jweaver

I know.. And we have already talked about this at length.. But CW doesn't support my printer and there is no way I am going to a model where I have to save the GCODE and print with another App all the time... I love CURA for its simplicity and I don't want to change. Of course I guess one option is to use CW for the few jobs which act like this.. And perhaps I should give it a ago.. But my first attempt using it failed dismally.

Sorry to bring this up again, but I am still not closer. At the weekend i was trying to print something that had a series of small holes in it. And I could not get the first layer down.. As always, I find that the small details arn't fully printed and they snag as the head goes over. I built a test STL which is basically a block, with a load of 1mm - 6mm holes in it.. And captured a video: I still can't help thinking that this is because the printer doesn't fully print all of the shapes.. Look at the circle drawn at 14-15s.. I can't see the head travelling the full perimeter. I do want to point out that this video is especailly bad.. A lot of the problems here are down to "adhesion" and I have some oozing as the temperature is high.. But this is quite typical of what I am seeing. My problem isnt' really getting the layer to stick.. its trying to get the shapes to be fully closed.... Does anyone have any more thoughts on this subject? Jon

Imuse the stable release for 99% of my prints but always look at the RC versions to see whats new and to have a quick play to see if there are any obvious problems.

I always thought that was the "print speed", not travel speed.. I have my bottom layer speed set slowly, but the travels between sections of the print are still lighning fast. But it doesnt matter as i did a test print with a slow travel speed and my first layer was still messd up.

Understood.. I have no idea where to get the "source commits".. But since I test software for a living, I always like to try out the RC versions just to see if I can find anything obvious. But if I don't know whats changed, its very difficult for me to find any problems (other than obvious things which get broken). Jon

I am still struggling to get my first layer down when there are small details. And today noticed that it all seems to go wrong during 'travel' moves.. I know there is a lot of new functionaltiy to slow down the first layer, but thats just the print speed.. Is there a feature (or plugin) that would allow me to use a slow travel speed on the first layer? Jon

I can see that 15.02 has a RC load.. But when you run it, you are told of the new features, but they are the same as 15.01 and 14.12. Where can you get a list of changes that have been added in 15.02 so that I can actually Beta test the new version? Jon

I am not convinced this is the temperature graph.. I loaded a small model yesterday and didn't print it, but left the Print GUI up monitoring the temp for 24 hours.. And the CPU usage is fine. So I need to do more tests... Specifically. 1. Load a LARGE model and leave the PrintUI up 2. Print a small model and leave the PrintUI up 3. Print a large model and leave the PrintUI up I am not sure whether this relates to having a large/detailed model loaded (my gut feeling is yes), and whether it only happens "post print". If I do manage to reproduce this, are there any logs I can gather? Jon

Yes to USB Printing.. Yes to Pronterface... So you think that this is simply that the graph has got too big after monitoring for so many hours. That would certainly explain it.. Although this has only started happening from 15.01 onwards.. Can that behavior be explained? I will do some tests to see whether its the fact that the Print UI is left open is causing this.... Thanks for the suggestion Jon

I mentioned this issue in one of the RC threads, but I am now convinced its a problem. Almost every morning I find that my PC fans are running flat out.. When I look at Taskmanager 'pythonw' is the the culprit using a huge amount of CPU even though CURA is idle, but just sat there with the model loaded and print window open.. When I exit Cura, the fans die down in a few seconds... Typically, this happens when : 1. I start CURA in the evening, and print a fairly large model 2. The print finishes 3. But I leave CURA running. 4. Sometime hours later the CPU usage ramps up. THis certainly wasn't the case in older (14.0) versions.. .Has anyone else noticed this? Is there a reason why 15.01 would behave like this? Jon

I didn't even know that this option/feature existed.. But I just tried it out and am not sure I understand its use. If I load a model lf a dice.. And look at the top layer.. With Combing set to "Off", i can see the tool path goes right over the holes in the dice. If I set Combing to "All" the tool path travels around the holes. When I set it to "No Skin", i would expect it NOT to comb on the TOP layer.. But when I look, its still combing and moving the tool around the holes. So what exactly does "No Skin" do? Jon

I went to download RC8 last night and found RC9 so took that instead. I did my first print and it was fine, but I left CURA running afterwords.. Came into the study this morning to find my PCs fans running flat out.. Looking at Taskmanager, CURA/Python was using 25% of memory (even though it was idle) and when I tried to exit, it hung (Not Responding) It could be a co-incidence.. But I have done 100s of prints with 14.12.1 and now this happened on my first attempt with 15.01.RC9. Infact, during the entire time I was using 14.12, I don't think it crashed on me once. I obviously need to do more testing, but I just thought you might be interested... Jon

Cheers Daid.. I have already slowed it right down.. And simply can't stop the small shapes from being laid incomplete. It seems that as my extruder motor starts to turn, nothing comes out for a few mms... This leaves the shapes open and they snag at the next pass...

