You can remove any remaining POP with some warm baking soda and patience. The final step is to cut or saw off the sprue shape. Please understand that the process described above is just to give you a basic idea of the process. There are many alternate or additional steps that may produce a better final product. Also, the process described should work of the rook model shown on the left of the image below, but not the model on the right, which has a small hole through the middle. There are ways to solve that issue, but as I said before, there is a whole world of this stuff. Casting is a way to create parts out of materials that you otherwise could not 3D print directly (on a home budget). For mass production, you would need to start with an inverse of the final shape. For example, a cylindrical slug with a rook-shaped void. Then you would use the investment casting process to create a mold out of a rigid material that you could use to, for example, create rubber copies of the original part that could, in turn, be used as the "wax" for copies in the final material. I urge you to experiment, maybe following one of the tutorials on YouTube. Good luck. Ref 1 - Investment Casting https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Investment_casting Ref 2 - FormLabs 3D printable casting resin https://support.formlabs.com/s/article/Using-Castable-Resin?language=en_US

Ender 5 Plus - does not level, the Z axis goes down, always My Ender 5 Plus (original) does not perform leveling. After the self-leveling command, the Z axis only descends. I have already exchanged the BLTouch three times, and the problem remains unchanged. I bought my E5P in December, in America, to bring it to Brazil, I had to completely dismantle it. Machine reassembled, I start work again, everything works very well. But, one day, I made the mistake of stopping an impression (due to problems with the appearance of the piece) and, before removing the piece from the bed, I pressed the HOME command, which caused the hotend/BLTouch to rest on the printed part, forcing the whole mechanism. Well, I changed the BLTouch and the problems really started. When I send the leveling command, the Z-axis behaves erratically, going down instead of returning to the beginning and, with each command, it goes down more and more. I changed the leveler again, the problem persisted, I disassembled piece by piece, wiped a general cleaning, applied a clean solution to contacts all over the electronics, reassembled, reinstalled the firmware (Version 1.71.0 KF), and everything went back to work. Yesterday, I sent a piece for printing (PLA nozzle 1.00 mm, layer 0.36 mm, speed 100 mm/s, infill 40 %), and left for my morning walk. When I returned, there was a huge ball of melted material, adhered to the hotend, again more problems. I disassembled the entire hotend, carried out the total cleaning, reassembled it, and let's go back to work. Leveling OK, there was a problem with the thermistor and the heating of the nozzle, I changed the thermistor and the heater cartridge (taking the opportunity, since several times the system had heating problems, when the temperature should be above 230 °C / 446 °F). Everything ready, come on... Leveling problem has returned. BLTouch exchange done, nothing done Loading the firmware again, nothing done Review of connections, nothing done The Z-axis continues to descend, not responding to commands, and in the Pronterface the message appears: Error: STOP called because of BLTouch error - restart with M999 Error: STOP called because of BLTouch error - restart with M999 I've already exchanged BLTouch 2 times and it didn't work out. I have 2 inductive levelers here, maybe the solution is to install them and forget the BLTouch, or do the leveling manually. Questions: Has anyone had this kind of problem with the printer? If so, what is the solution? removing the leveler and performing manual leveling, has anyone tried this? What changes in Marlin need to be made? Does the replacement of the BLTouch by an inductive sensor imply in what firmware changes? Is there a tutorial about it? I appreciate any help you can get from friends

I had the same problem with my Ender 5 Plus. There is a small set screw at the top of the BLTouch you will need to tighten this in to adjust the location of the sensor pin. Keep screwing it more and more until you see it initialize reliably that is it should move out and back twice to initialize. When the BLTouch initializes correctly then the leveling can be completed.

Creating a two part label for storage boxes I want to create two piece labels for storage containers. The main piece would be the “badge” which would have text cut out of it (e.g. “Paint”, “Electrical” etc.). The second piece would be a positive of the text which is would be in a different colour, and would fit inside the cut out on the badge. Because of the tolerance of 3D printers, I need to make the insert slightly smaller than the cut out. Initially, I thought I could just scale the insert but that would affect the letter spacing. Then I thought it would work if I could somehow taper the letters so they are slightly smaller at the top than the bottom. So my question is, how I do that. I did the original in OpenScad but I would try Fusion360 if that’s a better solution. Any and all suggestions are welcome. Thanks.

In OpenSCAD, apply the offset transformation to inset the letter outlines before extruding them. However you may find it works better to fill the sunken letter shapes with nail polish then remove the overflow with acetone; see my question & answer https://3dprinting.stackexchange.com/a/10872/11157.

When to use an anti-backlash bolt for a Z drive gear? I am building an HEVO printer with a 300x300 build plate and the project includes two T8 lead screws, lead 8 mm ("Tr8x8(p2)"). I read that such long lead may worsen backlash issues, so anti-backlash bolts are often used. They however increase the torque required to drive the build platform (quite important, since 8 mm lead involves using microstepping for fine adjustments) and they also reduce the usable vertical travel. Since the build plate has already a significant weight (2020 frame, 2x 2 mm aluminium plates, 4 mm borosilicate bed, 8 linear bearings, heater), I wonder what is an approximate weight threshold to decide for using the anti-backlash or to skip it.

First of all, let's look at the geometry: We have a static XY and changing Z on our build plate. This mitigates several problems we might have faced in a different setup, mainly that our lead screw has loads changing from one face to the other: all loads always go into $-Z$, so the lower surface of the Trapezoidal threads in the brass nut of the bed carrier and the upper surface of the screw will always rub against each other. However, let's talk about your lead. Tr8x8(p2) is not a Metric ISO-Trapezoidal pattern that is commonly recognized - the only 8 mm diameter one in that standard is Tr8x1.5, very flat and very well suited for putting high loads onto it because there are several engagement surfaces in the nut and a low pitch angle - the thread only has about a 5° (+-1°)to the horizontal. Assuming a 15 mm nut, that's 10 times the projected engagement surface for a total area of about 214 mm². A Tr8x8 is a very common oddball as in, it's not in the metric tables but available everywhere. It is considerably steeper, and with a 16 mm nut (for easier calculation) would result in 2 times the projected surfaceof a single engagement per thread. But that's only a projected area of 42.8 mm² per thread - about 1/5th of the Tr8x1.5, which correlates directly into that much less friction, because the friction is linear with the surface, which is linear to the length of the nut. Taking an "intermediary" TR8x4 gets us about 1/2.5th of the Tr8.1.5's holding power per thread at the cost of half of the speed. From a physical standpoint, I'd take this one, also increasing the precision of the Z-movement by a factor of 2 in comparison to the Tr8x8. Tradeoffs Generally speaking, we have a tradeoff here: Pitch is proportional to the movement speed double the pitch and you move twice as fast Pitch is anti-proportional to holding power/torque and Z-position accuracy half the pitch gives twice the torque and the Z-position error is in average reduced by half holding power is proportional to the diameter of the rod and the number of threads engaging with the nut Z-position accuracy is anti-proportional to the effective step-size of the motor Z-position accuracy can be increased by using a reduction gearset: a 2:1 reduction gear halves the step-size and doubles the torque at the price of halving the movement speed. However, it can and will introduce slop and backlash. Due to the geometry, the slop in the nut should not be an issue, as the relevant engagement surfaces never change. Further, the heavier the bed, the fewer problems you'll have with fast movements, as gravity will prevent the bed from going "airborne" at the end of travel towards the printhead. Travel away from the printhead, as it will do during printing, should never experience such.

How to solve spillage problem? I've done calibration test with "Concentric circle test" (https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:11895) and at specific points there are little bumped points on the print. Also Thingiverse page of the test mentions about these. How can I solve this problem? My printer is Creality Ender 3 Pro, I use Esun PLA+ with 210 celcius extruder and 60 celcius bed temperature. Here is the printed object, both are same print, just took photo on different base.

We had some prints like that recently. Turns out it was caused by the bed not being "level" or "trammed". Basically the nozzle was too far off the bed when printing started for the first layer. Check yours - a piece of paper should slide between the nozzle and the bed surface, with a little bit of resistance. If it slides freely, the bed needs to be raised some. Check it at the corners and in the middle of the bed.

Power consumption of filament extrusion I'd like to calculate the power lost through the filament being extruded (or in other words, at how many Watts I'd have to run an ideal heater that loses heat ONLY through filament so that it stays at constant temperature). Power is defined in Watts as $\text W =\frac{\text J}{\text s}$ Specific heat capacity of a material is defined as $C =\frac{\text J}{ \text K \times\text{kg}}$ When extrusion happens, the filament of higher temperature leaves the hotend while the same weight of filament of lower temperature enters the hotend. Let's say the specific heat capacity of the filament is $C$ and the extrusion rate $r$ is given with units kg/s. The temperatures are $T$. Is it correct then to say that the power consumption of filament extrusion is $W = (c\times T_\text{Nozzle} - c\times T_\text{Environment}) \times r$ meaning that if I would run a heater cartridge at exactly "W" watts and extrude filament with rate "r" and the block would not loose heat through any other means than through the filament extrusion, then the nozzle temperature would stay constant?

This is very simply stated, in fact the specific heat is a function of temperature and state of the material (liquid or solid). Also you need to consider which type of specific heat you use, e.g. the one for constant volume $C_V$ or for constant pressure $C_P$. Constant pressure is probably preferred considering the mechanics of the printer (pressing filament into the nozzle-heatbreak assembly). A very interesting source of information is the PolymerDatabase.com. This source confirms that: In the case of polymers, we have to distinguish between the heat capacity of liquid, rubbery and glassy polymers. The heat capacity increases with increasing temperature, therefore, a liquid or rubbery polymer can hold more energy than a solid polymer. All materials show this increase in heat capacity with temperature. also: Specific heat capacities as a function of temperature have been published for only a limited number of polymers. In many cases, the heat capacity (at constant pressure) as a function of temperature can be approximated by straight lines. In such cases you can use the value of the specific heat at a predefined temperature (in thermodynamics that is frequently 298 K) to get approximations for your thermoplastic material. These formulae can then be used to integrate over the temperature rise. Please remember that a cartridge is of a certain value of Watt; to have a lower power, the cartridge modulates voltage to keep the heating block within a predefined temperature range.

