What I learned today
Posted: Wed Apr 18, 2012 6:27 pm
So other people can avoid my braindead stupidity.
I've been trying to print a couple of reel holders for the last couple of days, I could print the first couple of layers and then I'd comeback, check on it and the infill and sometimes the edges would be horribly messed up, what looked like either starving of filament, or not sticking together.
I must have started 10 of these before I realized what was actually happening, it wasn't a PLA jam, it wan't a temperature issue, the filament roller was not too loose.
The filament roller was too tight, I finally watched the first couple of hours of the print today and what was happening is that the filament would stop feeding consistently at some point during the print. When it happened I loosened the tension bolts on the extruder about half a turn and it was fine for the rest of the print.
I believe the issue is that there is enough variation in the diameter of the filament that if you have it too tight, it will feed for some period and then hit a slightly wider section of the filament and be unable to pull it through the roller.
Hopefully it will help someone else who has filament feeding issues out.
I've been trying to print a couple of reel holders for the last couple of days, I could print the first couple of layers and then I'd comeback, check on it and the infill and sometimes the edges would be horribly messed up, what looked like either starving of filament, or not sticking together.
I must have started 10 of these before I realized what was actually happening, it wasn't a PLA jam, it wan't a temperature issue, the filament roller was not too loose.
The filament roller was too tight, I finally watched the first couple of hours of the print today and what was happening is that the filament would stop feeding consistently at some point during the print. When it happened I loosened the tension bolts on the extruder about half a turn and it was fine for the rest of the print.
I believe the issue is that there is enough variation in the diameter of the filament that if you have it too tight, it will feed for some period and then hit a slightly wider section of the filament and be unable to pull it through the roller.
Hopefully it will help someone else who has filament feeding issues out.