Show all posts by user
General discussions. For specific printers / electronics / fabrication methods / softwares, please see other sections.
Re: Printing problems - 13 years ago
Is that PLA you're printing with? If so, do you have a fan cooling both the in-progress print and also your hot end barrel?by Pointedstick - General
Re: first print looks like the blob - 13 years ago
Could you maybe post a picture of the problem?by Pointedstick - General
Re: Problem with print. Every x cm's of filament I getting too thin lines. What's wrong ? - 13 years ago
mike1986 Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > I found out that everything is moving but no > filament is extruding and stays in same spot for x > seconds (sometimes it will jump on bolt, I can't > also move it by hand..) Sounds like the hot end isn't hot enough to me. If your extruder idler tension is high and the hobbed bolt is doing its part to feed theby Pointedstick - General
Re: first print looks like the blob - 13 years ago
What material are you printing with? Is your hot end tube cooled with a fan? Does it look like too much material was coming out of the nozzle, or that the mechanical positioning of the head was wrong?by Pointedstick - General
Re: LM8UU VS IGUS - 13 years ago
The Igus bushings that are the same size and shape as linear bearings are said to be quote good (never used them myself), but they are extremely expensive. In the past, I have both used and sold the much cheaper (< $1 apiece) press-fit Igus bushings with great success, but you need to choose the right ones; some do not last for very long. The ones I used in the past tended to wear out after abby Pointedstick - General
Re: Frozen Prusa Mid-print - 13 years ago
Karmavore Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > When I switched from a 6ft USB cable with a > ferrite choke to a 3ft USB cable with a ferrite > choke, the problem completely disappeared. I can > now shred 2D and print 3D simultaneously. > #lifehacking Ahh but can you shred your failed 3D prints?by Pointedstick - General
Re: Frozen Prusa Mid-print - 13 years ago
I've had this happen before. Low-quality power supplies can be very sensitive to voltage spikes; cheapo PC PSUs in particular will often sputter enough to kill your print if you run a vacuum or microwave or something on the same circuit without. Paper shredders, too. Don't ask how I know that one... You can tell it's deeper than a firmware issue since all modern firmwares will shut off the hotby Pointedstick - General
Re: No motor movement troubleshooting - 13 years ago
This may be a dumb question... but are you able to connect to the board with Pronterface or another piece of host software? If so, can you verify that the board is actually getting power, not just USB signal? i.e. can you heat up the hot end and/or bed? My guess is that you can connect to the board via USB but it isn't getting power for some reason.by Pointedstick - General
Re: Proper G-code viewer - 13 years ago
Yeah, the preview looks like it correctly presages issues with the actual print. For such a shallow dome, I recommend reducing your layer height, and increasing the number of perimeters and top tolid layers. It's true that your slicer could be smarter about this, and many moons ago, I made a feature request for this, in fact: But you can easily fix the problem manually.by Pointedstick - General
Re: mendelmax calibration - 13 years ago
Looks like there's too much heat on those small layers, so the previous layer isn't fully solid by the time the next one is laid down, causing everything to turn into a blobular mess. You need a small fan blowing on the in-progress print to vacate that excess hear and cool the just-laid-down layer. Another way to improve things a bit is to set your slicer up with a minimum time per layer--say, 10by Pointedstick - General
Re: Aluminium rods - 13 years ago
thejollygrimreaper Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > Aluminium rods are going to be too soft, and won't > last very long against lm8uu bearings, > > you can use stainless steel rod which is pretty > cheap and seems to work well, however the hardened > balls in the lm8uu will make little grooves in > that over time, Heck, they'll do that onby Pointedstick - General
Re: Smaller dia all thread for Z axis - 13 years ago
Yes, that can help--but only if you don't constrain the ends of your Z-screws. There are a ton of things that can cause Z-artifacts and wobbling in addition to that, though; I'd suggest checking out the section on that subject in the first issue of the RepRap magazine:by Pointedstick - General
Re: Require a lot more heat for the same print...need some help - 13 years ago
Ohmarinus Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > I don't recommend putting up the heat as high as > possible. A lot of nasty stuff can happen, this is > the worst comment! How can you say that. It probably depends on the quality of your hot end. If you have some janky thrown-together thing that melts at 230ยบ, then yeah, you want to be more careful. With most hoby Pointedstick - General
Re: Require a lot more heat for the same print...need some help - 13 years ago
Sounds like there may be some plastic jammed up above the melt zone of your hot end, and the higher-than-normal heat is necessary to push past it. I'd turn up the heat really high--like as high as your hot end can handle--and run a couple cm of filament through it to hopefully get all the gummed up PLA burned out. Also check the teeth of your hobbed bolt. It's possible that those have become jamby Pointedstick - General
Re: FYI - 13 years ago
You can also use it as an opportunity to work on your filament swapping skills! When I've had that happen, I cut off the filament, untangle it, pause the machine, quickly replace the old filament stub with a new untangled length, and keep going until it tangles again. Eventually I could do it in about 10 seconds.by Pointedstick - General