Attitude problem? Really? Is that the way my comment came across.. I am not concerned about the wrench, I am more concerned about the ongoing issue I have with the way that my Printer lays down its first layer, causing small objects (As found in the Wrench) to get ripped off . I don't want to focus on the Wrench, or how this design is a problem, or how my version might be "corrupted" or "modified".. I have a general problem with my printer, which isn't helped by the way that CURA works.. And I am genuinely happy to try ANY suggestions as I am simply unable to print something which has small parts on the first layer. I have looked at Brim and it didn't help.. Raft looks like it could be been useful, but whilst it helped with the Wrench, it didn't with other small jobs I tested with. I really don't have an attitude.. I am here looking for help and am greatful to everyone...

Well it doesnt' work for me.. The "terminal" won't even send commands to my printer.. So even if the GCODE is compatible (never tested) and I was to use it , I would have to export the GCODE an then print it using another application (Repetier?).. Which is frankly a pain in the a**e. I do this already for multi-coloured prints where I need "pause" support, and it works.. But its not something I want to do very often! If/when CW supports my printer and will print directly.. I will relook at it.. For now, I would prefer to live with CURAs flaws, than have to use multiple apps to print.

Unfortunatly, the "Raft" isn't working out quite as well as I hoped. Last night I tried this again: http://www.thingiverse.com/thing:51806 I used Raft and Support.. The raft went down.. And the individual balls started printing.. But soon, they started to flick off the Raft, just like they did of the bed when I tried before. So clearly I am no closer to a solution for this one.

Tony.. I know that you are happy with CW.. But its not an option for me.. It doesn't support the Printrbot.. Infact, its "terminal" can't even send commands to the Printrbot, so I assume the GCODE that it creates won't work either. The developer has said that supporting the Printrbot is on their wishlist, but its way down and not likely to happen soon. Even if I could use CW to simply build the GCode, I would rather have CURA (even with its flaws) printing directly to the printer rather than having to export the file and use another app to print. I am more than happy with CURA.. I know that it could do some things better.. But I am not simply going to turn my back on it, just because it has a few flaws.. With the 'raft', its helped and this might solve the problems I have with it. Of course I wish it did some things better.. But taking EVERYTHING into account, its the only option I have. What does bother my about your replies is that you went from trying to help, to a missing to discredit CURA.. IMHO you went about things badly, and now it hasn't gone your way, you have gone on a campaign to tell everyone how bad CURA Is. I appreciate your responses.. I really do.. But it becomes tiresome to read your views on CURA over and over and over.

Who says its not a workaround? But its the only option i have.. And if it works. Its better han nothing.. I am greateful for anything to be honest...

Looks like the "Raft" could be the solution to ky woes... I tried this evening to print the spanner and after the raft was layed, it printed perfectly... But i thought that there was no way that i would be able to remve the raft.. But i was wrong.. It just snapped off in one piece leaving ZERO evidence that the raft was ever involved... I am really chuffed with this and will do some more tests tomorrow on some even more detailed prints....

Its not a problem with the Wrench.. Its a problem with my printer and the way that CURA lays down the first layer.. You need to go back to the start to understand if you are interested.. Basically, after retraction, my Printrbot lays down a tiny bit of air when doing new perimeters leaving them open.. And they get snagged and ripped off. I struggle with the first layer when there are very small parts... So in the case of the wrench.. That tiny little rectangle on the first layer, gets ripped up..

This is really annoying me now. I was trying to print the NASA Spanner: http://www.thingiverse.com/thing:608397/#files And the very first layer has a tiny part of the ratchet mechanism.. Which simply won't stick.. Gets rolled up as a blob and then gets merged into the rest of the print. I have tried everything I can "mechanically" to get this to stick, and its simply impossible. Now I need to start looking at playing with CURA (perhaps using the raft as suggested above) to see if any of the settings will help..... Jon

Thats what I assumed... Will test it when RC8 is out.... Cheers.

Happy days. Just realised that RC7 is out so installed it and the single layer view is not present.. So I guess its not included quite yet... . I will have to think of another fix now for you to work on for me

Awesome.. So does this mean that the single layer view will now be available on all future versions, without the need for you to change your code each time?

Cheers.. I just hope that there is pause functionality at some point (like Repetier does) as I really think this is a major feature which is missing.. Only last night I was printing for hours and needed to clean something off the head, and I just wish I could have paused for a second.. Moved the head.. Cleaned it.. And resumed.. A feature which works flawlessly in Repetier.