My print was going well so left it unattended for a little while, came back to quite a surprise.
I still haven’t done an investigation to find out the exact reason for the failure, but the belt clamp was actually ripped off the Y-plate and then torn in half.
After looking at the part I was printing I noticed that the entire part was angled in the Y- direction, so I should’ve been able to tell that something wasn’t quite right earlier if I was paying enough attention
P.S. In case you haven’t noticed this is my own custom build, so would be surprised if people encountered the same issue with one from lulzbot
Although I haven’t figured out why this happened, I believe the fact that I printed the part at 40% infill didn’t help at all.
I wasn’t using the standard belt clamps as I had issues with the inserts pulling out of the holes, so I used some zip ties to fasten the belt.
A replacement printed at 100% infill should fix the problem
Ya, we print all our parts with very high infills, like 90% or so.
Interesting. Are there any parts that could be printed at lower infills without detracting from the stability of the printer?
I ask because I am also working on my own TAZ with parts printed at 40%. I expect my first prints will be replacement parts, though I don’t know the extent to which I will have to replace the parts. So far I have decided to reprint the Z Nut Spring, Brackets, and now Y Belt Clamp…
Gannon, something else to look for is how Slic3r slices the holes, circular holes can be rendered smaller or larger than in the STL depending on settings used which can cause the thermal inserts to be pulled out relatively easily.
Cabage_breath, off the top of my head there aren’t too many I would print below 75%. It’s worth it for long term reliability of parts to infill at 85% or above. From personal experience on my machine I built at home, you can get away with 50% infill on the extruder body/idler, the bed fingers and maybe bed corners. Otherwise, the more rigid the parts that make the frame, the better.
I haven’t yet and this printer has been in operation since around march or april of this year. I have spent A LOT of time testing parts at Lulzbot though, the slices we use for printing have been through several iterations to get them just right for speed in production, strength and reliability of each part, and have been tested pretty rigorously. I wish I had a picture or three to post of buckets of parts we have tested.
