Hello,
I have a relatively new Taz Mini. It’s maybe been printing for about 15 hours, all in ABS from matterhackers, mostly with simplify 3d, but also with Cura a couple times depending on the laptop available. I was having no issues at all and then the other day I changed the filimant to white from black, went to make a print, and the initial skirt seemed to print like the bed wasn’t level. The back corner of the skirt seemed to be extruding higher off the bed from the rest of it and you can see that the extrusions are not close together but clearly apart. When pulling the skirt off the bed, the part that isn’t close together is not connected and like individual strands. This is the same side of the print for different shaped prints I have tried. I’m attaching a couple pictures to show the variation in the layers on the different sides of the print.
I’ve tried different prints in cura and simplify 3d. I’ve tried changing the filament back. I’ve flipped the wiping pad. I’ve brought the hotend up to temp and wiped it down with a small towell a couple times. I’ve wiped down the corner disks too.
Everything is with the same settings that I was previously using successfully. 0.1mm layer height. 240 hotend and 110 bed.
I’m no expert printer and have just been doing this for a couple months. With our taz5 and our printrbot, we have to take care of the leveling ourselves, which is one reason the mini has been the go to for small projects. I’m a teacher and trying to get things ready for an afterschool class starting next week!
Any ideas or recommendations?
It’s kind of hard to tell with the photos if it is a not-level issue. It might be an extrusion issue but it is odd that it would just show in the bottom right corner. What might be happening if it is a level issue, is that the PEI layer might have expanded in some places and not others. So one way to look at that would be to find a straight edge of some kind and lay it across the bed. If you see a divot in the PEI, then that would be the issue. Remember, the print head measures at the washers and an assumption is made about the height of the PEI layer.
However, my PEI layer has enormous bubbles in it – no need for a straight edge, I can see the deformation with my naked eye. Even so, after the first layer things go fine. You might want to check your software settings and set the first layer to be a bit wider than normal. In Cura, the default is to print the first layer at 125% normal width and usually almost double thick. That will give you bottom edge the flares out, but that can be corrected with a file. Anyway, when I look at the gaps in the lines of filament on the bottom right of that ring, I think the extrusion rate could be bumped up there.
Another thing, black seems more gooey to me, at least, it always seems to leave a mess for me while other colors seem to be less gooey. You might want to try switching back to the black and see if the issue disappears. If so, you probably need to either heat the white more or extrude a bit more.
Thanks for the reply. I will heat up the bed tomorrow and see if I get a straight/level bed. I can also try upping the extrusion a little. Again, the odd part to me is that I had no issues for the first 15 hours of printing or so. I did try going back to the black I had been using successfully and got the same result as the white.
Additionally, if I try to make a print closer to that corner, the whole thing ends up stringy/not connected, like in the bottom right corner of the image I posted. I tried letting a print of a disk shape run to completion and that whole side of the print ended up not being smooth at all, but quite jagged and bumpy.
If I watch the lines of code in simplify3d, I can see the measurements taken when the hot end levels, would those at all be helpful, or is there something close to standard that I should see?