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Unresolved Doesn't print whats showing on screen

Discussion in 'Troubleshooting' started by Terry Dowis, Apr 4, 2015.

  1. Terry Dowis

    Terry Dowis New Member

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    Hello, I'm very new to this 3d printing, matter of fact, I'm new to the 3 d modeling software. So we did the drawing attached, and when we print it, for some reason it fills in at the base of the 45 angle and it also cuts a little of the top off. Robo support told me to adjust my z axis, and i did their recommendations with no change at all. We've designed it in Rhino 3d and in sketchup to the same result. any. When i have it show the layers, it shows it exactly how it prints, but not in the print preview.. any ideas? Im pulling my hair out on this one, we've redrawn it several times, uninstalled and reinstalled matter control, tried it with a different machine... any ideas? pill thingy.jpg mattercontrol.jpg
     
  2. Bulldog3D

    Bulldog3D New Member

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    By any chance do you have rafts on your print settings?
     
  3. mark tomlinson

    mark tomlinson ༼ つ ◕_ ◕ ༽つ
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  4. Bulldog3D

    Bulldog3D New Member

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    So your slicer shows you that it is filling in the center there? How is that possible without support material? Can you show us a picture of the bottom of that actual print? I'd like to see what those middle horizontal layers are sitting on.
     
  5. Terry Dowis

    Terry Dowis New Member

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    I don't remember seeing "rafts" anywhere in the print settings...
     
  6. Printed Solid

    Printed Solid Volunteer Admin
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    It looks like your model has some non manifold features. Can you post the STL file so I can explain to you what exactly the problem is and how to fix it?
     
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  7. Terry Dowis

    Terry Dowis New Member

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    There is nothing to support for the fill, it just starts filling across, it sags at first, then eventually builds up.. IMG_20150404_125000.jpg
     
  8. Terry Dowis

    Terry Dowis New Member

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    is there a repair utility in matter control? or do we need to download that netfabb?
     
  9. Terry Dowis

    Terry Dowis New Member

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  10. Bulldog3D

    Bulldog3D New Member

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    It's definitely your STL.

    For what it's worth, rafts are used to get your piece to bond better to the print bed, thus minimizing warp. Do a quick search for a pic and explanation. They are especially useful for thin, tall parts.

    The setting can be found about halfway down the list in your MatterControl software. It's just a little box that you check marked "use rafts" IIRC.
     
  11. mark tomlinson

    mark tomlinson ༼ つ ◕_ ◕ ༽つ
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    No. MatterControl (IMHO) is software worth every dime you paid for it. Ok, maybe not quite that much.

    However, netfabb basic is a free download and includes a number of repairs it can do for you.
     
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  12. Terry Dowis

    Terry Dowis New Member

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    I don't have a use rafts, I have a create raft?
     
  13. mark tomlinson

    mark tomlinson ༼ つ ◕_ ◕ ༽つ
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    Same difference I would imagine (not an MC user so a guess).
    Raft is added by the slicer so that makes sense.
     
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  14. Bulldog3D

    Bulldog3D New Member

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    Ok, that. Same difference :)
     
  15. Printed Solid

    Printed Solid Volunteer Admin
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    Right, the model is the problem. There is no repair utility that will be able to fix that due to a number of problems and potential solutions. The repair tools won't know how to repair.
    Best way to fix it is in the native modeling tool.

    First / biggest problem is that those two upright cylinders are just single wall shells. You always need an inside and an outside surface. The inside surface needs to be fully enclosed (manifold).

    Second is that geometry has to have some thickness. So, if you just model a second shell on the inside without enough thickness, you're going to get weird things happening. For a stock Robo running mattercontrol's available slicers, that minimum thickness should be about 0.8mm and ideally should be multiples of 0.4mm.

    Third issue is that you have features within features and overlapping walls. Look at the cross section of the bottom of the part here where you have the two tubes crossing and overlapping the open cylinders. All of those features are overlapping. This does two things. First you have walls in two places at the same time, so the slicer doesn't know what to print. Second, you have multiple unintentional transitions from inside to outside surfaces. All of these things just confuse the slicer and give you unexpected results (as you've discovered).
    upload_2015-4-4_15-18-15.png

    In addition to what Mark has posted, I'd suggest broswing around the shapeways tutorial section: https://www.shapeways.com/tutorials/review-and-prep

    All of the same rules apply to sending parts to a bureau like shapeways, so I'd expect that they've really spent some time preparing decent tutorials that can help you out a lot.
     
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  16. Terry Dowis

    Terry Dowis New Member

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    So Basically, its the way we designed the part in rhino and sketchup. what is the best 3 d software to design with? We're new enough to this to start from scratch again...
     
  17. Printed Solid

    Printed Solid Volunteer Admin
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    Those are fine programs. You just need to take the time to learn the requirements for designing 3D Printable parts. Same thing will be true for any program. I think both programs offer plug ins that can help you with this and there are definitely tutorials online if you search around.

    CAD programs are like shoes. They're all fine. The 'best one' is the one that works best for you based on your past experiences.

    Personally, I was taught solidworks in school and used ProEngineer (now Creo I think?) in my early career, so programs that have that type of interface are most intuitive to me now. FWIW, that type of program does generate solid geometry so they tend to output pretty good printable STL files most of the time. On the other hand, both of these programs would be near worthless if I were to try doing more artistic design or character modeling.
     
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  18. Terry Dowis

    Terry Dowis New Member

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    Thank you, we're trying it again sketch up, didn't realize there was a 3d printing template, so we switched to that and are trying it again. Thanks so much for your help, I'll let you know how it comes out...
     
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  19. Bulldog3D

    Bulldog3D New Member

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    I too was trained in Solidworks, so that's what I use. But I think lots of folks without access to $XXXX software use Google Sketchup or something. Just remember to build your part step by step, making sure you don't have any steps (like extrusion and sketches) overlapping. More complicated programs will yield "rebuild errors" and isolate the problem for you, but there might be some shareware that does, too. If so, use that and donate to the programmers! They would deserve it.
     
  20. mark tomlinson

    mark tomlinson ༼ つ ◕_ ◕ ༽つ
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    For mechanical stuff it rocks (and we use it as well). It is less perfect for artistic things.
     

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