Is there a G-code for waiting? My printer has an auto-leveling feature that works by touching the build plate with the tip of the nozzle. I started using a BuildTak surface and BuildTak is damaged when you push a hot nozzle into it. So I edited the start G-code to run the auto-leveling before heating up the hotend But ABS doesn't stick to the build surface unless I pre-heat the hotend and wait about a minute. So now I'm looking for a G-code command to put at the end of the start G-code that will make the printer wait a minute before printing The sequence I'm looking for is: Heat up the bed Auto level Raise the hotend a little bit so it doesn't touch the build plate Heat up the hotend Wait a minute (that's the only part that is missing, everything else works) Start printing Any way to insert a delay into the G-code? I'm using Cura to slice/print, my printer is Robo3D R1+

The G-code to delay is G4. G4 P60000 will wait for one minute. The P is in milliseconds. Some firmware also accept a S Parameter that has the seconds. So, if supported, G4 S60 would do the same thing. The details for this and all other G-codes are documented here.

TMC2130 External VM RAMPS 1.4 I'm attempting to replace my DRV8825's with TMC2130's on a Prusa i3 rework clone, 12 V RAMPS 1.4, motor currents have been accounted for. Since they don't work as well with 12 V than with higher voltages, I bought a 10-50 V, 10 A DC-DC converter to power the drivers (and steppers). On the RAMPS this is done simply by taking the VM pin out and soldering it on the other side to draw power from an external source. It is stated everywhere that VM should be powered BEFORE VIO. Would it be valid to switch on a relay with the DC-DC converter and connect the VIO pin to RAMPS 5 V through it? Is it enough having both sources turn on at roughly the same time? I haven't found any indication on how much time there should be in between (or if there needs to be any). Please tell me your own experience if you have attempted something similar, or any alternatives (aside from buying a new board, because I'll eventually build a CoreXY or something else) that may be valid.

First of all, I'm not talking on a first-hand experience: I don't own a RAMPS based printer. If I were you and wish to be 100 % sure the setup you are describing doesn't blow up in my face I would use a spare pin on the Mega to drive the relay which, in turn, drive the 24 V source line. In terms of delay I would use a couple of seconds after power on: enough time to have the bootscreen completes and all the pins being set as per firmware configuration.

Why does my MKS Base not recognize my thermistors? I recently upgraded my Geeetech Acrylic Prusa i3 with a MKS Base V1.4 and it would not recognize the thermistors (100K {type 1}) even though they worked fine with the Arduino Mega 2560 with the RAMPS shield. After changing the thermistors for the 4th time it began to work, but the model printed was quite distorted. Then without warning it suddenly does not recognize them again. The board does create the USB port, but does not appear to communicate with my computer. Is the problem more associative with the board or my computer?

You should: Ensure that firmware has proper thermistor configuration. For details see this video tutorial. Verify that your thermistor works properly. Measure voltage on it. It should be around 5V on this particular board. There is possibility that the board is defective. Replace it. Temperature sensor possibilities for Marlin firmware: // -2 is thermocouple with MAX6675 (only for sensor 0) // -1 is thermocouple with AD595 // 0 is not used // 1 is 100k thermistor - best choice for EPCOS 100k (4.7k pullup) // 2 is 200k thermistor - ATC Semitec 204GT-2 (4.7k pullup) // 3 is Mendel-parts thermistor (4.7k pullup) // 4 is 10k thermistor !! do not use it for a hotend. It gives bad resolution at high temp. !! // 5 is 100K thermistor - ATC Semitec 104GT-2 (Used in ParCan & J-Head) (4.7k pullup) // 6 is 100k EPCOS - Not as accurate as table 1 (created using a fluke thermocouple) (4.7k pullup) // 7 is 100k Honeywell thermistor 135-104LAG-J01 (4.7k pullup) // 71 is 100k Honeywell thermistor 135-104LAF-J01 (4.7k pullup) // 8 is 100k 0603 SMD Vishay NTCS0603E3104FXT (4.7k pullup) // 9 is 100k GE Sensing AL03006-58.2K-97-G1 (4.7k pullup) // 10 is 100k RS thermistor 198-961 (4.7k pullup) // 11 is 100k beta 3950 1% thermistor (4.7k pullup) // 12 is 100k 0603 SMD Vishay NTCS0603E3104FXT (4.7k pullup) (calibrated for Makibox hot bed) // 13 is 100k Hisens 3950 1% up to 300°C for hotend "Simple ONE " & "Hotend "All In ONE" // 20 is the PT100 circuit found in the Ultimainboard V2.x // 60 is 100k Maker's Tool Works Kapton Bed Thermistor beta=3950 // // 1k ohm pullup tables - This is not normal, you would have to have changed out your 4.7k for 1k // (but gives greater accuracy and more stable PID) // 51 is 100k thermistor - EPCOS (1k pullup) // 52 is 200k thermistor - ATC Semitec 204GT-2 (1k pullup) // 55 is 100k thermistor - ATC Semitec 104GT-2 (Used in ParCan & J-Head) (1k pullup) // // 1047 is Pt1000 with 4k7 pullup // 1010 is Pt1000 with 1k pullup (non standard) // 147 is Pt100 with 4k7 pullup // 110 is Pt100 with 1k pullup (non standard)

Very messy prints with lots of fuzz on edges Recently my prints come out very messy. I tightened everything up and checked the extrusion multiplier. I have an Ender 3 Pro which I use together with Cura 4.2.1 (and Octoprint). I print in PLA at 190°C. The print bed is set to 70°C. The Bed temperature is lower though, since I use a glas bed on top of the heated bed. I use a print cooling fan at 100%. The layer height is set to 0.2 mm, the line width 0.4mm from the 0.4mm nozzle. My retraction is 5mm at 45mm/s. Does anyone have any idea what the reason could be?

I figured out the problem. I reduced printing speed and printing temperature and the print came out decent. Still some issues but worlds better then before. I will try a few more settings to determine exactly what was the actual Issue. I will also try what @Fernando Baltazar recommended and update here what exactly changed the printing quality.

Eliminating unwanted internal surfaces One of the biggest challenges with 3D-drawings is internal surfaces unintentionally formed that cause slicing not to work properly. This is using SketchUp Pro, slicing with Slic3r, and printing with a Reprap X400. Eliminating lines unnecessary to form the outside surfaces helps, but this may not eliminate all the internal surfaces which can be hard to see even with an x-ray view. It often takes deleting an external surface, looking for internal surfaces to select and delete, then adding the external surface back, being careful not to use a line that also adds the internal surface back. This can be a huge issue when importing an STL file into SketchUP. The import seems to prefer using all triangles and thus the maximum number of lines with no attempt to see which are unnecessary, leaving it up to the user to eliminate lines. What techniques do you have for eliminating or avoiding unwanted internal surfaces in drawings?

I am sorry to tell you that SketchUp is not a good software for printable 3D designs due to its exporting feature not properly reducing complexity. It creates unnecessary faces and vertices inside of items on a regular basis, which in the slicer creates artifacts. To make a SketchUp created file well printable, a huge amount of careful re-engineering in a graphics program like Blender is needed, manually removing the excess vertices surfaces.

Resolution Drawbacks With an ABS or PLA extrusion 3D printer, are there any potentially negative quality differences that could occur if I try to print at a higher resolution? I am not concerned about print time as the equipment is not under high demand. I am, however, worried the device may be more prone to fracture, likely to have defects, or have other issues I cannot currently imagine.

The biggest effect I've see on resolution is due to plastic stress due to thermal gradients. The higher resolution prints build up more layers of material, and each layer has a cumulative effect on thermal stress. The upper layers pulling up more as they cool, and the lower layers curling up more strongly as the layer count is increased. To counteract this, a heated (or even just a draft free) enclosure makes a big difference. Having a heated print bed helps significantly, as long as the bed itself resists deformation (a sheet metal or PCB bed will bend more than glass under the same tension, for instance). The actual plastic strength, however, appears increased. Laying down thinner layers of material appears to increase the bond strength between layers.

Does Octoprint stop printing on Crash Detection? A corner of my model curled up, causing the head to crash into it. The Prusa MK3 detected the error, printed a message to that effect, and moved the print head to the home position. I was surprised when printing immediately resumed, and of course immediately went awry as it pulled the model off the print bed and dragged it around. My questions: Is it expected that printing stops when a head crash is detected? If so, does Octoprint recognize this condition and stop printing?

You are describing precisely how the crash detection should work on the Prusa Mk3, so it is doing exactly what it should do. If you look into this video from Jozef Prusa you will see him explaining that in case a crash is detected (steps missed are registered because the Mk3 uses trinamic stepper drivers), the print head is homed and will immediately restart printing. Please do read this interesting post; it describes your similar problems: after detection it resumes. He noteworthy mentions that even a few lines of G-code went missing, this is probably caused by the fact that OctoPrint buffers a few commands or something that get lost because the Pruse Mk3 crash fail safe kicks in. In effect, OctoPrint is just a simple supplier of G-code commands and does not recognize the problem to act on it and will therefore continue sending new commands after the Prusa Mk3 crash has recovered (sending ok to OctoPrint for receiving new commands) from the crash and re-homed and got the temperatures back to normal levels. An existing plugin for OctoPrint may help you in this case. The Action Trigger Plugin is able to detect events, but have to be implemented in your firmware. E.g. the action for filament describes: This trigger will pause the print and home the X and Y axis, giving the user the opportunity to change out the filament. The print needs to be resumed manually through the UI. Maybe it can be configured to pick up the existing event and issue a pause. It could be worth looking into this. EDIT Looking closer to the ActionTrigger plugin I noticed that you cannot configure it and the "manual" is very terse. I guess this might involve some serious hacking...

How do I repeat the layers of Slic3r for every 3 infill layers with different angles? (Might need some programming knowledge) I'm working on developing alternative infill layers to print at different angles, using Slic3r. Using Slic3r's rectilinear infill, printing at specific angles for 3 layers then repeat. I'm working towards finding the code in the source code where they alternate the layers and change it to alternate it for every 3 layers. I know I will need some C++ knowledge to fiddle around with the Slic3r's source code, but if there is someone who can point me in the right direction I would gladly appreciate it!

