My TAZ 5 has been shut down for a couple of years and I am getting it back up and running. Its a tank! But i am having difficulties getting the print tuned back to what it was.
Does anyone have suggestions on what errors I have in my setup. I assume several. I love this printer and i have not had this kind of trouble in the past.
Printing ABS. I know first layers are squashed right now. I am more concerned about the vertical edges and the “ringing?” that seems to be happening around the Hole and then edges.
First part shown - the right side warping off the plate caused those layers to squish above the warp.
The corners could be a minor layer separation issue from warping of a layer mid-part. ABS definitely will do it, and HIPS can be touchy as well, especially if you’re not running in an enclosure. It’s happening on the longer straight sections, as the adhesion and stability from the print bed starts to fade, since the shrinking can all pull in the same direction as a single mass. Where you have holes, the pull from shrinkage is split up, so it happens less. Then above the holes, it would probably start again, but the top of the part comes soon enough that it doesn’t have a chance to show up again. Reducing temperature might help a little bit, but there’s the balance between layer adhesion keeping things attached, and too much heat increasing the warping.
Ringing? That a visual defect that wasn’t even considered an issue when these printers were made. The toolhead is very heavy and is going to oscillate during any change of speed/direction. The only “solution” for a printer like this is slow it down even more, or just accept that a decade-old printer isn’t going to ever print as pretty as a Klipper-based printer with input shaping and an ADXL345 strapped to a toolhead that weighs less than the stepper motor on your Taz 5’s extruder.
I do not care about speed so i will slow down the printer and I now have an enclosure for the printer. I will increase the temp of the box to help with the warping but decrease the temp on the hotend to see how it affects the rest. Jerk was not a thing in earlier version of cura so i will also give that a try. I will start with aggressively low settings on speed and jerk to see what i am working with.
I have had some excellent prints with this printer before so i am still hoping that i can work out some alignment issues or something.
Forgot to mention, since it’s been sitting for a long time, is the same true of your filament? That would definitely affect some of the print quality issues.
Other factors from storage might be in play as well. Being sat on a non-level surface, objects on the bed, objects on top, getting bumped, natural loosening of screws affecting the square of the frame, etc.
I’d verify square of the frame and check tightness of screws before you get too deep into little things.
