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3d Printing Tips Exclusive

Discussion in 'Helpful Tutorials and Tips' started by jovian, Aug 21, 2012.

  1. jovian

    jovian Member

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    Well guys I am trying to print a mandible for a talking skull prop with the H-Bot. In so doing I have been humbly reminded of a few things that apply to 3D printing as a whole that I would like to share. This would also be a good time and place to go over some other tip to ensure that you have successful prints. So without further ado here are Jovians rules to 3D printing.

    Rule 1: Everything is interrelated, so the trick is having the proper balance. ex The proper temperature depends on your speed, material, thickness,... and vice versa with each item. Stripping of filament, inproper adhesion between layers, blobbing could all be related to these issues or even others. It will only take experience to know where to go to get what you want

    Rule 2: Pick a layer height that the number of steps will fit evenly into. Not doing this will lead to periodic bad adhesion between layers as the stepper will take a full step at some point to catch up. As you can see in the photo this results in "Splitting" there are 4 or 5 layers that are visible in the below photo where this occurs.



    Rule 3: The First layer is the most critical. Seriously even after tuning your machine babysit that first layer you would be surprised what crops up unexpectedly in that layer and what you can fix quickly by watching it.

    Rule 4: Level that bed and keep it level. Since vibrations are a factor and will muck with the very fine tolerances over time it doesn't hurt to put this in a maintenance routine. I have extra skirt loops simply to look for this on every part, but that is my routine cause I muck around a lot.

    Rule 5: Reduce Speed. This does so much you will be easier on the hardware and reduce the amount of maintenence due to lower vibrations. Your part will typically come out better and you can get an extra cup of coffee.

    Rule 6: Always double check you parameters before slicing. Improvements in software here have been made but gcode generated with the wrong parameters can through off a finely tuned machine. I would also be rich if I had a nickel every time I did this. See small mandible forgot to scale it to 1.5 and didn't follow rule 7.

    Rule 7: Double check you gcode. The stl files are a messy format and the slicers can be picky. You will save yourself time and plastic by using the nice gcode viewers available in the repetier-host software package (Click on the visulization tab under the GCode-editor section). I should have caught that both these mandibles were missing over half their teeth . DOH :fugly: (inverted faces can be ugly)



    Rule 8: Master the Phase Transition. The absolute key to kick butt prints is manipulating the phase transitions of the plastic. You want cool and solid up to the nozzle opening, liquid going through the opening and then FREEZE it the instant is put where you want it. Well the phase transitions (at least for pla) happen around the whats called the glassing temperature. You will notice that the raw plastic has a kind of satin look to it. Once the plastic hits its glassing temp it will have a very glossy look to it like well glass. You will want to run about 5-10C above the glassing temperature. To find the glassing temp pick a temperature like 200C and print a small object. If the object has a glossy look decrease the temp by 5C and reprint. Continue until the part is no longer glossy. Your glassing temp will be the temp that was used with the last glassy looking part. Try running and do your other tuning about 5C above that temp. If your part looks dull increase by 5 degrees until your part has a glass look. Likewise run at 5C higher than this to finish out your tuning. (See knot photo)



    Rule 9: Chill out man. Seriously keep them electronics cool. The stepper drivers on the ramps board are running near their limit which means they can get quite toasty. They get toasty they like to miss steps. Miss a couple steps... your part looks ugly, your part strength is sub par...

    Rule 10: Ask questions. The world of 3D printing is literally exploding. There are many resources online. I am also happy help you get started and work out those kinks and build your experience.

    EDIT: I will be adding more tips as they occur to me. Simply just to many to remember sitting down and typing them.

    Additional TIPs (Trials In Printing :D )
    Tip 1: Depending on your particular setup The pressure the extruder exerts on the filament is important. Too little and the filament won't move or can strip. Too much and the filament becomes out of round gets jammed and then strips or creates inconsistent prints due to the varying volume. So how to tell if you have the goldilocks pressure from them gears? Simple you should have enough pressure that the teeth leave indents in the filament but do not get it out of round. Also (at least with transparent not sure about solid colors) if there is discoloration of the plastic out of the extruder gears there is too much pressure.


    Tip 2: If your having a problem getting a part to say its solid in Sketchup or have an untusted model (Like from thingiverse) run it through netfabb. They have a cloud service that fixes the STL model so its good for slicing again. They have a free download of software that does the same plus some extras like Splitting a stl file up. The splitting is great for those parts that you just can't print (or print well) in one go. Its fairly straight forward to figure out but I might make a video to show how. Heres a link for the download http://www.netfabb.com/download.php Attached files [​IMG] [​IMG] [​IMG] [​IMG]
     
  2. ToxicToast

    ToxicToast Down in the weeds. Staff Member

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    Very nice write up, Jovian. I'm bookmarking this for when I finally get around to doing my own 3d printer. Too much on the list at the moment to dive into this. I have found that zbrush makes for a phenomenal stl tool, but as an artist tool, it can be tricky to use for technical people used to the way traditional tools work. Kinda like comparing sketchup to a dedicated CAD/CAM tool.

    I've used it to capture details for routing on the P3, and have friends who have used it to professionally print sculpts. You have to be smart about how you break apart your model, but the tools in this package are quite robust for this use.
     
  3. jovian

    jovian Member

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    Sculptris is a free version of ZBrush kinda like the the free and paid versions of sketchup that I have heard is very good also for artists. I've downloaded it to try but haven't actually used it yet.
     

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