Various NOOB questions

[Dionysus480]

Hi guys,

The new printer is a bunch of fun. We've been printing little 20 mm cubes, and trying to improve the print quality. Things have gone a bit south recently, and I'm looking for some advice.

Setup:
Rostock MAX v2
Astrosyn dampers
E3Dv6 hotend (0.4 mm nozzle)
Tricklaser Al heat spreader
FabLam surface on Borosilicate Glass
jFettig's ducted effector platform (I actually really like this.)

I usually print ABS at 228C with the bed at 85C
I usually print PLA at 205C with the bed at 50C

Adhesion issues: A ton of my problems arise from poor adhesion on larger prints. I get curling with anything bigger than 4-5 cm across. I can't get my Xenocrates/Raymond enclosure brackets to print. As a result I'm sure a large PLA print was ruined due to the AC coming on. The thing looked beautiful, but about 5-10 layers in the middle of the item had poor adhesion, and my single piece quickly became multiple items connected by spaghetti when removed from the build plate.

So - with the FabLam

Can I use anything to help with adhesion? Am I missing something? Hairspray? GlueSticks? I'll try anything. Do I need to try even higher temps? I'm thinking the enclosure may help, but I can't get the dang thing printed... Uggh.

Belt Tension Issues: OK - so I took a perfectly good (OK - clearly not perfect) printer and tried to print BigBadBison's spiral chess set. The spiral legs had irregularity to them, and I thought - OK - some backlash causing wobble. I tightened them. The sound of the steppers wasn't quite a smooth, and a repeat of the pawn showed no improvement, so I backed off the tension. Then things when to heck in a handbasket.

I printed a Raymond bracket (bottom if its important) last Tuesday. The bottom layers warped, so scraped and increased the bed temp to 90 and tried again. The bottom layers printed fine, so I went to bed.

I woke up the next morning to find the entire hotend, effector and part to be a giant ball of molten abs. Everything melted together into one giant mess. I recovered my E3Dv6 from the middle of the mess by heating it, and using a woodburner to carve it out. Some acetone, and the thing is back in service (new thermistor.) I rigged the thing up and printed a new ducted effector (very happy with it actually.) The next print I started while I was sitting at my desk with my back to the printer (another enclosure bracket attempt.) There were some horrible belt grinding, and stepper missing sounds, and I turned around to find the effector travelling wildly in 3 dimensions.

I re-homed, but found the whole thing back out of calibration. I use a dial indicator to set the endstop screws to within 0.001". One test print, and the thing is back out of level again.

Questions:
Any suggestions for my adhesion problems on FabLam? Should I invest in a real PEI surface? Is more heat the answer (if, so I understand the 24v conversion now.)
How do I know if the belts are too tight? Too loose? At this point I'm frustrated.
Would Duet/FSR (I love Sublime Layers as a source of guidance) help with the callibration? I feel like I spend half my time switching the Dial Indicator for the hotend doing callibrations.
[img]IMG_3583.JPG[/img]
How would you guys troubleshoot this irregularity? I've tried two different slicers. Now I'm recovering from my distaster, but once the thing is functioning again, what changes do you suggest for the irregular spirals?

[Xenocrates]

If it's the bottom of the two sets of brackets I published, let me ask two questions: First, are you printing it with a raft? Secondly, if so, does it usually fail during the raft?

If the two questions are both yes, then the answer is that until ~3rd layer of the raft, reduce the speed to 90%. Don't know why, but MC doesn't do Z-hop properly for the raft, and this often will catch on a spot and rip the raft off (I really should have noted that on my thing page for it). But also, that is actually a pretty phenomenal print for one without support. Don't feel bad about it.

Belt tension: If the carriages move while you hold the belt still at the top, it's too loose. If the thing hums when you snap them like a rubber band, too tight. Beyond that, not sure.

Duet FSR is nice, but not neccesary. I as yet haven't laid down the cash, and with PEI adhesion seems mostly nailed. I'm sorry to say I can't help any with the Fablam, but I've never used it (As I made my PEI plates before Fablam became available, and so didn't see a need to try it)

I doubt more heat is the answer. Fablam is supposed to reduce the heat you need. I know that the stock power supply can get you to 95C fairly well, which is more than enough for most purposes. PEI I usually run at 100C, but that's mostly to keep it high enough that the fluctuation from opening the enclosure door in the winter doesn't screw things up (Although it does usually cause some warping sadly)

[geneb]

It's my understanding that FABLAM works with ABS at 60C and with PLA with a cold bed.

Make sure your first layer is good - it won't matter what bed surface you're using if you're putting down a poor first layer. If you look towards the end of the user guide, you'll see what a good first layer extrusion is going to look like - there's a series of photos that show a comparison of extrusion settings.

g.

[guanu]

also, if pats are not sticking on the fablam, wipe it down with isopropyl alcohol and do not touch the surface.. after a wipe down with alcohol, things stick amazingly well

[Dionysus480]

Thanks guys.

The first layer looks good. I've printed a bunch of 20mm calibration cubes and other small stuff. I've tried playing a bit with the first layer height. The fact that it seems to need recalibration with every print (even when its basically an immediate turnaround) to get that perfect first layer is troubling.

I actually do thing the steps are being missed because of the nozzle snagging on parts that are starting to curl up off the bed. Small parts print fine at 65C for me. But for the larger prints, I've been increasing the temp. I made a mistake of printing a small part at 85C and I couldn't get the thing off. New sheet of FabLam for that one...

It just dawned on me that the snagging seems to occur after the infill starts. The z-hops would be much more numerous. Perhaps I need to look at the minimum length of movement that triggers a z-hop. A shorter distance might move the nozzle up more frequently and minimize snags.

I wasn't using a raft, because the part had such a big flat surface. I can however, and see. I do understand that the raft will change the force vectors and help with adhesion. I'll keep you guys posted.

Again - thank you very much for taking the time to respond.

Oh - and cool guanu... Yes, I keep denatured alcohol handy and give it a good wipe down in between prints. How long do the FabLam sheets last? My last one started to bubble up in a couple of places. I was assuming (dangerous I know) that the higher temps were affecting the adhesive.