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It's the time of the season for...Humidity and print problems?

Posted by Chowderhead 
It's the time of the season for...Humidity and print problems?
June 20, 2012 02:41PM
I've gone from making stellar prints to total $#it over the past month. I can't keep filament going through the extruder to save my life. The ONLY thing that has changed is the season - it's now very humid while not being terribly much warmer.

Has anyone similar experience? If so, suggested remedies?
Re: It's the time of the season for...Humidity and print problems?
June 20, 2012 06:28PM
I have had similar problems with weather causing the prints to lift on the corners due to the lower temps here ( Australia ) at this time of the year.

The problem is the cooler air moving past the edges of the print as the bed moves in the y axis direction. I have fixed this on some prints by rotating the print in sli3er to have the wider side of the print along the y axis and some prints work better at 45 degrees.

Some have mentioned a heated box of sorts. This should keep the cold air from the corners of the prints and also fix your humidity problem. Maybe add a fan to circulate the air.
Re: It's the time of the season for...Humidity and print problems?
June 21, 2012 04:01AM
Is the humidity causing problems with your print while it's printing?
Or is it causing problems for the filiment itself?


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Re: It's the time of the season for...Humidity and print problems?
June 21, 2012 08:11AM
It's related to filament, I think. The Wade's extruder is tearing up the filament more readily and extrusion just stops mid-print. I've played with idler tension, tried two different style hobbed bolts (the aggressive hyena-like version and the more typical hobbed style - it's worse with the hyena-style), messed with slicing settings (slowed printing, varied hotend T).

It seems to happen more frequently with PLA than ABS.

Same printer, same filaments but very different results from what I had 6-8 weeks ago. I don't have A/C and the relative humidity (and subsequently mosquito/black fly hatch - another issue altogether) has been grotesque the past couple weeks.
Re: It's the time of the season for...Humidity and print problems?
June 21, 2012 09:15AM
It could be humidity making the filament softer but the usual problem is bubbles in the extruded filament giving the object a poor finish and lots of ooze.

It could also be that your hot end has degraded in some way. All hot end faults lead to the filament stripping. Have you tried pushing the filament by hand to see if the force required is reasonable?

It could be a partial blockage or a PTFE liner giving up (if you use one). I have had lots of hot ends work for a while and then stop without any change in humidity. I have just stripped one down now and it isn't obvious why it stopped even when it is in pieces.


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