Slic3r generating support in midair

The attached STL won't generate properly in Slic3r v0.9.10b. The recessed area is 3mm deep, and has support generated, but the support doesn't extend all the way to the print bed. The support doest start to print until Z=2.0, where it attempts to print in mid-air.

I would attach the generated gcode, but it exceeds the size the forums will permit me to attach.

Thanks,
Dave

It seemed to slice OK in 0.99 and looking at it in Repetier the support is grounded ok

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Waitaki 3D Printer

I'm having same problems. I am printing a "plate" and embedded into the bottom is a 6201 bearing. On the top is a special feature for a part to fit in. On the first two of the three kinds of plates, it would string but I could cut out enough of the strings to make the plate serviceable. On this 3rd plate, the area above the bearing doesn't have enough thickness for the print to complete properly.

But it's not just on this print... I notice that slic3r rarely brings support fully to the platform. Curiously, my Airwolf3d printer and their default slic3r settings can make lack of support work if there is enough Z axis to recover from it. I have gone through quite a few failures and am about to just print it solid and use my milling machine to carefully bore out the hole for the bearing. This is really bad.

Win 7 x64, SLic3r c 0.9.10b

have you tried reverting back to 0.99?

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Waitaki 3D Printer

I often make my own support in my 3D software. I find leaving a gap at the top of the support the size of your layer height so it skips one layer will allow full support yet remove very easy. I use a very thin wall about the same as the nozzle width and shaped the same as the as the part, so in your photo I would use concentric circles maybe 4 or 5 of them.

This only works easily if the support can be simple like yours. Something like a skull with lots of varying height overhangs would be near impossible so I just trust Slic3r and play with settings until I get something that works.

@waitaki this is the only version I have used. And given how well it works otherwise (and this is what Airwolf3D recommends), I haven't looked at using a different version of Slic3r. The main point of my reply is to help the software authors see this is a real problem and perhaps effort can go into fixing it.

@tmorris9 Yes, adding my own support in the CAD file was what I did and it worked; allowing me to finally get a successful and working part. Though my implementation was far more clumsy than yours! I just did a big disk. Though hard to know if a solid disc with 40% fill is more or less material than x number of concentric cylinder walls....?

I am going to research using Kisslicer ... and maybe Skeinforge. My problem with Kisslicer is coming up with baseline values to start with. I was so impressed with their software when I was still banging my head on the Rapman that I bought their software to support them.