Slic3r is available on Github. I think the section you'd be looking for is here

3D prints keep suffering from warping I have a Prusa i3 made by Geeetech. My 3D prints keep suffering from warping when printing with PLA. Whenever I print something with a base at about 10 cm x 10 cm, at least one corner of the print would warp up. I've read numerous articles about warping and tried all sorts of methods. My printer's bed is level, and heated to 60°C. My bed is made from clean glass. I've tried all sorts of adhesives. I tried blue tape, and used hair spray. The only way for me to combat this is gluing the base to blue tape with 502 Glue. I used brim and the whole brim just warps up. I sometimes leave the model printing over night. For the first few hours it's perfectly flat. When I go back to it the next morning I'd find one corner warped up. This is very dysfunctional to my prints. Is there a reliable way to stop this warping from happening?

For ABS it will warp unless you build a heat chamber. That said the tricks to reduce warping come down to: Material, i.e. PLA is less likely to warp; Use a fan, it helps so much; Make sure you have temps calibrated well - Too hot is more warp; Use a raft. The Makerbot uses a raft and no heated bed; Make sure the room is not drafty. Having it by the window will result in warping; Adding a large brim also helps; I find good ol' glue sticks work the best at keeping the print to the bed; SMASH the first layer. This one is controversial. I personally do first layer at 130% and print speed of 30%. You get elephants foot sure, but it's on the bed real good. Tom is right. It is very very hard to print that big of a piece without warping. That said I have done very large pieces on my Ultimaker, using a fan, glue stick, MatterHackers PRO PLA and no raft. But again that's on an Ultimaker. Note you can build a heat chamber pretty easily. Specifically a passive heat chamber.

Which capacitor to change on CR-10S S500 motherboard? I have a CR-10S 500 and want to change a capacitor on it to improve and solve temperature issues. This capacitor that needs to be changed should be labeled as "C4" as mentioned on this post but it's not present on my motherboard. The goal is to replace 100uF capacitor with 220uF 16V capacitor. This is what the motherboard should look like: but mine looks different. Below is what it looks like: There is no version number on my motherboard and there is no "C4" capacitor. Also, the component that's labeled "330" on the original board is labeled "470" on my motherboard. It's hard to decide which capacitor to change. On my motherboard, there two capacitors instead of one, closer to the location of the capacitor that needs to be replaced. They are labeled "C42" and "C35" instead of "C4". I do not want to replace the wrong one since it's risky enough to replace just one capacitor on these boards. Anyone know my motherboard type or version? Also, which capacitor to change? EDIT: Here is a better or zoomed in section of the place: As Trish requested in the comment, below is also the back side of the motherboard. theSealion might be right in his answer and I did a test and it all points to "C31" as he suggested but the problem is that the capacitor is different from the one it is supposed to be replaced with like on other CR-10 boards. I am not entirely sure if this is the capacitor since the type of capacitor are different from the one I was suggested to use. Below is the new capacitor: My current idea is to remove the tiny "C31", solver wire to pin 4 of LM2596 and to the new capacitor but I do not want to remove the "C31" because I don't want anything to go bad. Can I add the new capacitor parallel to the existing "C31" without removing the "C31"?

You are looking for a capacitor that must be connected to Pin 4 of the LM2596. Maybe you could provide a better picture of that area so we could see the different tracks on the board. The LM2596 is in the center of the right side of the board (it is also labeled with LM2596D). The pins should be counted from top to bottom (in your picture) My guess is, the Elko you are looking for is connected to C31, and you must look for the positive pin. In this wiring diagram Cout is the capacitor you are looking for. The SMD Parts R1, R2 and CFF should be R31, R32 and C31 in your picture. With the corresponging measurements I would say you do not need to replace the capacitors. In comparison to the old board your board already has the "fix" implemented.

How to optimally make a 3D model of an object using photos? I would like to obtain a 3D model of my insoles. I tried to scan it with 123D catch but finding reference points is difficult because the insole is black. How could I improve the scanning? I attach a photo of the insole to show its not easy shape. I thought about placing a grid of white spots on the surface, but will it be enough? Also, is it recommended to keep the camera still and rotate the object (I have a rotating stand) or should I move the camera? in the second case, the accuracy of the photos will be lower, while rotating 5-10 degrees the stand every time is extremely easy. As background should I use a checkerboard or something else not repetitive? I noticed that the insole has basically three different "levels", joined smoothly with each other. These "planes" are sloped the same way, so that if I change the pitch of the insole by about 10 degrees, they will be horizontal. Would it improve the accuracy? Edit: the insole is perfectly new, newer worn before. Update I dotted the insole with white paint (the white eraser paint used in office and school) and I took a series of photos with the insole in top of a tripod, laying on a flat white cardboard support. 55 photos in total at 3 different elevations (side, medium, high). I also did a test with fixed camera and rotating object. Photoscan did not work well in general. Keeping the object fixed produces the best results, but poor. 123D Catch did a much better job! again with fixed object and moving camera. Still, treating the resulting mesh was difficult and the accuracy could be improved. Autodesk Remake 2017 worked VERY well, as you can see in the attached screenshot, and it allows the editing of the mesh to remove useless parts of the model. I haven't tried yet to process the photos with the camera fixed and the rotating object. I did the processing locally (it's slow!) with maximum details and resolution.

Usually, the largest variability in 3D imaging is lighting, closely followed by the color scheme. You'll probably want to heed some of the following points: No colors in the background/stand, keep to shades (unless otherwise specified for scanner) No gradients. This applies to poor lighting causing a "gradient" light effect Set the backdrop beyond the range of the scanner if possible (like with Skanect w/ Microsoft Kinect) Ideally set the backdrop and especially the stand in contrast with the color of the object. You're right, a typical 3D scanner will have a difficult time with darker colors due to physics. However, there are no rules that say you can't change the color of the object. In this application, I would suggest just going ahead and spray painting the object and scanning it. Scanning the insole is going to require super tight tolerances in scanning as I'm assuming the insole is naturally worn due to use. Completely alternatively from 3D scanning, you could try using a 3D touch probe like on a CMM (Coordinate Measuring Machine). It will take longer, but a touch probe doesn't care what color the object is. Update The touch probe comment seems to be a hit, so I'll elaborate. My experience with touch probes comes only from manufacturing technology and can be found and in a variety of different machine tools: Mills Lathes CMMs Vision Systems "Romer" Arms (aka portable CMM) You could probably get away with searching for a local machine shop (or job shop) and asking if they have a machine for reverse engineering. The quickest and easiest machine for reverse engineering (in my experience) is a portable CMM, I recommend Googling it. Alternatively, I've heard of people adding touch probes to their 3D Printers, but I haven't seen it before. In theory, a basic touch probe can easily be achieved by using a momentary switch. If you're good with programming and maybe a bit of Arduino, you could do the following: Add momentary (normally off) switch to Arduino Find a way of attaching the switch (below nozzles) Connect to your 3d printer in your preferred method and preferred programming language. I've used the provided libraries in Python that come with installing MakerWare in order to connect to my MakerBot. Write your routine to sequentially move the new probe in a grid pattern and then incrementally move the Z up until you get a signal from your Arduino that the momentary has been switched on. For each trigger, append a simple text file with a new line containing the coordinates. once complete, you should have a "point cloud" of your insole which, if formatted correctly, will be able to import into CAD software There are a few file types off the top of my head that can be used including: .pts .XYZ .CSV

Passing from nozzle diameter 0.4 mm to 0.2 mm causing filament jamming in heater Im using Prusa Slicer 2.1 for my FlyingBear Ghost 4. I just changed my 0.4 mm nozzle for a 0.2 mm but it seems to jam in the heater probably due to too much filament trying to get out by the nozzle. Where is the setting to reduce the filement speed and how much I should reduce it? Here are my settings: Config.txt

0.2 mm and 0.4 mm are half the diameter, but the maximum flow is not just half: Flow scales with the area. The 0.4 mm nozzle has an area 4 times as the 0.2 mm one: $\frac{A_1} {A_2}=\frac {0.2^2}{0.1^2}=4$ You need to reduce print speed or the volumetric flow by this factor or make sure your printer can handle the increased flow by reducing the viscosity of the melt - for example by increasing the print temperature. Also note, that a 0.2 mm nozzle can't be operated with layer heights above 0.15 mm.

Linux software for laser engraver I am searching for a Linux software to control the 3000 mW laser engraver depicted below. It's a common model you'd find on AliExpress, Banggood, etc. under different brand names. I have already tried nejePrint, LaserWeb, and EzGraver, but they don't work. Any ideas?

A program that lists as functional with Linux is Lightburn. It's new to the laser engraving world and supports GRBL type controllers as well as Ruida brand and possibly a few others. If you can determine your controller, you're a step ahead of the game. Directly from their site: LightBurn LightBurn is layout, editing, and control software for your laser cutter. With LightBurn you can: Import artwork in a variety of common vector graphic and image formats (including AI, PDF, SVG, DXF, PLT, PNG, JPG, GIF, BMP) Arrange, edit, and even create new vector shapes within the editor, with powerful features like offsetting, boolean operations, welding, and node editing Apply settings like power, speed, number of passes, cut order, brightness & contrast, dithering mode, and much more Send the result directly to your laser cutter LightBurn is a native application written for Windows, Mac OS, and Linux. I'm a satisfied Lightburn user, not a company representative.

Creality Ender-3 slanted nozzle I’ve just received my first 3D printer, the Ender-3 and while assembling the unit I noticed that the nozzle is slanted and not vertical on its holder unit. Is this normal or do I have to try to make it vertical? Did I receive a faulty nozzle unit?

This is not normal, the heat break (which is the cylindrical part between the nozzle block and the upper cooling part assembly is probably bent in your example) should be perpendicular to the 2020 guide beam (X-axis) so that the nozzle exit is exactly perpendicular to the (heated) platform. You either received a faulty heat break, or too much force is exerted during assembly. You should contact the seller. You could disassemble (after you contacted the seller) to see if the heat break is bent or something else is incorrect. Once you have the heat break out, you can measure the dimensions and order a replacement locally (for speed). It is advisable to have some heat breaks, nozzles, and even a heater block, heater cartridges and thermistors available as spares, these are pretty cheap to obtain through the regular Chinese vendor sites or auction sites. If the heat break is bent, bending it back is not advised as this heat break easily tears open as it usually consists of thin walls.

