Welcome to the SeeMeCNC Community

The first layers of my prints aren't coming out very well, i have the bed as high as it will go in temp, 120c, and I have tried with goop on the bed or just clean glass, but i get these results.... I might have the first layer set to high?

what do you have for a print nozzle temp? i assume its the wrench so you are using ABS?
ABS will adhere just fine at 90c. You just have to make sure you are keeping a few things in mind.
1. No layer fans.
2. I usually do 200% extrusion width on my first layer. That way its a fatter extrusion and more adhesion likely.
3. 230c is a pretty standard ABS starting temp.

the fact that you can see space between your lines means 1 of a few things.
1 . you are under extruding and you may need to calibrate your e-steps.
2. Your nozzle is too far above the print head.
3. Software issue


its nice to finally feel like i can be of some assistance around here... ive only had my printer a few months, but ive seen every problem you can imagine


EDIT: Taking a good second look at your pictures i would say its likely the nozzle is way too far off the bed. When you calibrate your Z height 1. make sure you put it in your printer slicing software. and 2. make sure when you put a piece of paper between the nozzle and the bed you can move it, but you do feel some friction.

I'm guessing you calibrated your nozzle height on a cold bed? It expands about .25mm for me cold to hot.

Ffettig, good point... I always calibrate about 220c nozzle and 80 degree bed... which is somewhere midpoint of PLA and ABS..

dunginhawk wrote: 1. No layer fans.

does this include the head fan? I bought an e3d head and it has a fan pointed at the body of the nozzle, should i turn this off?

dunginhawk wrote: 2. Your nozzle is too far above the print head.

I was having issues when trying to print a circle the radius of the print bed, now that i think about it my top plate might not be square to the base.... so instead I cheated and left the head a little high in the middle so that when it went to the one side it wouldnt hit the bed.... so ya, i may have done that to myself unwittingly.....

for sure.. i just ran in to a similar issue... well sort of..
I had almost always printed at most 2-3 inches from the inside of the bed... so i leveled it with that in mind... then i had to print something 8 inches wide, so i used the outside of the bed... it forced me to get REALLY accurate in how i leveled the ENTIRE bed... so yes, before you do anything else, level the bed, and then start from scratch calibrating and making sure x y z tower test is all accurate... it will help a ton..

So what happened to me was around the middle part of the print my extrusion was correct. and at the edges it was scraping the bed so hard it wasnt extruding at all... "It will make up for it on next layer" i thought, but not giving any thought to the fact that the feeder didnt stop, so now i had a log jam of filament and pressure in the nozzle that was going to find its way out somehow... that somehow was the first layer, which was globby as poo...

first layer, and bed leveling is everything.