thalassa

A week after I got my UM3E, I managed to do this to a nozzle (with UM PLA): -- -- -- -- You can see what happened. Is there any hope for saving this nozzle, or should I just order another one?

I'm so frustrated with my UM3+ today! Printer worked fine yesterday for a 7.5 hour print in UM nylon. I tried the same print 3 times today in the same material, but at "fine" quality setting. All three failed at the beginning with the filament failing to stick to the plate. Before the third attempt I cleaned the plate and put on a new layer of glue. I also did an active leveling of the plate. I thought maybe nozzle 1 was getting clogged, so I put in a new AA print head and loaded UM PLA to calibrate the new head (1). The XY calibration has now failed three times. The PVA isn't sticking to the plate. I unloaded and reloaded the PVA to be sure there weren't issues with the feeder or the nozzle. Seemed fine. Here are photos of the last XY calibration fail. It looks to me like the z-offset for the BB head is off - it's really dragging through the PLA part of the calibration print. What do you see? Any advice? Something else to try? --- ---

Congrats on your UM3! We received our UM3+ a few weeks ago, and aside from a ton of trouble today, it's been performing well. I've been printing this test piece at normal and fine quality in different UM filaments: http://www.thingiverse.com/thing:1363023 It's a great test. Also very revealing was the overhang test: http://www.thingiverse.com/thing:1564848. So far, my UM3+ isn't performing very well at all on that one. I'm not impressed so far with the PLA/PVA dual prints. The PVA doesn't stick well to the PLA, so some overhangs aren't any better than not using any support at all. Plus, the PVA drops bits everywhere, and sometimes they end up between layers of PLA, which creates imperfections in the print. I started a thread on where to find filaments, and there is a lot of good advice in there about filaments themselves, too. Might be helpful for you: https://ultimaker.com/en/community/36101-best-us-distributor-for-um-filaments Have fun!

Thank you, @rowiac! Much appreciated.

That bin looks perfect, but of course it doesn't look like they offer that size on the US website. I'll keep looking! Hard to imagine needing to store more than 20 spools, but I'll order two if I can find them. And, a hygrometer! Now you're speaking my language ("librarian"). We use them to track temperature and humidity in our library spaces - I absolutely love the idea of extending our measurements to my filament bins!

Perfect! I even have some of this at home that I can bring in to work tomorrow. That's why I LOVE these forums! Thank you so much for taking the time to respond. Super helpful! <3

For the record, all my sh*t was deeply offended by your comment @SyntaxTerror Ha ha! Glad you took it okay... ;-) Thanks very much for the recommendations. I definitely missed a few of those in my shopping spree to get supplies. I did manage to buy 2-gallon Ziploc bags and desiccant for storing filament, and I'll leave the new ones unopened until I need them. The UM filaments that came with the unit were double shrink-wrapped, which was nice. I'll have to check the ColorFabb ones. How do you like to store your filaments - in a drawer or bin, out on the shelf ...?

Thank you, @ClausJ - also helpful to know who to AVOID.

Thank you! Somewhat helpful to see these, but not very helpful in terms of getting advice about what tools to keep on hand, what kind of storage works well, etc. Definitely gave me a laugh to see people with sh*t everywhere! That's what I'm trying to avoid. Tangent: It would be super helpful if I could search the forum for threads. I have no idea where to look for topics like this, and there's no reasonable what to click through pages and pages of threads. I'm working with a blank slate at the moment. Definitely need more storage!

Hi all! I just ordered our UM3 Extended and want to prepare our space for it's arrival. [i apologize if this has been asked before, but without a search feature, I couldn't find a similar thread on this in the forum.] I'm wondering how you like to set up your printer area. How do you keep flaments organized? What tools do you keep on hand? Any tips or tricks for a functional 3D printing space? Bonus points for sharing photos!

Thank you, @LePaul! I'll be sure the check these stores out. I like the idea of quick shipping! Side note: I spent a summer at the Darling Marine Center in Damariscotta. Beautiful area! [waves from all the way over on the other coast]

This is extremely helpful - thank you, @krys! I found a good selection of filaments at 3DUniverse, but it's hard to tell which ones are good quality vs. just being expensive. I really appreciate your recommendations.

Thanks for sharing this! It is interesting, but I agree - still many questions. Also, I find it maddening when they test things in inches. mm or microns would be so much more useful. I've found that most companies share information regarding XYZ accuracy, which is important, but I've only seen Formlabs address the issue of feature resolution. That, in itself, is interesting!