Using multiple infill types within one model When modelling for 3D printing, can I distinguish somehow the type of infill in various areas of the model? Say there may be some areas in the model where I want 100% infill (maximum strength) but some areas where the infill can be less (maybe 25%). I am new to 3D printing, doing my first model (enclosure for electronics - camera module). Using tinkercad.com only so far. Places where 100% infill is wanted are usually walls of the case and "threads" for the bolts but I want to make the enclosure as stiff as possible as a whole so I am thinking about using some sparse infill in the "free space" inside of the enclosure (so that it does not break so easily when it falls to the ground etc). I just do not know how to define this within the model.

To achieve additional localised stiffness, you can also insert small voids (gaps) inside the model. These become double thickness walls once sliced and can be used to support things like screw holes. See the 'negative' parts used with a cube, and the sliced result here:

Pronterface window question I switched to a Raspberry Pi 3 to use with (Linux) Pronterface for my 3D printer. This Pi 3 has a 3.5" 320x480 LCD display. When Pronterface is loaded, only part of its window can be seen and some of the UI elements are unreachable. I have the Pronterface source code from GitHub. Where do I start to shrink the app window?

You can change your Pi's resolution using raspi-config or the Raspberry Pi Configuration app. To use raspi-config, access Terminal and run raspi-config. Then navigate to Advanced Options > Resolution. If you'd rather use the GUI, open the Raspberry Pi Configuration app and select Resolution from the resultant dialog. This may help with the rendering issues.

Adding points to a point cloud I made a scan and got a cloud point file, but the cloud point is not that good, but I need to print it in a 3d printer as soon as possible, just to see how it would look. Basically it's missing some points that were not scanned properly due to it being transparent at those points. I'd like to add those points manually (using meshlab preferably) and create a surface with them .. something that makes this file printable. I know I could edit this file manually since it is an ascii file with the values of xyz .. but that is a lot of trouble and certainly there is a faster way to do this with a free tool.

A good free tool for editing meshes would be Blender. Linux, Windows, Mac are supported. It has a serious learning curve, and is somewhat counter-intuitive in use (right click object to select) unless you customize it. Plenty of online video tutorials to learn the basics, though, and if you have a membership for Lynda.com, those videos are the best (opinion). I've used it to pull edges and vertices together, to chop out pieces that weren't supposed to be there, etc. The flexibility and power of the program is amazing, considering the price. Many artists use the program for creating 3D animations and full length movies. Amazing talent, well beyond my capabilities, but it shows what the software can do. The website also has links to tutorials and the manual, which is also a work of art. If you can devote the time to learn the program, anything 3D modeling related will be within reach.

What causes ripples on part of first layer? I'm having issues with ripples on the first layer of big flat prints. The initial corner of a big flat print is fine, but then ripples begin to form as shown in the screenshot. I'm just a newbie, so I was thinking they might have something to do with heat or contraction or something. Normally, I use the default and print with no turbofan on the first layer. When I tried adding fan 20% or 50%, nothing much changed (slight differences in the ripple pattern and area, but that pattern varies anyway). I also wonder if one strip gets bent, then maybe the rest just follow the bends. As far as I know, my heating plate is working fine, has no serious hot spots, and I'm using a high-quality PLA+ filament. I also tried adjusting the print temperature from 205-220 (the range on the box is 205-230). Nothing seemed to help. I am running a default first layer thickness of 0.3 mm because that is supposed to help adhesion (and adhesion is fine). The ripples look worse than they feel. They feel fairly flat, only slightly rippled, even though they look terrible! (And I don't know what that weird row with blobs is in the top left of the picture. That only happened once; almost like junk was in the nozzle or the feed gears slipped or something). I'm running a Qidi Xpro machine, Sunlu PLA+ (wonderful) filaments, bed 50 C, print temp 205-215, print speed 30-40 mm/s on the first layer, and first layer thickness 0.3 mm (normal layer thickness is 0.2 mm). This machine has a direct drive with gears immediately above the nozzle. Does anyone know why this rippling effect occurs, and what I might to do to correct it? Thanks UPDATE: I'm adding this info here to respond to several comments concerning bed leveling, etc. (Thank you to those who made comments!) 1) I'm sure that the bed is as level as I can make it because I always go through the cycle twice). 2) Regarding clearance, if anything I worry that my clearance is too small since there is a fair amount of drag on my leveling card under the nozzle. So, there is definitely drag on all three level points, about midrange between the lightest drag and the heaviest drag that makes me think I'm filing off part of the nozzle. 3) I do have two nozzles, so I suppose the problem could show up on one but not the other if the nozzles were screwed into the block to give different heights. But the ripple shows up on both nozzles, always in the middle of the build plate, always in the middle of a big flat print. Corners don't usually show ripple effects. I don't want to believe that my build plate dips in the middle on my new machine, either ... :-) Adhesion is fine on small prints in the middle of the plate. Here is a picture of the bottom of the piece. A careful examination shows an oscillation in the squished filament segments on a filament thread. Almost like the extruder was oscillating vertically in the z-axis at that frequency, or perhaps the filament squishyness was oscillating at that frequency. Looks almost like a weave pattern, since the squished parts alternate position on alternating lines. It's worth saying again that the piece feels pretty smooth on both the top and bottom sides, even though it looks awful. I don't know what to make of that.

First layer rippling is usually caused by a too low of a first layer height (for the amount of extruded filament). Are you sure that: Your bed is leveled as good as possible, and the initial height between the nozzle and the bed is correct when Z=0 (A4 paper thickness, when moved should be giving some drag), and the bed is flat. (This is most probably your actual problem!) To minimize the effects, you could try to: increase the first layer height, or set an additional Z offset in the slicer, or reduce the filament flow for the first layer, or install an automatic bed leveling sensor, or perform a manual bed levelling mesh procedure (if you have Marlin Firmware). This usually helps fighting these ripples.

Random lines are being printed? I recently got a Creality Ender-3, and tried printing a few things for some tests. I’ve printed a cube and just printed a cylindrical tube today, and I notice each time, it adds this random line on the left and a sort of outline around the actual print. Neither of these were there in my Cura file, but they’re always printed and I’m not sure why?

If the printer is printing, it is instructed to do so by the G-code file unless you are printing through an external software program that has extra G-code to print before your print starts. E.g. in OctoPrint print server it is possible to execute G-code before the print starts. Left line = Priming The straight line on the left is typically used to prime the printer nozzle to get the filament flow starting, this is typically seen in PrusaSlicer (Prusa's fork of Open Source toolpath generator for 3D printers Slic3r). This straight line is called priming line, purge line or intro line, and is typically (but not necessarily) printed outside or at the edge of the bed area. Furthermore, a prime line print routine will catch errant nozzle ooze, test extrusion (it is the first indication if the nozzle to bed distance is correct; if not you can abort with minimal material loss) and perform a final wipe action to avoid stringing between the prime line and start of the print. Note that this straight prime line is not a standard option in a custom profile of Cura, so this was part of the Ender-3 Preset you imported or possibly you have copied a starting G-code that includes this prime line. A typical set of G-code lines to create a prime/purge/intro line is found in your start G-code and could look similar to: G1 Y-3.0 F1000.0 ; go outside print area G92 E0.0 G1 X60.0 E9.0 F1000.0 ; intro line G1 X100.0 E12.5 F1000.0 ; intro line G92 E0.0 After slicing your object, you will find such lines in the generated G-code file, but they are not displayed in the preview. Further information can be found in Writing G-code : swiping at start of print Equidistant line = Skirt The lines at distance from the print object is called the "skirt", the skirt is an option found under the "Build Plate Adhesion" options in your slicer. The function of the skirt is similar as described for the straight prime line, but it has additional effects that can be wanted. It also shows fairly fast if the bed is unleveled as a whole or if the bed is greasy. Please look into: "What are main differences between rafts, skirts and brims? ". Note that it is usually superfluous to use both the prime/purge/intro line and the skirt, both have a similar function. The benefit of the skirt is that you can configure it within the slicer (e.g. length of the printed skirt, height to use as a shield for draft or ooze and distance to product). The downside is, that a skirt limits the useable build area by the distance and width of the skirt.

Why doesn't PLA stick to heated bed? I have a basic Creality Ender-3 with a black rough bed cover. I'm printing with PLA. After assembly, I printed 3 or 4 small toys sliced by Cura with basic settings. All were printed very well! However, after that, extruded filament would not stick to the bed. I tried the following: Bed calibration with A4 paper (each corner with a tight nozzle to paper and repeated calibration again) Once raised up the bed temperature from stock 50 to 60 °C Washed the bed with a soap and water (and dried) Sprayed with a hair spray Changed the filament Nothing helped so far. What else can I try?

I think you may have used the wrong substance to clean your bed. Try using Isopropyl Alcohol (IPA). You may have left some residue behind from the soap, which is now interfering with adhesion. When that is done, ensure you've gone through the steps for bed leveling again. It's amazing how much of a difference proper bed leveling makes in adhesion. If it still doesn't work, post some pictures up of your results, which will help tremendously in getting you a better answer.

Error: Dry mode when moving Z-Axis My printer just stopped working. It seems like it's working perfectly, but it gives me an error whenever I move the Z-Axis (Error: Printer set into dry run mode until restart) then, the bed temperature appears to be at 293ºC when it's actually at 95ºC. I suspect that the bed wires short-circuited since they got stuck behind the bed when the printer was moving Y-Axis to home (the wires blocked the movement). Since then, the error appeared. I suspect that the controller board could have been harmed by the supposed short-circuit, but despite the error, I can move perfectly any axis; I can heat the bed and the extruder; I can extrude filament; it is just the error which doesn't let me print. Printer: Anet A8 Desktop 3D Printer Prusa i3 Software: MatterHackers: MatterControl 1.7 Update: The bed temperature is stuck at ~95ºC, sometimes ~250ºC, even if I disconnect the sensor wires and restart the printer, so apparently, it's failing to read the bed temperature.

