aggertroll

I ordered replacement via amazon today, will take apart the hotend over the weekend. Thanks for the link.

Thank you geert and peggy for your feedback. OK, I will check the teflon coupler first (hoping I will not damage anything in the process). The 140% feedrate has me baffled, too. I checked the extruder steps and did a few atomic pulls - everything looks good. Temperatures are steady - I am using the Pronterface plugin that graphs the temperatures. (Btw: UMO refers to the Ulitmaker Original - really happy with it.) I remember seeing different couplers offered. Any advice on which to get? - I'm in Europe. Happy printing.

No ideas?

Hi all, I am printing with PLA and am trying to improve the surface quality of the first layer laid down on glass. My printer is a UMO with the glass bed upgrade; I slice using Cura 15.4.3. I found 196 degrees / 55 degrees at about 50 cm/sec giving good results. I had to increase the feedrate to 140% with the PLA filament I currently use to assure solid parts. At 100% the lines tended to seperate. For adhesion I use a very fine layer of diluted wood glue - works great. To improve first layer quality I increased the bottom layer line width to 130% and slowed down the bottom layer speed to 25 mm/sec. Bed is levelled to give a nicely squished first layer. I increased the infill overlap somewhat - I believe 30% (am not at my printer right now). The photo shows the bottom of a part I just printed. (I am not concerned about the diagonal travel tracks - I might try to do something about them later.) The surface is generally ok, but some areas are not - i.e. at the lower left or to the bottom right of the center hole. It looks to me like it is printing well going towards the edge but underextrudes as it moves away from the edge. The areas immediately surrounding the small holes left and bottom look real nice. Any tips on what I can do to get a more uniform, solid bottom surface? Thanks - Thomas

I had the same thing happen as described in the OP and it turned out I had a lot of friction in the bowden tube. Over time, debris from the feeder had gotten into the tube. Took out the tube, cleaned it with some thick wool, added a bit of graphite and everything was good again. You might just want to inspect your bowden tube whether you can see tiny pieces of filament near the feeder end. If you can, open the feeder, pull out the filament at about 90* and check friction by moving the filament by hand.

Looks like it is called Octoclient for Octoprint: https://itunes.apple.com/de/app/octoclient-for-octoprint/id1260531874?mt=8 I need to try out Octoprint - and also the client.

The 4 main axles are fixed, as you say. But the 2 axles on which the printhead rides are not. These two axles need to be parallel /perpendicular to the main axles. The calibration sticks help assure this. (This has nothing to do with moving the pulley laterally against the case; it helps turning the pulley on the shaft/axle into its proper position and locking it there.)

Okay vielen Dank. Ich hatte nur schon oft genug gelesen das es wahnsinnig wichtig ist, immer alles blitz blank zu haben, hatte aber selbst das Gefühl das der zweite oder dritte Druck nach der Reinigung immer viel besser funktioniert. Dann habe ich es einfach gelassen. Viele Grüße, ViviBee Das "blitzblank" ist aus meiner Sicht wichtig, wenn man einfach auf Glas druckt - was ja auch gehen kann. Dann sind zB Fettreste von Fingerabdrücken etc. ein no-go. Wenn man einmal eine gute Haft-Methode gefunden hat, kann man sich ganz auf die anderen 497 Parameter konzentrieren. Happy printing!

Using periods to separate sentences greatly improves readability. And starting off a sentence with a capital letter would be an additional treat. Just my 2c. Aggertroll

Das Glas lässt sich leicht mit warmem Wasser reinigen, weil der Leimfilm ja ultradünn ist. Wenn ich sehe, dass das Glas nach etlichen Drucken in der Mitte blank wird, erneuere ich die Schicht. Gereinigt habe ich das Glas erst einmal - braucht man eigentlich nicht.

Zum Thema Haftung: Ich habe auch den UMO + Heatbed und nehme verdünnten Holzleim (Ponal etc.). Etwa 1 Teil Leim mit 5 - 8 Teilen Wasser verdünnen, kommt nicht genau drauf an. Das Bett dünn und gleichmässig benetzen und das Wasser verdampfen lassen, es bleibt eine ultradünne Leimschicht, das Glas sieht ganz leicht milchig aus. Ich drucke PLA auf 55* Bett und die Teile haften perfekt, auch mit geringer Grundfläche, und lassen sich nach Erkalten des Betts leicht lösen.

This? https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:126716 Cheers, Thomas

Very, very impressive. Thanks for sharing.

On my iPad and iMac (Safari), the subject column of the forum topics pages has less line spacing than the columns on the right - number of replies etc. As a result, there is an increasing misalignment further down the list. Yesterday I saw for a first time that the right column with the time reference used two lines - which aggravates the misalignment. Maybe something that can be fixed.

The stl export plugin is a must-have if you use sketchup for 3d print design. Get it in the extensions warehouse: https://extensions.sketchup.com/de/content/sketchup-stl While you are there, you also want to get ThomThom's Solid Inspector2. It does what the name says and repairs most errors it finds - the 2nd must-have for 3d print design. Personally, I chose Sketchup as my CAD software because it seems fairly easy to learn and there is tons of online help. Works well for me - but since I didn't invest time into Autocad et al I can't compare. Happy printing.