Re: Leadscrew-ify Mendel/RepRap - 13 years ago
IMHO, leadscrew-driven X and Y axes aren't worth it unless every other component of your bot is already better and it's the X-Y motion that's holding you back. The weakest link in the chain is usually elsewhere. If you upgrade to screw-driven X and Y axes with high-quality 4-start ballscrews, and accordingly use to huge beefy NEMA 23 motors to drive them, you will indeed have fast, accurate X-Y mby Pointedstick - General
Re: Nozzle size ? - 13 years ago
Just to provide a bit of an update on my previous advice, I've successfully printed at 0.07mm mayer height with a 0.5mm nozzle, so it can be done and still look beautiful. I'll get a picture up tonight of a Star Destroyer printed at that layer height with a 0.5mm nozzle. IMHO the advantages in print quality offered by a < 0.5mm nozzle are smoother top surface finish and smaller potential featby Pointedstick - Reprappers
Re: Open an STL file to make changes to the part - 13 years ago
Meshlab can do it. Great little program.by Pointedstick - Reprappers
Re: ABS or PLA & Acetone Smoothing? - 13 years ago
Polygonhell Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > Generally if it's sticking too much, I'd try > printing the first layer 0.05mm higher. That's the ticket. I'd really recommend a glass-covered heated bed though. Makes printing in PLA soooooooo much nicer. The parts stick well when the glass is hot and then pop right off after it cools down. I printed PLA on aby Pointedstick - General
Re: glob after travel ? - 13 years ago
That's caused by two things: insufficient retraction, and slow travel moves. Your problem appears to be retraction. -0.5mm is actually not retracting at all, it's pushing 0.5mm of filament out! You want that number to be positive. I have mine set to 1.2, but it's pretty machine-specific, so you might have to experiment a bit. After you do that, if the problem persists, try speeding up your traveby Pointedstick - General
Re: Fine Calibration - 13 years ago
There are a bunch of designs for Prusa-2-compatible braces: I don't have any Prusas so I haven't used any of them and I can't recommend a specific one, I'm afraid. As for your stepper drivers, I'd say turn them up until the motors start to get warm-ish, and actively cool them with a fan (the steppers, not the motors). If your motor mounts are ABS, you can turn them up even higher until the motby Pointedstick - General
Re: Type of material for computer cases? - 13 years ago
xclusive585 Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > Was I misled that AOI is a popular program for 3d > solid design? Even though it's not a Cad program, > it has many many plugins that perform CAD > functions... There are a zillion programs than can make 3D models; really anything will do. If you like AOI, then by all means, use it! But if you're looking foby Pointedstick - General
Re: Fine Calibration - 13 years ago
There's a lot that goes into consistently producing great quality parts, but in my experience, 90% of moving to the next level is having well-aligned layers. There are a lot of things that need to be done to nail this down. First of all, you need a rigid frame that doesn't move at all when the parts that are supposed to move do so. That means a MendelMax, Mendel90, Prusa i3, or something else thby Pointedstick - General
Re: Why does my X/Y axis occasionally loose there positions ? - 13 years ago
There's a bit of an art to this. If your pots are set low and you're trying to drive the printer fast in software, the motors will skip steps trying to reach that speed, in which case you can turn up the pots, or turn down the speed. But if you turn the voltage up too high, the drivers may overheat and briefly shut off, resulting in the same thing--skipped steps. Also, higher voltages will make tby Pointedstick - General
Re: noob question - 13 years ago
The lines become more visible the taller the height of the individual layers. 0.3mm layers means 3.3 per mm, which will be quite visible. 0.1mm layer height is 10 per mm, which is much smoother. 0.075mm or 0.05mm layer heights are smoother still, and on a well-calibrated machine, will look very, very good. That brings me to my next point, which is the importance of sound mechanics. At the low layby Pointedstick - General
Re: Layer displacements issues - 13 years ago
Given that it wasn't the acceleration, here are some remaining possibilities: 1. Too much friction on the X-axis (caused by a heavy carriage, or mis-aligned bearings/bushings, or a bad combination of rods and bushings/bearings) 2. Travel speed set too high (because carriage is too heavy or friction is too high) 3. Pololu is set too high without a fan cooling it (causing it to briefly shut down beby Pointedstick - Printing
Re: Quality of MendelMax vs Ultimaker - 13 years ago
The second supposed MendelMax print (of the silver figure) is actually mine! It was, as was stated earlier, done on a Prusa. My MendelMaxes produce prints that are an order of magnitude better. This chess piece, for example, was done at 50 microns: This Admiral Akbar bust was done at 150 microns in the interests of time (It's 15cm tall): Those prints were all done on an older Mendelby Pointedstick - General
Re: Non heated bed question - 13 years ago
Didn't try that. Not a bad idea, though.by Pointedstick - Developers
Re: Non heated bed question - 13 years ago
I have had very, very good results printing PLA at 210c straight onto heavily scratched-up acrylic. You basically go over the surface with sandpaper for a few minutes to get the surface finish all cloudy and scratchy. At that high temperature, I get NO warping and 100% surface adhesion. Getting the prints off is harder than with a heated bed though; you need to use a paint scraper and a mallet. Tby Pointedstick - Developers