Try checking the wiring on your motherboard and all of the connections to your steppers. When I first had my printer, the z-axis didn't work because a wire was loose. I took apart the control box on my Di3 and made sure everything was firmly connected, and after that everything worked fine.

Top Layer/Solid Infill Bulge Whenever the print reaches a layer with top/solid infill, it bulges out. It is not on the same layer for every print, which rules out Z-binding. Here are things I have tried: Different slicers Updated firmware Smaller K value for linear advance Lower temperature Slower walls and top layers More perimeters Tightened belts Different filaments Different jerk and acceleration values My problem is similar to what these people are experiencing: https://forum.prusaprinters.org/forum/original-prusa-i3-mk3s-mk3-how-do-i-print-this-printing-help/buldge-when-print-reaches-solid-layers/ These pictures show my problem. The lip in the second picture is supposed to be parallel with the body of the model, not stick out to the right like in the picture.

I'm not sure about other slicers, but Cura has an option called Skin Overlap that defaults to 5% and causes excess material to be extruded beyond what actually fits in the skin (top/bottom "solid infill" surface) area. If you only have a few top layers it probably won't push the outer walls out and will just build up a rough top surface, but with more than a couple it's likely to start making the walls bulge out because there's nowhere else for the excess material to go. I've gotten dramatically better print quality since turning this setting off (0) and doing the same for Infill Overlap.

How to add "skin" to a Voronoi shape? Suppose I'm given a shape with a Voronoi pattern, such as this lamp. I'd like to be able to add a "skin" which covers the complete shape on the inner surface so I could print it with translucent material to produce a more-or-less uniform glow. Here's an example of what I'd like to end up with: tea lamp shade. Any ideas on how to reverse-engineer a Voronoi object?

I posted this to an Autodesk forum, and a fellow named "MagWeb" proposed the following solution. I have not tried it yet. A possible workflow depends much on the overall shape of the voronoi object: If it's convex all over (like an egg) or convex and planar (like a cylinder) e.g: SelectAll (Ctrl+A or Cmd+A on MAC) Run Edit/FitPrimitive and set its PrimitiveType to ConvexHull (CreateNewObjects checked) Run MakeSolid on this hull object and set its SolidType to Accurate. Accurate enables the OffsetDistance slider. Pull it down a bit and hit update. You want to get a result intersecting but showing the voronoi object. If needed adjust the offset. Finally accept. Now activate both the voronoi and the MakeSolid result and run BooleanUnion Show the FitPrimitive object again (MakeSolid did hide it before) and run MakeSolid again in Accurate mode. Now set a slightly bigger offset as you did before. The difference will determine the "lining's" thickness. Accept Activate the BoolleanUnion result first and the last MakeSolid result and run BooleanDifference to get a hollow object. You might use another intersecting object to bool-off an opening the bottom. Harder but doable with a different workflow on an voronoi object owning concave regions... edit Having run some trials, I can confirm this works for simple convex objects. If there are concavities, most likely the source shape needs to be chopped into sections each of which can be treated as convex. I played around with Meshmixer's "apply pattern" functions with limited success. I could get a form-fitting pattern shape but with a rather uneven surface. Some fine-tuning of the pattern parameters may help. Note that the new shape tends to be as thick as the original voronoi object, so it may well be better to do something like the following: 1) create a duplicate of the original 2) shrink the duplicate by a few percent 3) align the two objects to a common origin and take the boolean difference to create a thin-wall version of the original. 4) Build the pattern object based on that thinwall object. edit number 2 I succeeded! For those who care, I took an open Voronoi glasses case and put a skin inside to protect your glasses. See this Thingiverse item

Difficulty getting good precision I have a reprap printer with 0.3mm nozzle. It prints quite well, I am really surprised with quality of all the surfaces and the general precision of the parts printed. BUT I HAVE a problem: when making (for example) a 10mm x 10mm x 10mm cube with a 2.8mm diameter hole from top to bottom (to fit a screw) after I print it gets a size of 3mm diameter. I know this is related to extrusion width but cant the slicer software (I am using s3d) know that it is using a specific extrusion width and compensate for that in order to get the diamter right? OBS: this printer is supposed to get 0.05mm precision.

It's a generally accepted fact that FDM/FFF printers will have deviations when it comes to holes and perimeters. Typically, holes print smaller than designed and external surfaces end up larger than designed. In your case, it seems to be the opposite: the hole is too big. It could be that you're just printing too big overall. You might want to make sure that your printer is printing the 10mm X/Y dimension in you example correctly. If it's too big, part of it may be just the typical oversized perimeter, but some of it might be due to incorrect firmware X/Y 'steps/mm' or extrusion like you mentioned. See also: "Are you printing undersized holes?"

Additional mods for printing metal filled filament with Ender 3 V2? I am thinking about getting into the 3D printing craze and currently looking at purchasing a Creality Ender 3 V2 as an entry-level unit. I would like to print using the normal PLA, PETG, ABS, etc. but I'm also thinking of metal-infused PLA or similar for printing jewelry. The suggested modification that I have found in researching is the Micro Swiss All Metal Hotend in order to reach the higher temps for printing metals. Am I correct with this additional mod? Are there other Hotends that would better? Any additional mods for working with metals?

There is a lot of misinformation in the 3D printing world about "all-metal hotends" being an upgrade. Some of them, especially clones, are not even all-metal but just poor lookalikes that create all sorts of problems. But even if you get a real one, it's a trade-off, not an upgrade. It lets you print materials that need a hotend temperature over 250 °C (over which the PTFE liner will begin to degrade and possibly release small amounts of harmful gasses) up to the temperature your heating element can achieve, at the cost of losing the extremely-low-friction PTFE pathway all the way to the nozzle, which aids with smooth extrusion and retraction and avoids jams. Depending on your particular all-metal hotend, it may be harder to get retraction working correctly than with a normal PTFE-lined one. Some users report very good results, others lots of problems. There are very few materials that need temperatures over 250 °C to print that don't also need a much more expensive machine (or at least a heavily-modified one) for other reasons, such as requirement of a high-temperature enclosure. The main materials that can be printed on an Ender 3 with an all-metal hotend but not the standard PTFE-lined hotend are polycarbonate (needing 255-300 °C) and some forms of nylon (which may need up to 250-270 °C). All the other non-exotic materials, including PLA, ABS, PETG, and TPU, and even some exotic ones like POM (aka delrin or acetal) and many nylons, can be printed just fine with a stock Ender 3 (possibly with a minimal enclosure built around it). In particular, for the purpose you want - printing metal-infused PLA - there is no point whatsoever in an all-metal hotend. Metal-infused PLA is printed within the temperature range of PLA, which is typically 230 °C at the absolute highest (and preferably much lower) and the printer you're looking at should print it just fine out-of-the-box (or rather, once you assemble it). If you're concerned about abrasive wear from the filament, this affects the nozzle not the hotend. Technically the nozzle is "part of" the hotend assembly, but it's easily removable and generally considered a consumable item that you replace periodically. You can get hardened steel nozzles and all sorts of other exotic replacements designed not to wear out from abrasive materials, but the standard brass has the best thermal (heat conduction) properties and is so cheap you're generally better off sticking with it and buying a pack of 20 or so to have on hand when they eventually need replacement. In any case, there's no need to replace the hotend with an all-metal one to deal with nozzle wear; you can get either type of replacement to fit the original one.

Z-Axis on i3 clone won't move at all, Melzi A4982 driver problem I'm setting up a replacement Melzi 2.0 board from TRONXY for my i3 clone (a Monoprice Maker Select v2 for those curious), which according to the RepRap wiki has A4982 drivers for all the steppers. I'm attempting to configure Marlin 2.0.x for this printer and this is the last big problem I'm encountering. The problem: The Z-axis (or any motors connected to the Z-axis driver) won't budge no matter what I try. All my other steppers work fine. What I've tried: I've done everything I can to prompt the Z-axis to move, from Gcode commands to homing via the LCD and Pronterface. I've connected my X-axis motor to the Z-axis driver and it won't move either. Sometimes, when I send a command for them to move, they'll make a small noise - like they're getting power - but won't move. I probed the motor connectors at the board and received nothing but a few stray millivolts here and there, very different from the several volts on my Y-axis motor when I did the same thing. Bear in mind, that was just one test moving them from the LCD, and this time they did not make any noise or attempt to move. I have switched pin definitions in the firmware for X/Z ENABLE/STEP/DIR and the Z driver once again appeared to be the culprit, keeping the Z-axis planted even if it was being controlled as if it were the X-axis. What I think the problem could be: To me, this seems like a software problem. I'm configuring Marlin for my first time and I think I messed something up somewhere. Could it be a problem with the trim pots, motor currents, motor enabling, or something else? Outside of that, maybe the driver is just dead? My Marlin 2.0.x config.h for reference: // These are all excerpts from various parts of Configuration.h #define DEFAULT_AXIS_STEPS_PER_UNIT { 80, 80, 400, 500 } #define DEFAULT_MAX_FEEDRATE { 300, 300, 4, 25 } #define DEFAULT_MAX_ACCELERATION { 3000, 3000, 100, 10000 } #define DEFAULT_ACCELERATION 2800 // X, Y, Z and E acceleration for printing moves #define DEFAULT_RETRACT_ACCELERATION 2800 // E acceleration for retracts #define DEFAULT_TRAVEL_ACCELERATION 2800 // X, Y, Z acceleration for travel (non printing) moves //#define CLASSIC_JERK //left at default // :{ 0:'Low', 1:'High' } #define X_ENABLE_ON 0 #define Y_ENABLE_ON 0 #define Z_ENABLE_ON 0 #define E_ENABLE_ON 0 // For all extruders #define DISABLE_X false #define DISABLE_Y false #define DISABLE_Z false #define INVERT_X_DIR false #define INVERT_Y_DIR false #define INVERT_Z_DIR false #define X_HOME_DIR -1 #define Y_HOME_DIR -1 #define Z_HOME_DIR -1 #define X_MIN_POS 0 #define Y_MIN_POS 0 #define Z_MIN_POS 0 #define X_MAX_POS X_BED_SIZE #define Y_MAX_POS Y_BED_SIZE #define Z_MAX_POS 150 #define MIN_SOFTWARE_ENDSTOPS #if ENABLED(MIN_SOFTWARE_ENDSTOPS) #define MIN_SOFTWARE_ENDSTOP_X #define MIN_SOFTWARE_ENDSTOP_Y //#define MIN_SOFTWARE_ENDSTOP_Z //disabled until the driver works correctly #endif #define MAX_SOFTWARE_ENDSTOPS #if ENABLED(MAX_SOFTWARE_ENDSTOPS) #define MAX_SOFTWARE_ENDSTOP_X #define MAX_SOFTWARE_ENDSTOP_Y //#define MAX_SOFTWARE_ENDSTOP_Z #endif //#define Z_SAFE_HOMING #if ENABLED(Z_SAFE_HOMING) #define Z_SAFE_HOMING_X_POINT X_CENTER // X point for Z homing #define Z_SAFE_HOMING_Y_POINT Y_CENTER // Y point for Z homing #endif // Homing speeds (mm/min) #define HOMING_FEEDRATE_XY (50*50) //changed from 3000 to 2500 #define HOMING_FEEDRATE_Z (4*60) // Validate that endstops are triggered on homing moves #define VALIDATE_HOMING_ENDSTOPS // Sorry if that was a bit much, I tried to include all the settings that could // potentially have an effect on the Z motion. I genuinely have no idea where to even look to solve this problem, so any guidance or advice would be hugely appreciated!! Thanks! My conclusion is that the driver chip itself is dead and replacing it ought to fix the problem. If this works, I will post an answer to this question.

