cloakfiend

was trying a chem bath, and realized weird diagonal lines on my latest print. these are my mystery lines I get and have no idea what causes them. Im assuming there is a very slight curve on the model causing a step even on the barrel, otherwise I have no clue as the top should be perfectly smooth and flat as it was printed flat? will try again as usual. It may be bad topology as there is a lot of intersecting geometry, which complicates things.

That block looks fine, and better than mine did. I think you dont really know until you use it. The bottom of it looks like it was printed hot hence the colour. It does not look underextruded. 99% of under extrusion for my um2 was feeder or nozzle related, or printing too cold with too many retractions which cool things even further. So once you eliminate those issues, you should be fine. You are risking sending back a machine that is perfectly fine. I once bought a plasma tv and send it back 2 times, but wish now i kept the second one because i though it worked quieter than the one i ended up with. Tangles are very likely. People say they are rare and dont happen, but sometimes certain filaments just unwind badly during prints regardless of how well you keep them in check and cause print issues. Doesnt mean there is an issue with the printer. A more powerful feeder just makes it easier to print without getting most of the issues people got with the um2 and its clicking madness that drove me crazy, but cleaning the nozzle usually helped. Move the head around with your hand and check for any play, if it moves about smoothly and evenly without any wobbling then id say youre fine. Surely you cant judge an entire printer on one or two test prints.

From what I can see, you're model has little to no thickness and that is why it is not printing most of it. Make the shell thicker. Use the shell modifier in max and set it to inwards (obviously)

Always wanted to print a gun, now i have! mini desert eagle. the first time i saw this gun was in robocop when it was given to a bloke to shoot ed209. Loved the look of it, even as a child, lol.

Thanks, im just trying the best i can, i cant do much better unfortunately, the printer says no, lol. ive yet to work with smaller nozzles but i hate waiting for prints. ive also noticed more cooling issues during multiple prints because of retractions which forced me to raise the temps by 7 degrees. my over-extruded pineapples....

Latest print, ive given up on fake nozzle sizes and am back to printing at o.o6. plating stages process in pics.

I just got this problem today! Lol. I printed the same object three times and even bent my fans to try to improve it, but nothing. It seemed like the back right side was affected. I feel the uneven fan may be to blame a touch, but i think if i printed two at the same time it would solve the problem, i dont normally get this but i tend not to print small stuff so i think thats why. The slight overhang (very minor) seems like it triggered it. It only occurs on stuff about 1cm in diameter with no infill, i presume because the layers simply dont hav enough time to cool. I may try again in the name of science, but now my fans are stupidly bent, lol. Oh well theres always something in ths game!!

I set the temp during the first 10-20mins. after that its down to the gods.

How do you prevent the case from wobbling if you print it vertically, as i get wobbling if i print to high and too thin, especially near the top?

And a pineapple, the body came out perfect, but since installing the OB i have some issues with thin bits, or I just need to print two at a time to give it time to cool more. Not sure. Fingers are also a problem, i don't seem to remember having these issues before, maybe the new head and feeder upgrade will solve this....who knows....

And another...

Lol, asking a question without providing any details of the settings and materials you are using is like asking a mechanic whats wrong with your car over the phone saying somethings wrong and you want it fixed. You havent even stated if your using infill or not? But then again I remember my first question, as it was to post good settings. One thing you will learn is that there are no good settings for everyone. But only good advice. Asking for exact settings will only give you false hope. Good luck, try 18% infill, print cooler and slower than whatever youre settings are and go from there.

The main thing that all people need to consider is that post work is essential even if its only a bit. nothing comes out perfect from any printer from what ive seen. Things need to be finished, polished, glossed whatever. People with less post-work experience will simply not produce the same quality of print finish as those with more. Its that simple. You need to want it to look good and know what to do to get it the way you want. Sometimes it take time, sometimes not. Just practice and i would definitely recommend needle files for seam lines if you are gluing things. After acetoneing glued objects, the acetone melts them together so when you sand the seam down, often you dont even need any filler as the melt has fused the seam together! I personally like to get things as good as i can before i paint them, but everyone has their methods and don't expect everyone to do things the same way. Superglue is NOT affected by acetone BTW. And this is a very useful fact.

For organic stuff just buy Zbrush, you wont regret it, unless you wont useit much if you get bored, but i am now creating organic things far faster on Zbrush than any regular 3d prog. Blender is free, but i use 3dsmax or maya it makes no difference as you will have to learn something. maya has a steep learning curve, but download them all and try them out nearly all software has 30 day trials, so just learn them all one month after the next and stick to the one you ike the most. There are thousands of tutorials fro all of them, if you are serious you can sign up to lynda.com or fxphd digital tutors, gnomon....the list goes on. It al depends on how serious you are in learning all the ways of modelling whaich are changing day by day and release after release. So something you will learn now may change in a year or two. But the basics or polygons/nurbs/quads remains. they are the building blocks of 3D and polycount will always limit your creations because too many and your hardware will die or give up unless you are very experienced with handling them. games cheat and use displacement maps and normal textures to mimic high polys but if you want to print it it has to be there for real!! A lot to learn but once you know, you can make ANYTHING, and have a go at printing it later. Until then you are stuck downloading mostly rubbish or expensive models that you dont even know how to alter! Time is all you need and motivation.

I've only use cura 15.04.02, but id actually like to experiment with another slicer to see if those weird vertical lines are less visible, as they are the only thing preventing me from making perfectly smooth prints at the moment.