As a fellow Mac user: I have been weary about upgrading to newer versions of Cura. Actually I believe I might still be running 15.04.03. Upgrades always came with improvements and drawbacks, so I decided to not fix whats not broken. I added and customized a Pronterface printing interface and tweaked a few things, but that's all. What I am trying to say: It is not Mac related. It takes a bit of patience to find a Cura version that works well for your set-up. Give upgrades a try, but if they don't work for you, they just don't. Stick to what works. Ymmv. Thomas

Jesse, stick with Sketchup for the moment - I have been using it for modelling and it is quite ok. I assume you merged your object into a group before exporting as stl file. In Sketchup, select the grouped object, open Window: Entity info: Does it tell you "Group" or "Solid group" up top? If it does not say "Solid", then the object is not watertight- it has a hole somewhere and that confuses the slicer (Cura). There is a nice Sketchup extension "Solid inspector" which shows you the hole so you can close it. Also, Cura will show you any problem area in x-ray view, as mentioned by nallath. Hope this helps, and good luck with your print. Thomas

Assist91: Since you bought your UMO used, there are a few maintenance things I would consider doing. First is to check if the alignment of your two 6mm printhead axes is ok. With the power off, you should be able to move the printhead in the x and y direction with two fingers; there is a little resistance, but it should be easily doable and it should be sort of even. If there is wobble in resistance you want to check for wobble in the axes. The UMO came with two template things to help align the axes. They fit over the 8mm x and y axes and have a bunch of circular grooves for the 6mm axes. If you don't have those check this thingy. The directions there explain how to adjust the alignment. This is pretty important. Before you check if all your pulleys and belts are tight, take a look at the positioning of the belts in the pullies. Ideally the belts run in the center of the pullies. Start with the short belts between motor shaft and axes. Then move the x and y sliding blocks close to the pullies and check that the belt goes to the center of the pulley. If not, loosen allen screw in pulley, slide over, re-tighten allen screw. I would go through all allen screws on all pulleys to make sure they are nice and tight. Next check that your belts are tight, especially the short ones. Taking off the 8 bearing caps at the upper front, left, right and back of the housing is easy, getting some of them back on is a pita because the nuts are hard to put where they need to go. But the caps might be a source of friction; there are several good printed replacements around. A drop or two of fine sewing machine oil on the printhead axes every few weeks will do them good. 8mm axes do not need oil, and z screw takes the stuff in the green plastic thing. I would also check that the sprocket on the feeder motor is nicely aligned with the large feeder wheel. And I would take a real close look at the feeder (i.e. take it apart) to see that all is clean and as it should be. Heated bed z-stage: I just upgraded my UMO with one and had the same z-steps issue despite sw update. I found that the housing is really close to the back wall; I might need to do some light sanding to prevent friction. If the power is off and I gently tap the bed, it will sink by itself. Happy with that. Also very happy with the 3 levelling screws. A well levelled bed is kinda essential for a good print. The best accessory by far that I printed for my UMO is the Z level adjuster. I level the bed with the 3 screws, then set the gap using this thingy. Works very well. So much for maintenance - I am sure others can contribute some valuable thought. 10) vertical walls: when printing with a 0.4 nozzle, make sure your walls are a multiple of 0.4. The 1 mm walls make the slicer do all sorts of things. The "Initial layer line width" under Cura advanced (I use 15.4.3) is quite usefull: It determines the spacing of the bottom lines in the horizontal direction. 80% means less gap, i.e. lines are closer together for a more solid layer. Hope you have fun with your printer.

Very impressive! How did you design the parts, decide on interal supports? Wingsspan and weight?

Awesome!

Ultimaker has some terrific brand loyalty, as this forum shows. But speaking for myself, this forum is seriously testing my patience. This forum's design and mechanics have a pretence of being oh so special. But when it comes to usability and function, it is simply a mess. (I just reviewed this post in preview; can I scroll in the editor window to see the start or end of the text? No.) I am 60 years old so it must be an age thing, but I fail to understand why users should be awarded with levels and points and likes and best answers and titles and icons. Some feedback is nice, but there appears to be some serious craving for awesomeness in all this. Anyway: Wiki? 3D printing is complex, there is so much to learn, there are so many helpful insights. Collect them in a wiki, fed by users? Makes a lot of sense, no? So I wonder why a wiki is left to die. My only answer: Ultimaker does not want to empower a community. So what is Ultimaker trying to prove? My 2c. No offence meant. Just don't understand the priorities.

Let me try: The white sleeve locks the tube in place. When the white sleeve is pushed all the way down, you can slide the tube in. Make sure it goes all the way in. If the end of the tube is in any way deformed, cut off a quarter inch with an exacto or any very sharp knife. Once it is in the correct place, you pull up the sleeve. This sqeezes the sleeve's little teeth together, grabbing and locking the tube. You now secure the sleeve in the up (lock) position with the blue spacer and your bowden tube should not move. There are various replacements for the blue thing on Thingyverse, also for the similar spacer at the feeder end. They are worth a try: http://www.thingiverse.com/thing:46318 http://www.thingiverse.com/thing:621862 Hope this helps.

Maybe this is a good place to say this again: A good wiki would really be very, very valuable. Almost 3500 topics in Troubleshooting and Maintenance says something. Its educational to dig through threads, but having a good knowledge base along with the discussion would be great.

What have you made: 175 topics Tips & Tricks: 506 topics Troubleshooting & Maintenance: 3466 topics Anyway: Love my UMO and enjoyed the read.

Bei Rechtsklick kommen bei mir auf dem Mac 3 Optionen: Druck per USB modem, gcode speichern und Log zeigen. Aber ich klicke einfach links und alles läuft. Dass der Drucker druckt, ohne zu heizen und das Bett zu bewegen, kann ich nicht erklären. Eines sollte man wissen: Neue Cura-Einstellungen (Temperatur etc.) werden nur an den Drucker geschickt, wenn man das Druck-Fenster geschlossen hat.