PLA Printing Like Lace?

[The Rigger]

Test-printing PLA with the new E3Dv6 hot end... It's not working too well.

Shooting SMC's PLA off a 1K spool through the stock EZ-Struder. 0.4mm nozzle in the new v6. Temps set at 220°for the nozzle, 70° for the bed. Shooting on glue& glass. Great first-pass adhesion, skirts & rafts look excellent, as do the first few layers...

And then it all goes tango-uniform. I hear a stuttering from the hob gear in the EZ-struder, and the layers start to look like... Well... Like these photos. As if the nozzle was partially blocked or something.

Yuck!

Mo' Yuck!

Yuck From Above

I thought PLA was supposed to be easier to print then ABS. The E3D head sure likes ABS, though... This PLA? Not so much.

Ideas?

[IMBoring25]

The v6 has a reputation for not liking PLA but it usually comes down to assembly mistakes, inappropriate settings, or both (or a bad counterfeit).

They say 2mm or less retraction and they mean it. Retraction should also be slow. Some get away with 20 mm/s. I use 10.

Are your thermistor settings updated in the firmware?

Is the fan turning the correct direction and is the duct covering all the cooling fins?

Did you get it directly from E3D or an authorized distributor?

[bubbasnow]

oh yes that looks like blockage. with new materials there are always steps to fine tune for your own machine... its best to slow things down and tweak from known working settings. set retracts to zero and work up from there, slow down the nozzle speeds and take your time for best results.

[The Rigger]

The v6 has a reputation for not liking PLA but it usually comes down to assembly mistakes, inappropriate settings, or both (or a bad counterfeit).
They say 2mm or less retraction and they mean it. Retraction should also be slow. Some get away with 20 mm/s. I use 10.
Are your thermistor settings updated in the firmware?
Is the fan turning the correct direction and is the duct covering all the cooling fins?
Did you get it directly from E3D or an authorized distributor?

Well... I bought it directly from E3D, so I assume it's not a bad counterfeit hot end...
Took my sweet time and assembled it in accordance with directions on the wiki referenced from the E3D website...
Updated the Rostock's printer profile in MatterControl to this: http://tinyurl.com/jo56lao" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
The three cooling fans are all turning the correct direction and nothing's blocking the duct - the hot end platform *is* the duct; it gets cooling air from 360 degrees.

I don't recall the retraction speed/distance, off the top of my head - I'm not at home at the moment - but I'll check it out when I get back there.

[The Rigger]

oh yes that looks like blockage. with new materials there are always steps to fine tune for your own machine... its best to slow things down and tweak from known working settings. set retracts to zero and work up from there, slow down the nozzle speeds and take your time for best results.

I wondereed if 0.4 was too small or not... I susect not, but...

[IMBoring25]

I've put a good amount of ABS, PLA, PETG, and polycarbonate through my v6. The only times I've had issues anything similar to that were when I was NOT using the 0.4mm brass nozzle...Experimentation with a 0.8 and trying bronzefill and laywoo3d with a hardened nozzle. I am using 2mm, 10mm/s retraction.

[Xenocrates]

Some quick questions:

Did you add thermal paste between the heatbreak and the heatsink? That is suggested to help.

Have you had any jams/oops's before this with the E3D? Did you clean out the nozzle between filaments/jams? If not, that may be the issue, and the easy fix is a torch.

Is the fan all the way down on the heasink? You want the bottom of the duct on the bottom of the bottom fin.

Is the stepper motor getting too warm? Have you tried PLA with the stock hotend (I presume yes, and that it worked. It's probably not the motor current, but it never hurts to check)

Other little things that may have escaped notice or not been known to be important to you:
The hotend end of the PTFE should be even and straight. It may be a little off angle.
Something may have slipped into the fan and stopped it.

[jram]

I've had prints look exactly like that from my EZ struder motor heating up the hobbed gear, the filament starts to slip when softened. Another thing I've had happen with the E3d is that the nozzle worked itself loose.. I had similar looking prints when this happened.

[The Rigger]

Some quick questions:
Did you add thermal paste between the heatbreak and the heatsink? That is suggested to help.

Yes.

Have you had any jams/oops's before this with the E3D? Did you clean out the nozzle between filaments/jams? If not, that may be the issue, and the easy fix is a torch.

No; the E3D shoots ABS perfectly. And it began shooting PL fine, until it didn't...

Is the fan all the way down on the heasink? You want the bottom of the duct on the bottom of the bottom fin.

Yes

Is the stepper motor getting too warm? Have you tried PLA with the stock hotend (I presume yes, and that it worked. It's probably not the motor current, but it never hurts to check)

The printer shoots PLA just fine with the stock hot end.

Other little things that may have escaped notice or not been known to be important to you:
The hotend end of the PTFE should be even and straight. It may be a little off angle.
Something may have slipped into the fan and stopped it.

The fan is unobstructed. And I trimmed the PTFE tube square before inserting it into the E3D's heat sink.

I'll doublecheck the retracts and back off as suggested.

[Eaglezsoar]

Please let us know the results of what you changed.

[The Rigger]

Please let us know the results of what you changed.

I've reduced the retraction from 3mm to 2mm, and slowed it down to 10mm/s in MatterControl. Next time I get home and have a chance to print some PLA (which will most likely be in late April/early May, to be honest), I'll let y'all know how it goes.

Thanks to all for the ideas, though. Let's see what happens.

(p.s. for those of you in the Goshen environs, my "job" will be playing the Embassy Theatre in Ft. Wayne for a one-night stand next Friday.)

[626Pilot]

Run a print with part cooling turned way down, or off. If there's too much air blowing, it can overtax the hot end, and it will overheat the filament. The E3D Cyclops is especially bad about this.