I've replaced the Z-axis stepper driver with an off-board Pololu-style A4988 driver by soldering leads to pins 2 and 3 on the Melzi board, then connecting those to the driver on a separate board. The Z-axis now moves correctly. When I encountered issues with the step pin (pin 3), I connected it to pin 12 (bed heater) instead, leaving the bed to be heated manually. This has worked so far and the only problems I've encountered were minor issues with electrical noise, which I was able to fix with a shielded cable.

What's the advantage of two z motors? Some RepRap models use only a single motor for the Z axis, others use two. For example, there is the 3drag that has only one motor and a smooth rod on the other side. There are modifications that add a threaded rod on the other side that is connected to the motor axis with a belt - which seems to be a really good solution. Other printers, like the Prusa i3 or the Mendel90 have two Z motors. And after playing around with a two motor model, I find it pretty annoying when they get out of sync and I need to calibrate the axis and the print bed again. So two motors seem more like an disadvantage to me. Could someone please shed some light on why most RepRaps have two Z motors (nowadays)?

There are three main options here for Mendel style ZX gantries: One Z screw and motor, which is similar to a cantilevered design but somewhat more stable because of the opposite smooth rod Two Z screws and two motors Two Z screws and one motor, with belt synchronization of the two sides Of all of these, running two screws off one motor is clearly superior in reliability and user-friendliness. There is no risk of the two sides of the Z stage going out of sync. One motor running at higher current will generally out-perform two motors splitting one driver's current via parallel wiring, because one motor with twice the torque can push much harder when one side of the gantry binds up or hits a rough spot. The only real downside to the single motor, double screw approach is that it requires more engineering and parts. A closed-loop timing belt must be run between the two screws, with associated pulleys, tensioner, and support bearings. In comparison, using a separate motor for each screw is very simple. It adds a stepper and a shaft coupler, but saves a lot of vitamins and design complexity. Two-motor, two-screw solutions are lower-cost and simpler to design. That's why they're used. End of story. One-motor, one-screw Mendel style printers are quite rare. The passive side of the Z mechanism does add a little bit of stability to the X stage, but not a lot. It's possible to rack the X stage out of square with the bed and bind up the gantry. In order to work at all, they require a very wide/tall bearing footprint on the driven side to resist torque exerted on the driven side by the weight of the X stage and extruder carriage. So it's true that they don't have synchronization issues, but additional design challenges and undesirable flexure modes are introduced. It's much more common for one-screw designs to simply cantilever out the X stage, like a SmartRap or Printrbot Simple.

Upgrading to silicone heat bed, will it burn my house down? I'm looking into upgrading my heated bed and replacing it with a silicone bed. I know nearly nothing about electronics, so I would like someone more knowledgeable to confirm if what I have theorized is correct or I'm going to burn my house down trying it. Basically, I'm considering setting up a 200W@12V heater, and I am using this premium ramps, which reportedly has Toshiba TK72E12N1, S1X MOSFETs. I did some basic math following Tom's guide, if that is correct, I would be pulling 16 A current. Assuming I plug the heatbed directly to the ramps, that would mean the MOSFETs are losing approximately (considering 20 % more resistance than the datasheet says as per Tom's advice) about 1.2 W, which means the MOSFET would heat up about 100 °C above room temperature, so the total temp would be around 125 °C, which is below the graded 150 °C in the sheet. According to this math, I'm thinking I can just plug that heater to my RAMPS board without any issues. Should this cause any issues? Will it set a fire or melt down something? Anything else I should consider?

The heated bed port on your board has a 11A fuse. It will not work for a heated bed requiring 16A of current, no matter how good the MOSFETs might be. Note that the terminal block might also not be rated for that much current. You'd have to check, because often it is not the MOSFET itself that catches fire but the wiring or terminal blocks. Also, keep in mind RAMPS only drives the gate with 5V. The value specified in the datasheet (for 10V) plus 20% is probably a bit optimistic. The datasheet doesn't specify the resistance at 5V, so you're guessing at what the resistance might be. Since you're already running the part quite close to its limits, and considering ambient temperature might rise above 25C, I'd be cautious. The designers of that board only intended it for use at 11A, probably with good reason...

How can I get a 3D model from a bunch of 2D photos? I am a physics graduate student and I want to create some 3D models for my crystal samples. We have an X-ray diffractometer in our lab. It comes with a goniometer inside it, so basically I can take as many photos as needed from any angles. (I have included a gif animation made of 10 photos taken by the machine as an example below) My problem is, given these 2D photos, am I able to construct 3D models for my crystals in AutoCAD or similar software so that I can determine angles, edge lengths and volume more precisely. I am new to 3D printing section. I just thought maybe someone here has encountered with a similar problem. It would be very helpful if anyone could tell me any Github codes, MATLAB scripts, Mathematica scripts or software that can finish this kind of job. I can try to figure it out myself.

YES, it is possible to make a model from several shots, if you know the angle of rotation between the pictures. most CAD programs allow to insert a picture, for example as backdrop or to trace it. We are interested in the later use: We insert the picture, trace it in the picture's layer, then insert the next picture, rotated around the axis of rotation of the picture, and trace that. This we repeat again and again. The resulting cloud of outlines approximates the photographed body to a good degree. There is a big caveat though: all photos must be in the same scale and distance, the rotation of the object has to be around one axis of the item itself (no wobble) and the rotation between the pictures has to be known quite exact. This principle is pretty much used by raster scanning by the way. With a very hard contrast between the crystal and the backdrop, software might be able to automate the tracing process (for example use a white background and a black crystal and make sure no reflection hits the camera). Example using Fusion360 Let's assume I have a perfect crystal like this octahedron with two cut tips To model this, we need at least a photo of the XZ and YZ shape (that is, 90° rotation to each other), which look like this: But that shape would also match a double-cone! So we'll need some intermediary photos, in this case, the 45° shot that lies on the plane of (XY-diagonal)Z Plane As you see, the more outlines you have, the more detailed the pseudo-body becomes - it is just a gathering of vertices and lines yet though! But, we can take 3 points and create a construction area on these, then draw the face to merge all points on these faces... Now, we turn these construction faces into modeling faces, then create a too large object and cut out the whole thing out... The whole workflow looked like this for 4 pictures (0°, 45°, 90°, 135°) The actual f3D design file is here.

First move after Start gcode, to start position (but before printing) is way too fast I have a delta printer. The problem is that after the start gcode is executed and the extruder head is 15 (Pic: x0) mm above the center of the plate, the first move towards the start (x1) of the actual print is performed at (maximum possible?) speed @ infinite acceleration. After that the print is performed with regular acceleration. This can cause missing steps. The problem seems to arise after the start gcode section. How can I fix it. I use Cura 3.5. Start gcode G28 ;Home G1 F1000 G1 Z15.0 G92 E0 G1 F200 E3 G92 E0

By way of comparison, here's what Cura writes as the header of a gcode file. You may want to adjust some of the default parameters in your Cura settings. (this header was same for both the default Prusa and the default Deltabot printer settings) ;FLAVOR:Marlin ;TIME:67934 ;Filament used: 22.2173m ;Layer height: 0.06 ;Generated with Cura_SteamEngine 3.5.0 M140 S60 M105 M190 S60 M104 S200 M105 M109 S200 M82 ;absolute extrusion mode G21 ;metric values G90 ;absolute positioning M82 ;set extruder to absolute mode M107 ;start with the fan off G28 X0 Y0 ;move X/Y to min endstops G28 Z0 ;move Z to min endstops G1 Z15.0 F9000 ;move the platform down 15mm G92 E0 ;zero the extruded length G1 F200 E3 ;extrude 3mm of feed stock G92 E0 ;zero the extruded length again G1 F9000 ;Put printing message on LCD screen M117 Printing... G92 E0 G1 F1500 E-6.5

FEA in 3d printed solids I would like to get a pretty accurate method to do finite element analysis (FEA) on my 3d designs considering the infill. I use Autodesk Inventor to design parts but the FEA can only be applied to a solid body (100% infill). Does anyone know software that can convert a 3d design to another but considering the infill so I can use FEA more accurately?

Rhino will let you create a custom lattice structure inside the solid object, this can in turn be used to create infill using grasshopper (an inbuilt scripting tool): create a standard cell size and apply the lattice, convert the whole thing to solid, reimport into inventor

3D printing extruder not warming up I faced some problem with my 3D printer device. It seems the bed warms up without any problem, however, the hotend does not warm up! Could you please help me identify what the problem is?

