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Think I got it!

Discussion in 'Troubleshooting' started by cosber, Nov 7, 2013.

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  1. cosber

    cosber Active Member

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    I'm happy to report I''m finally printing!
    The PLA test prints wouldn't stick despite all the various suggestions in the forums, and then the extruder got plugged and I couldn't push the filament through manually (of course it was heated). Despite the consensus that printer's tape wasn't necessary for PLA, I put it down anyway and rubbed some acetone on it, then dipped the extruder in an acetone soaked cotton ball. It seemed to have worked because a bunch of filament came running out when I fired up the heater. So I tried one last time and though the first layer was messy, the print came out beautifully! I did 2 more tests with a cube and a gear and again, except for the first layer, both printed great. I then tried a heart for my grandaughter and the first few layers were fine-I walked away and when I returned, there was a glob of melted filament stuck to the extruder.

    So, a couple questions:
    1. Do I need to refresh the table with acetone every few prints?
    2. What are your procedures for starting the print so the filament comes out immediately? It seemed every print the first few passes nothing came out, despite me manually pushing out filament (using Repetier) before I hit the Run button. When it does come out, it's messy at first.
    3. What are your procedures for shutting down? Do you pull out the filament? What about the excess that is left in the extruder assembly? Do you heat it up the next time you print and push it out manually?
    4. And finally, the few files I loaded sliced within 20-30 seconds. One file I loaded of a heart was at 7 minutes before I got bored and cancelled it. It seemed like it was stuck on "building support material" or something like that for at least 5 minutes. Can it take a long time to slice what appeared to be a simple file?
    Thanks!
     
    #1 cosber, Nov 7, 2013
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  2. Printed Solid

    Printed Solid Volunteer Admin
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    1. I'm confused. You're wiping acetone on the painter's tape? I don't think your tape (and it's adhesive) will tolerate that too many times. with tape, you are going to want to clean it periodically and will also need to patch and replace fairly frequently as well.

    2. use a skirt. it is a setting in the slicer to lay down a few layers of plastic a few mm around the model on the first layer to get the nozzle primed with good material.

    3. I pull out the filament. If I don't, then I extrude a little bit manually before starting any new prints after startup. Also, you want to get things cooled off pretty quickly after prints if you are going to leave filament in.

    4. If a simple file is taking a long time, the geometry of the model might not be as simple as it appears. Check it in netfabb. consider running a quadric edge collapse decimation in meshlab (or something else) to reduce polygon count.
     
    #2 Printed Solid, Nov 7, 2013
  3. cosber

    cosber Active Member

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    Thanks! I'll try the skirt. In regards to the acetone, somewhere in the forums it said to do that. It worked though I see your point with the tape not tolerating it.
     
    #3 cosber, Nov 7, 2013
  4. tesseract

    tesseract Moderator
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    One suggestion is to modify the Gcode for every print to home it all then raise the z axis and then extrude some filament.

    First I manually turn on the heater so it starts warming up when it gets there I start the print which follows the code and raises Z about 10mm the extrudes and it hits the built in command to bring it to temp which is already there so it isn't long but I sit poised with my tweezers on both sides and as the printer nozzle and when it moves to begin printing I simple close teh tweezers on the nozzle and it scrapes it clean and begins printing in just seconds. Works pretty good for me.
     
    #4 tesseract, Nov 7, 2013
  5. cosber

    cosber Active Member

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    It's so much more fun having successfully printed and then read suggestions to make the experience better, rather than suffering the pangs of getting that first print down. The skirt worked great. Tesseract, I do exactly what you do, except I don't have tweezers. The main thing, as you've stressed in many posts, is getting the nozzle the right distance above the bed. The first time I did the heart and it gunked up, it messed up the leveling. It took 3 trys to get it right again and then it printed fine.
     
    #5 cosber, Nov 8, 2013
  6. tesseract

    tesseract Moderator
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    three tries is getting good when it means you have a good eye to whats going on and know about how much to adjust. That skill will come in handy later if and when you migrate to higher res prints
     
    #6 tesseract, Nov 8, 2013
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