Layer Settings

I'm calibrating my Prusa Mendel (RAMPS hardware, Marlin firmware and Pronterface).

I printed the 20mm box to get the X & Y settings correct, however the print quality wasn't too good.

I therefore reduced the layer size from 0.4 to 0.2 and printed again. This time the box was approximately 30% taller and seemed to be "bulging" ... as if there was too much filament being used.

If I change the layer size do I also need to adjust any other settings?

Thanks.

James.

Printing a box to get your calibrations will only work for the X, Y, and Z. Your Extruder also needs to be calibrated. So that you get the correct volume of plastic.

It sounds like you're extruding too much plastic to get the "bulging".

Even with the extruder not calibrated properly, you will not be getting a part 30% taller. A taller part means the Z axis needs to be calibrated.

Using the prints as a calibrating tool is for fine tuning (secondary). Use a caliper to measure how far your printer moves from a given point first.

Thanks KingRahl - I had previously calibrated the Z-axis and printed the 50mm tower with the correct height. What is confusing me is how changing the layer size from 0.4 to 0.2 could throw all these other parameters out. Why should changing layer size impact other settings?

Thanks.

James.

Changing the layer height should not effect the height of the object. I would recalibrate you extruder. The bulging is normally caused by over extrution.

I had a similar issue recently. I was using pronterface and slicer. When I would go to slicer through printerface and change the settings it wasn't actually changing anything.

I ended up opening slicer up, changing my settings such as layer height and loading the stl file and making the gcode. I then exported it and loaded that Gcode file into pronterface and it worked.

Now I'm using cura and it's working much better for me and I'm not having these issues anymore.

Good luck!