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Solved First few layers not printing correctly

Discussion in 'Troubleshooting' started by Greg Howard, Dec 7, 2016.

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  1. Greg Howard

    Greg Howard Member

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    After some significant troubleshooting attempting to get PLA to stick to the bed, I have this issue. The first several layers are not printing straight, they are forming a curved edge. The first layer looks like it should be right, but next layers are not.
    Does anyone know what causes this? see image
     

    Attached Files:

    #1 Greg Howard, Dec 7, 2016
  2. Greg Howard

    Greg Howard Member

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    It looks like its pretty consistent in tapering the first 3 mm. Like a Fillet corner. I cant find anything that would be 3mm in the MC settings.
     
    #2 Greg Howard, Dec 8, 2016
  3. mark tomlinson

    mark tomlinson ༼ つ ◕_ ◕ ༽つ
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    It sort-of looks like a lose drive part (for example the belt or a drive motor cog for the belt).

    The only reason I hesitate to blame that exclusively is the fact that you say it only happens on the lower layers. Those issues will generally demonstrate the problem at any layer.

    You can try slowing the overall print speed down dramatically and if the problem improves then it must be drive-train related.
     
    #3 mark tomlinson, Dec 8, 2016
  4. Greg Howard

    Greg Howard Member

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    It only happens in the first 3.14mm of the print. The first layer is to dimension, the 2nd on up to roughly 3mm is the tapering. 2016-12-08 16.05.26.jpg
     
    #4 Greg Howard, Dec 8, 2016
  5. mark tomlinson

    mark tomlinson ༼ つ ◕_ ◕ ༽つ
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    Have you tried another slicer?
     
    #5 mark tomlinson, Dec 8, 2016
  6. Greg Howard

    Greg Howard Member

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    Not yet, I was using the MC slicer. Are others better? This is an image of the second layer. It looks like crap, as if the extruder is pulsing the material out. This is not the case for the first layer.

    2016-12-08 16.54.49.jpg
     
    #6 Greg Howard, Dec 8, 2016
  7. mark tomlinson

    mark tomlinson ༼ つ ◕_ ◕ ༽つ
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    That looks like the filament was dropped. not pressed down.

    I'd certainly try another program first (repetier host or Cura)
     
    #7 mark tomlinson, Dec 8, 2016
  8. Greg Howard

    Greg Howard Member

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    How do you get it to press down on the 2nd layer?
     
    #8 Greg Howard, Dec 8, 2016
  9. Greg Howard

    Greg Howard Member

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    I tried Cura with similar results. Any idea why the 2nd layer is not dropping down or smushed?
     
    #9 Greg Howard, Dec 8, 2016
  10. mark tomlinson

    mark tomlinson ༼ つ ◕_ ◕ ༽つ
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    Well, when you get right down to it there are only 3 possibilities for any 3D printing problem with the Robo:

    1. Your model is bad (such that any slicer will generate funky GCode)
    2. Something is mechanically wrong
    3. Something is electrically wrong
    I presume you already ran the model through netfabb or azure to check for modelling errors (https://azure.netfabb.com/)
    Normally mechanical problems are things like something blocking the travel of the bed or the carriage in X or Y, but anything that mechanically interrupts the print drive on any axis would count. Those are usually very repeatable since they will always happen in the same spots. Electrical problems are the beast since they can be the most sporadic. Things like a stepper driver card getting flaky can make for a long day of digging to find it. On the bright(?) side your symptoms don't really look electrical. They are too consistent. I would (from the visual evidence only) suspect the model or mechanical.

    If you wonder how #1 can be read here: https://www.simplify3d.com/support/articles/identifying-and-repairing-common-mesh-errors/
    It is surprisingly easy to generate a 3D model that visually looks correct and yet, is unprintable.
     
    #10 mark tomlinson, Dec 9, 2016
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  11. mark tomlinson

    mark tomlinson ༼ つ ◕_ ◕ ༽つ
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    P.S. all of that discussion is based on this being a repeatable problem as you mentioned. If only one or two prints did this it could just be karma :)
     
    #11 mark tomlinson, Dec 9, 2016
  12. Greg Howard

    Greg Howard Member

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    I did not run the stl file through the fixer, I did and printed again with the same issue. I think it may have to do with the extruder. Not sure if that's mechanical or electrical. I do notice that the bed does not move smoothly it 'wiggles' with the x axis (or what ever direction the extruder is moving from side to side). This movement could be messing up the filament as it is dropping on the second layer. The difference is that the first layer is much slower. Subsequent layers, 3, 4, 5... are difficult to see how the material is dropping because it's more smushed into the previous layer.

    I will try printing slower.
     
    #12 Greg Howard, Dec 9, 2016
  13. mark tomlinson

    mark tomlinson ༼ つ ◕_ ◕ ༽つ
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    most slicers run the first layer slower (check your slicer settings).

    They do what is called a "first layer underspeed" and this is usually expressed in % (i.e. 50%) meaning that it will run that percentage slower on the first layer to help adhesion.

    If all of the subsequent layers were too high from each other that would indicate bad firmware (i.e the Z axis steps/mm incorrect) but it looks like in your case that only a few layers are bad and then it gets going correctly. Now obviously I can not see that so you will need to confirm that after the 'glitch' that the layers are indeed being laid down correctly
     
    #13 mark tomlinson, Dec 9, 2016
  14. mark tomlinson

    mark tomlinson ༼ つ ◕_ ◕ ༽つ
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    If all of the layers were too high you would end up with modern art and nothing at all like you are getting (normally) :)
     
    #14 mark tomlinson, Dec 9, 2016
  15. Greg Howard

    Greg Howard Member

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    Still not printing right. My money is on firmware next. Gotta look up how to update the firmware.
     
    #15 Greg Howard, Dec 9, 2016
  16. mark tomlinson

    mark tomlinson ༼ つ ◕_ ◕ ༽つ
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    Well, just make darn certain you get the correct version.
    Most (almost all) problems are not firmware problems and the different flavors of printer all take different versions.
     
    #16 mark tomlinson, Dec 9, 2016
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  17. Greg Howard

    Greg Howard Member

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    This is killing me slowly. I still can't figure out what is making this print like this. I took the stl file and had a buddy print it, printed fine. On my Robo3D, prints with issues. I got the first layer to print better, but it looks like the next 10 or so layers print in a weird fillet... I'm running out of ideas. Any suggestions are appreciated. The image below should be a disk with square edges and flat top/bottom.

    2017-01-04 14.56.40.jpg
     
    #17 Greg Howard, Jan 4, 2017
  18. mark tomlinson

    mark tomlinson ༼ つ ◕_ ◕ ༽つ
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    What filament?

    Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-G930A using Tapatalk
     
    #18 mark tomlinson, Jan 4, 2017
  19. Greg Howard

    Greg Howard Member

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    Hatchbox, PLA Grey 1.75

    I just updated the firmware through MatterControl, 'after' the recent software update, 'and' the .net MS update that seemed to screw things up... after restarting everything. trying my first prints. It's definetly printing differently. The gap between the nozzle and the bed seems very high. when overlapping extrusions in the perimeter the nozzle is so high that the PLA layers on top of the previous bead of material and never makes it to the bed. Strange.

    Still have the same fillet issue with first 10 or so layers.
     
    #19 Greg Howard, Jan 4, 2017
  20. Greg Howard

    Greg Howard Member

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    Supper crappy 2nd layer, but top layer looks like there is too much extrusion, material being pushed to the sides making a wider edge.




    2017-01-04 16.40.59.jpg
    2017-01-04 16.41.11.jpg
     
    #20 Greg Howard, Jan 4, 2017
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