I agree because whatever you do, if you have lines, you will inevitably reduce the detail in your model which is why i like to print high and either over paint, or simply coat my object in a way that i keep going until the lines are gone. There are many many ways. Mine is not the only one obviously but its very easy and you dont need to overspray which i find can make some areas bulge on flat surfaces due to the paint rolling according to gravity, chemically treating it means you dont need as much spray hence avoiding this issue, but it all depends onthe look you are going for or you just need to use more smaller layer of spraypaint. Your witcher medalion looks really nice btw and the metal look real! lol The only real alternative is to print it with a different printer but that will cost you more money which is what i am trying to avoid as a hobbyist.

The vertical lines are speed related lines which are more visible the faster you print and the thinner the layers, i have no idea how to remove them other than print slowly, but i'm very impatient and want things quickly and effortlessly and cheaply like many other people out there so i tend to push the speed and flow a bit too much. From a very perfect point of view, if you analyzed it very close, subtle lines are still visible, but even for me they are not a problem. These layers are not visible after an under coat, you will always see the layers after post treatment in some form or another, but the sacrifice is that you lose definition the more you smooth. If i wanted something very smooth i would first give it a very light sand to scrape of the tiny imperfections of the printer, then treat it longer, then buff it and it would be perfect. But you need to be careful as too much acetone can crack your model, even many months later! and aggressive post work can also damage the quality! There are a few other chemicals like thf and dioxane and chloroform that smooth PLA but they are more expensive and much more toxic, and start to literally eat the pla which is not what i want, i personally prefer subtle lines that i can sand away compared to the melted ABS vapour look which destroys all details. If you want it shiny, then just spray it with gloss. My models are sculpts mainly from Zbrush exported directly as OBJs and clean up very easily after prints, the one above was not sanded and you can see how it looks in the print section after a metal coat, but here is a pic anyway.... You can see other surface treatments of this object (painted on) in the prints section if you are interested to see what the undercoat looked like, or the matt coat....

Ok, i've had enough experimenting and i think ive found the best smoothing compromise without too much whitening, which I have a very bizarre way of dealing with to some extent. here are my latest tests....

Ok so heres the black print. came out real nice with no whitening at all. you can see the tiny speed lines, but that is just the nature of reflective materials as i have my flash on which it brings out any details. the main thing is no print lines. i can deal with those ultra fine vertical print lines, besides im sure if i applied more smoothing it may evennget rid of them. i rushed this one as i was testing out my theory behind whitening which appears to be correct...i still have a few more tests to run before i decode which method is best for which purpose. i spent longer doing the blue one btw. this was a quick job fastest yet, maybe 7 seconds of post work. i have a theory about removing those remaining ling but we'll see... it might be down to the particular filament.

Yes funnily enough! this was printed directly after the grey painted one before it same blue filament too, and the same overextrusion that i have been playing with to save time. Im doing a black filament one now which will show exactly how much white i'm getting with my newer experimental smoothing method. And absolutely ZERO sanding as usual. Looks real nice to me and if i can reproduce this everytime, then i dont see my self moving from the UM2 anytime soon. I have a lot of detail in the model too such as beard hairs and sharp edges around the eyelids and such which also survived the smoothing process unlike any vapour method i've seen. I hope that the bearing hold up, but only time will tell, im putting a lot of sewing oil on the all the cross bars as it appears to help quite a lot. I have been regularly oiling them every second day or so and feel that this is essential now. I may need to lube up the main screw though as its much less green (excess lube) than my old one. I'll post the black one up when I get back.

Cheers! seeing as they need to be swapped out eitherway, i may as well go for the high quality bearings! I can afford 5€ each as i feel they are important considering they directly effect the quality of the print. Im assuming they are both the right shape and will fit just fine? Ill see how long my current ones last as the problem is just beginning, and drowning them in sewing oil is proving quite effective in clearing up the issues a bit. I may also have a bend rod somewhere but having left the printer printing random stuff constantly has ironed out the weird sqeaking noise so at least its not driving me crazy anymore.

Don't worry this used to happen to me all the time, you just need to do more proper atomic pulls. like up to 30 if need be! and do another 5 or 6 after it looks good. use white and look real close for ANY imperfections. you must have either had a jam at one point that wasn't serious that burnt the material in the nozzle. Don't ever increase temps to offset a blocked nozzle, you will just end up completely blocking it and making your nozzle cleaning routine job harder in the long run. I call what you have a slow jam, its not apparent first and everything prints fine but eventually completely jams and doesnt finish the print. Once you learn what blocks your nozzle, i.e. too low temps or long print with too high temps and slightly blocked nozzle, or changed material without flushing enough new material through....you'll soon learn. Atomic pulls are not necessary unless you get jams. I havent done any since the start of december and i've used than 7 different materials of different consistencies, transparent, old um filament and colorfabb (plain ones, not woodfill/carbon/fx mats or stuff like that though), and have had no real issues. I think i did one just out of curiosity because i wanted to see how my new machine sounded in comparison to my old. I used to do atomic pulls before each print and it drove me nuts! Not anymore, but you need to be able to do them just in case.just make a cup of tea and do like 30 in a row, it will take a while but its the only way to learn. An hour later you'll be a pro and will be able to leave you printer knowing it wont get jammed. This is also another issue of printing on the roll, if it gets snagged its likely you'll get a jam sooner or later. Its bound to happen, I have many filament that arrived tangled on the roll. I've just given up printing like that and have never looked back.

Thanks! Any trustworthy place to get them or just anywhere, is there anywhere to avoid or are they all pretty much the same. At least they appear dirt cheap. 10 for 4 pounds or 2 for 2 pounds. Eitherway less than a pint of beer, lol. Do i need two or 4 or more?