I really hope the extruder doesn't warm up as this would be a problem with your stepper motor :) I'm sure you mean the hotend doesn't heat up. This could be a number of things but i would start to double check the pinout in your code vs the pins on your mainboard and measure if it gives 12v/24v (depending on your PSU) output. There's a lot more info required to properly help you. What board are you using? What OS are you using? Marlin or something else? Share the relevant code of the OS for the hotend config/pinout potentially share pictures of your wiring

Isn't using the Extrusion Multiplier like cheating? One thing I never understood is the so-called Extrusion Multiplier (EM) or Flow setting in slicers like Simplify3D (S3D) or CURA. The description for this setting reads... S3D: Multiplier for all extrusion movements (...) CURA: The amount of material extruded is multiplied by this value. (...) I always believed that this parameter is just an ugly way to fix an underlying miscalculation or misconfiguration, because using it feels like doing a calculation, getting the wrong result and "correcting" it afterwards by a multiplier - isn't that cheating? But, recently I thought a bit harder about this setting, now I am not sure anymore. One of the main reasons is, that S3D suggests different values for the EM, depending on the type of plastics used, 0.9 for PLA and 1.0 for ABS. This somehow implies that there is a physical property that justifies the EM, but I cannot think of one because 1 m feeded would lead to 1 m extruded - no matter what kind of platics used, right?

No, the Flow rate or Extrusion multiplier is to compensate for different materials and temperature ranges. Where does the factor come from? Let's say we calibrated our nozzle for work at 200°C with PLA, so 100 mm extrusion are correct and want to print ABS. ABS behaves differently and we get bad prints. What is wrong? Well, they do behave differently in the heat, and print at different temperatures. One easily noticeable difference between the two is the heat expansion coefficient. Now, I had to scrounge through research papers and Material/Technical Data Sheets for PLA, so take that one with a grain of salt. But we can clearly compare the various plastics heat expansion coefficients: PLA: $41 \frac{\text{µm}}{\text{m K}}$ a TDS ABS: $72 \to 108 \frac{\text{µm}}{\text{m K}}$ Polycarbonate: $65 \to 70 \frac{\text{µm}}{\text{m K}}$ Polyamides (Nylons): $80 \to 110 \frac{\text{µm}}{\text{m K}}$ Those are just three randomly picked plastics that clearly are printable. If we heat one meter of them by one Kelvin, they'd expand by that length (a couple micrometer). We heat the later three printing materials to about 200-240 K over the room temperature (~220-260 °C), so we'd expect these the materials to expand by the following ranges: PLA: 6.97 to 7.79 mm (1) ABS: 14.4 to 25.92 mm (2) Polycarbonate: 13 to 16.8 mm (2) Polyamides (Nylons): 16 to 26.4 mm (2) 1 - using 170 K and 190 K temperature difference for its normal print temperature range of ca 190 to 200 °C2 - first: low expansion at 200 K increase, then high expansion at 240 K You have calibrated your printer for one of these values somewhere in there. And now you get a different filament that has a different color and a different blend or even you swap from PLA to ABS or switch from one brand to another - the result is: you get a different heat expansion coefficient somewhere in that range and you have almost no chance to know it. The heat expansion coefficient, in the end, has an effect on the pressure in the nozzle and this the speed the material leaves the nozzle, which impacts die swell and so the overall printing behavior. Remember that heat expansion is not the only thing that is happening in the nozzle. Other big factors are for example the viscosity of the polymer at its printing temperature, its compressibility (which depends for example on chain length or embedded fillers), the geometry of the nozzle, the length of the melt zone... they all play a role in how exactly the print gets to come out. We can sum all those up under a general "behavior in the nozzle" tag, and as a result one gets vastly different flow/extrusion multipliers, like the 0.9 for PLA/1 for ABS in Simplify3D. Other Factors? There are also other factors that play a role. The distance between the extruder and the melt zone and how the filament behaves there are somewhat obvious: A ductile filament can bunch up some in a Bowden tube while in a direct drive there is much less space for that. The extruder can have an influence depending on the geometry of the drive gear and how much it bites into the filament. The depth of the deformation is again dependant on the hardness of the filament and the geometry of the teeth. Tollo has a great explanation how this has an effect on the need to alter the extrusion multiplier. gaining the factors Most of these are determined by trial and error using a factor of 1 and dialing up manually until proper printing is achieved on the machine, then putting that factor back into the software. As a side note: Ultimaker Cura has (in its filament database) the ability to save flow rates into each different filament, but does initialize all with 100 % default. TL;DR It is a way to adjust to the relative difference between the behavior of filaments (using one of your filaments as the calibration) and not cheating.

What does a stand alone "T" index value do? I'm using IdeaMaker for slicing my print objects. IdeaMaker start strings have a >T0< standing alone on one line and then >T1< on the next line. What does this accomplish?

T stands for "Tool" and has its origin in the origins of .gcode being for other automated machine controls. Depending on the machine, everything could be a tool for .gcode, like an actuator or pump or a spindle motor or a drill. In 3D printers, the T-controlled tool is usually the extruder motor. Convention has it that the indexing always starts at 0, so T0 and T1 are your first and second Extruder respectively. It is the way to choose which tool is used. As a side note: E is not originally intended for extruders but for the feed rate of lathes.

Self-lubricating 3D printable materials for space Materials used in space need to not outgas significantly An answer to this question: Would 3d-printed objects outgas in vacuum? referred to the NASA outgassing database which showed that ABS, PET, and PLA filaments are all fairly low outgassing and suitable for space application. What I'm wondering is whether there are any 3D-printable plastics that are both suitable for space and also self-lubricating. Nylon is the obvious printable self-lubricating material, but I believe that it outgasses too much (I don't think NASA has tested nylon filament, at least I can't find it in the database). My primary interest is in hobbyist-grade, FDM printers but if there are materials that can be commercially 3D printed, that is also of interest. Any ideas?

Well, I think this depends on your machine. If you can support extrusion temps north of 350C and bed temps ~150C, you could try PEI: https://www.3dxtech.com/ultem-9085-3d-printing-filament/ I believe PEI has self-lubricating properties, and has outgassing of ~0.40% TML (PET is ~0.43%). Of course, most off-the-shelf printers don't handle that sort of temp range. But then, industrial grade materials are likely to require industrial grade machines. :) You could compare other DBs to NASA's as well. Outgassing DB: http://esmat.esa.int/materialframe.html By the way, Nylon has an outgassing aspect >2.0% TML, which is definitely on the high side for vacuum applications.

Connector Suggestion for Extruder and Heatbed On my Reprap-like 3D printer, I routed all the wires to a spot near the base; for the motors, endstops, thermistors, etc, I plugged them all into a DB25 breakout board, and that's working great. For my Extruder (12v), and my heat bed (16v), I'm using a 4-pin molex connector -- like we used to use for old hard drives and such, and it's working, but it gets a bit hot, and my print bed is having trouble reaching temperatures that it didn't have trouble with before. -- None of the wiring gets hot at any other point, and none of the other connectors get hot. -- The only thing that gets hot is this one molex connector. I believe the heat is caused by passing too much current through that molex connector. -- I'm curious to know what other connectors might be better suited to this task. Can you recommend something that's worked well for you, or others? I prefer not to double or triple up this connector if it can be avoided, so that I can just have one physical connector to disconnect there, and so that I don't end up mixing them up. -- also, being able to easily disconnect it is important (it's hard to work on the reprap if I can't spin it around or turn it over, etc., that's why I'm using connectors for everything).

You might be able to use one of the connectors (Deans Ultra, EC3, XT-60/30, Bullet) that are normally used for RC models. They're made for very high currents. The XT60 connectors depicted below are rated for 60A continuous (well above what you'd need for any heated bed); their smaller XT30 cousins are good for 30A but less commonly available. (Photo by Mark Fickett) For your extruder you wouldn't need anything quite as drastic as an XT60, even a simple JST connector would suffice (though if you are going to source XT60/30's for your heated bed anyway, you might use them here as well). (Wikimedia Commons, Mike Mahoney)

Is there a way to make a watertight model? Is there a spray that may work? This is a specific model for a specific reason. It's shaped like a cylinder and has a recessed bottom. I'm using a Flashforge Adventurer 3 with Flashforge filament. I tried Sunlu silver/silk PLA+ but my Flashforge didn't like it, so I took the recommendation to use Flashforge filament. It worked just fine, but when I put water in it, it has leaks. I was printing at 210 with a plate temp at 50. Like I stated, I was excited except for the fact that it's not watertight. Since I'm new at this process, my first thought was there must be a food grade spray, or close to food grade, that could seal the model after I touch it up. Does anyone know if there is one available? Or are there settings that I need to address? Thanks in advance for any comments.

There are several ways to ensure water tightness: Thicker walls I have experienced that 3 walls and 5 tops/bottoms with an outer shell of Concentric while the core is lines become watertight enough that leakage is almost none. Lacquer The oldest known method to seal a piece of porous material is a lacquer, followed by glaze. Glazes require to be burned at some thousand degrees, so are out, but lacquers are simple and easy. Basic clear acrylic lacquer can be used to seep into all the cracks and crannies and then harden out. It's easy to apply and cheap from home depot. Polyurethane lacquers also work. If you look to use it for food, ask if the lacquer is food rated in home depot.

Ultimaker Cura infill issues (weird vertical pillars due to underextrusion) I have spent ages debugging this problem but I can't figure out what I am doing wrong. I have a Wanhao duplicator i3 (Prusa i3 clone) and until recently I used Wanhao's adapted version of the Cura slicer. But it's quite an old Cura version and I wanted to make use of the improved supports in the new Cura. Unfortunately it seems like I just can't get the infill in the newest Cura to work. I copied all the settings from my Wanhao branded Cura version and printed the same file. This is the result: The infill is shaped like many tiny pillars. They are super fragile and while they do support material to be printed on top, they hardly withstand any pressure. I have gone through quite a few testing cubes each with some setting altered, but nothing seemed to help. It can't be the printers fault as I have successfully printed test cubes sliced with the old Cura in between (and not only once). Increasing temperature or slowing down the infill didn't help either. Neither did increasing flow rate or switching to triangular infill pattern. Also I have tried printing with all speeds set to 50mm/s and it still failed. My standard settings (from which I have created many test cubes with each cube having some settings tweaked): Layer Height: 0.12 mm Init. Layer Height: 0.10 mm Wall Line Count: 2 Top Layers: 6 Bottom Layers: 4 Infill Line distance: 5 mm (used to be 20 % in old Cura, but this is very dense in the new Cura) Infill Pattern: Lines Infill Overlap Percentage: 20 % Printing Temperature: 200 °C Build Plate Temperature: 60 °C Retraction: Enabled, Distance: 2 mm, Speed: 60 mm/s Speeds: Print:60 mm/s, Infill: 60 mm/s, Outer Wall: 30 mm/s, Inner Wall: 60 mm/s, Top/Bottom: 40 mm/s, Travel: 100 mm/s, Initial Layer: 20 mm/s Combing Mode: All

This problem is most commonly caused by infill speeds which are too high. Instead of printing lines, the filament is caught on one of the lines of the previous layer, leaves a blob there and only restarts extrusion when it hits the next line. Instead of extruding continuously the filament comes out in blobs at the locations where there's filament on the previous layer. You can have good infill up to some layer and suddenly start getting this problem as of some layer. When the problem occurs the next layer is more likely to show the problem. It's snowballing.

