A weird problem

So I had loaded the Auto_Level_Series_6_10 into the beta printer, having been advised that this was OK (no sensors, not auto-level, just don't invoke that).

I started having issues where the printer would just stall and the software could no longer communicate (mid-print). Simplify reported it as a loss of firmware communications. The arduino itself was apparently off-line.

I swapped USB ports, cables and even bought a new arduino mega board.

No joy. Reloaded the 2_14 version convinced this was a firmware issue....

So, it turns out... this is a model issue. Not a model issue any of the repair tools detects, but it is one nonetheless. If I print one of the model, alone, it works. If I print (or attempt to print) multiples, it will hang the arduino. Mad slicer you say... good guess, but Simplify3d and Slic3r both have the same tendency (it will just crash in different spots).

I could try Cura and MatterSlicer and Kisslicer, but in the end... I don't have the time to play with them all -- nor do I care enough. Just a weird bug I thought I would toss this out, because by all appearances this was bad hardware. Yet, it clearly was not (although I have a much better Arduino Mega install now--Yay!).

 

I can confirm that one copy of the model works flawlessly, every time. Weird squared.

So I just printed 4 singles. There were some oddities when editing/placing/arranging the model in Simplify, but nothing errored out during the slice. (same was true for Repetier). Not a large model... well, it is close to the max length the bed will allow, but not larger and not very tall (50 layers maybe). Every time printing multiples in a single print though the Arduino Mega would lock up at some point prior to layer 4. No obvious errors in the model, the gcode or anything else. Ran all of the repair tools in Netfabb and Simplify (nothing found or fixed)... oh well, a lesson learned.