How do filament properties change after printing? (In relation to water absorbtion) I have PLA and PETG filament. I hear that 3D filament absorbs water and causes problems when printing but after printing they can be used with water and they are water proof. So my question is why is it different after printing/what has changed to make it now waterproof? Is PETG waterproof or does it absorb water? Is there a limit on how much water PETG can absorb or will it keep going until it splits and turns to mush?

Filament that absorbs water prior to printing is subject to boiling temperatures as it passes through the heater block. In extreme cases, steam will be visible and a spitting sound will be heard. The filament will expand as the water exits, causing multiple structural and printing problems. Once printed, dry filament may absorb water from the atmosphere, but is unlikely to be subject to boiling temperatures. Waterproofing as a general consideration usually means the ability to keep water out, which is possible if the model is sealed and some printing conditions will adhere each layer well enough to the previous one to provide floating-type waterproofing. PETG is hydroscopic, which means it will absorb moisture from the air. When printed properly (layer adhesion), the model can be waterproof. These terms are independent and should not be used interchangeably.

Replicator 2x getting too hot with silent stepper drivers I equipped my Makerbot Replicator 2x with silent stepper drivers TMC2100. According to the product page I reduced Vref from 127 (factory default) to 25 in the printer settings as well as in my start G-code. With this I get horrible layer shifting (a few millimeters!), even if I reduce print- and travel-acceleration to 300. The layer shifting is mostly happening on the Y-axis, but also on X-axis. Not only layer shifting was happening, also the extruder-motors lost many steps. To fight this problem I increased the Vref little by little. At around 70 for X and Y axis (and 50 for extruders) all layer shift- and extrusion problems were gone. Also I had to install a dedicated fan for the stepper drivers, because they got very hot. I was happy with this solution for about 10 minutes, then I noticed that the stepper motors are getting so hot I burned my fingertips by touching them. My guess for the motor temperature would be 80~90 °C. So my question is: Are those TMC2100 stepper driver unsuitable for my usecase somehow or am I missing something? Is there a way to get the 3D printer silent while not overheating? On behalf of advice in the comments, I mounted some heat sinks and measured the temperature via an IR-thermometer. With the old original stepper drivers I get 60 °C for the Y-axis and 66 °C for the X-axis. With TMC2100 it is 86 °C for both. (Each temperature measured at the heatsink)

Most Stepper drivers will have lots of energy passing through them so it is crucial to having a moderately sized heatsink to cool them off otherwise they will get too hot. Most stepper drivers found online come with heatsinks but you could search online for mini heatsinks.

Alunar m508 Firmware I have a Alunar M508 machine that I am trying to get new firmware on. The firmware that was loaded on the machine wasn't very good. The x axis was mirrored and the home point was way off. I was looking into Marlin to put on the machine, but don't have any experience on what to edit in the code to make it work for this machine. Does anyone have any experience with this machine? Uploading new firmware that works or editing the code to make it work for this machine. I appreciate any help! Here is a link to the firmware I am currently using. I'm on MacOS Sierra 10.12.5 using the 1.6.8 Arduino IDE.

The Alunar firmware you linked is a fork from the main Marlin firmware. If the bed Y direction is reversed, usually the stepper is incorrectly placed (mirrored) this is seen frequently for the Anet A8 printer which is very similar to your printer. In your case the X direction is wrong, this is usually related to the wiring of the stepper, reversing the connector by 180 degrees should do the trick (hardware solution). As a software solution, changing direction is not difficult in Marlin based firmware; you just want to invert the stepper direction; the following section in the configuration.h file does that for you: // Invert the stepper direction. Change (or reverse the motor connector) if an axis goes the wrong way. #define INVERT_X_DIR false #define INVERT_Y_DIR false #define INVERT_Z_DIR true Just change INVERT_X_DIR to true. If your home position is still not working for you, you should look into this section of the same configuration file: // Travel limits (mm) after homing, corresponding to endstop positions. #define X_MIN_POS -33 #define Y_MIN_POS -10 #define Z_MIN_POS 0 #define X_MAX_POS X_BED_SIZE #define Y_MAX_POS Y_BED_SIZE #define Z_MAX_POS 240 Change the MIN_POS positions as such that it starts at the corner of the bed. A more in depth bed center calibration tutorial can be found here. P.S. Please do not print anti-wobble caps for the Z-axis rods (as mentioned in another answer), these are not reducing the wobble, in fact they cause problems. What happens if you constrain the top is that you get a statically indeterminate construction; forces and displacements are not predictable! Better solutions to eliminate Z-wobble are lifting devices that decouple X/Y movement from the threaded rod (eccentricity of the threaded rod) from the Z movement. Also fixate the threaded rod above the springy stepper-to-threaded-rod coupler.

Is E-axis steps/mm resolution limiting factor in print quality? I've been noticing in some of my linear advance test towers that the (very minor/fine) ripple pattern in walls varies with the K factor, which made me think that it isn't coming from any vibration in the print head motion, but rather from quantization of the extruder into discrete steps (i.e. wall gets slightly thicker right after a step, thins out afterwards until the next step, repeats). By my math, with 1.75 mm filament and 93 steps per mm on my printer (Ender 3), each step is 0.02585 mm³ of material. At 0.4 mm line width and 0.2 mm layer height, there's 0.08 mm³ of material per linear mm, so that should give roughly 3 extruder steps per linear mm. That seems comparable to the ripple rate I see, although not exact; I suppose it varies somewhat because of linear advance and perhaps other reasons. Anyway, to get to the question, am I missing something or is this the limiting factor in print resolution on my printer? It seems like isolated small details (smaller than 1/3 mm) won't be extrudable at all except as ooze, or over-extruded if they happen to cross a step threshold, and like things would be far worse if I tried to use a smaller nozzle and thinner layers. It seems that, ideally, you'd want the E-axis steps per mm to be sufficiently high that quantization is a non-issue (i.e. +-1 step is small relative error) for extrusions corresponding to a single X- or Y-axis microstep.

Your calculations about the theoretical extruder resolution are spot on. I did a similar calculation to evaluate which extruder to use with different hot ends, I paste the results. The dark cells are the input cells, the rest is calculated. You can see that for some lines I entered directly the mm/microstep value, since I wanted not a theoretical but practical result for my printer (3 mm filament) or for known extruders (BMG). Concerning the question, the resolution of the extruder matters, but it's a bit complicated to estimate exactly how much. In general, this are the factors I can think about. A poor resolution may not impact straight lines much, since the rotation of the extruder is continuous and the extruder is unlikely to snap exactly to the desired microstep position as soon as you ask for it: it's likely a bit behind all the time, that's how torque is obtained (more or less). The issue may become smaller with drivers which interpolate microsteps up to 256x. However, whenever there is a change of flow rate, poor resolution implies that you cannot control the exact location/moment where/when the flow changes. This matters mostly at the end and at the beginning or retractions/re-retractions. Maybe you get more ooze? However, the extruder resolution is not, in practice, as good as you calculated. In fact, as we know, microsteps reduce the incremental torque to very low values. The extruder is a motor which requires quite a lot of torque, since pushing the filament is quite hard, and it is unlikely that you can achieve all the time the 16x microstep accuracy you assumed. For example, due to friction in Bowden, hot end, ... the filament (= the motor shaft) may at a certain point stay "back" more than average. This would cause an increase of effective torque, pushing the filament a bit faster, which would it bring to in sync or so with the desired position, but at that point it would slow down, and so on. Depending on the average speed, this oscillation may be dampened (and then no rippling is visible) or may oscillate constantly, and you see ripples also along straight lines. This is why I placed the usteps column in my calculations: it is meant to calculate a more realistic resolution assuming that no accurate microstepping is achieved. I assumed higher achievable microsteps the lower the load on the motor is (this means gears, or thinner filament). Having a high resolution to begin with clearly helps to reduce this issue. You can try to increase the current to the max your drivers and motor and cooling allow, and see if the ripples change. I think it will be reduced. You may also try to build the Orbiter extruder (linked also in the table) and see how it goes.

What is the strongest filament to use? I'm looking for a strong filament that can handle a large tension load and no bending deformation when a perpendicular force is applied to it. Any suggestions?

Carbon or glass fiber reinforced PLA likely has the strongest without deformation. PLA will snap before deforming. Fiber reinforced ABS is also an option. ABS is stronger but will bend before breaking. Both are hard on nozzles and may require a stainless steel nozzle.

Ender 2 LCD replacement My Ender 2 LCD is suddenly not lighting up. Is it possible to replace it with an Ender 3 LCD?

Not easily. Some folks have been messing with both 2 and 3 LCDs and based on their posts, the pinout is different between the two. Ender 2 display pinout from when one GuzLightyear figured it out for Marlin (MKS MINI 12864 LCD): ----- 5V | · · | GND MOSI | · · | LCD_RS LCD_A0 | · · || BTN_EN2 RESET | · · | BTN_EN1 BTN_ENC | · · | SCK ----- From a user called arnd13, the Ender 3 equivalent would be: ----- 5V | · · | GND MOSI | · · | LCD_A0 SCK | · · || BTN_EN2 CS | · · | BTN_EN1 BTN_ENC | · · | Buzzer ----- Maybe you have some luck in debugging your screen (sometimes with these LCD screens, a contrast adjustment resolves the issue).