plasmageek

Jake, I think you and I are in the same position. Our PLA layer is only 0.1 mm in most places, with PVA under it for support. We've set all of our layers to print thin. This may be part of what is causing issues. I am trying to swap between our PVA's now, with one always in a bag with desiccant. and one on the printer, and changing between the prints. We'll see if it makes a difference. Our next problem to fix is PLA warping....

Thanks for the replies and tips! It's good to know the PVA tip needs to be cleaned more often. I'll just make that a standard practice at least every two prints. Our prints are pretty large and tend to take 20+ hours. It normally goes wrong pretty early, but it would be frustrating to have it happen towards the end. I have noticed that I have to do the cold pull multiple times, even when the hot pull comes out clean. I haven't noticed the PVA pop and crackle, but I will keep an ear out. Dry boxes aren't expensive, so we could feasibly get one and rotate rolls. I've cleaned the feeder twice now, because I noticed that chunks were missing from the PVA and was worried it was gunking up the feeder. It was pretty messy in there both times and there was a nice pool of PVA dust just below the feed as well. I loosened it some more after yesterday's cleaning. It seems to still be feeding fine, but without so many chunks missing. There are still some, but they're considerably smaller than previously. I'm still not sure why that's happening. Another group member thought it was because the nozzel wasn't heating properly and therefore getting stuck. I could see if the PVA got stuck at the nozzel side that the feeder would spin on the same bit of PVA and might take some chunks out, but we can't really stop to clean mid-print (can we?).

Hi, We're printing with PVA and finding it really inconsistent. Some times it prints with relatively little issue and other days it doesn't print well at all and we end up with a rat's nest. I've also noticed that chunks of PVA are getting ripped out by the feeder. We actually had it print the best after I took the feeder apart and cleaned it (note our machine is only about 2 months old now). I loosened the tightness on the feeder after the last cleaning in case that was causing the issue, but after two prints (we're onto the third) it's back to printing awful. I've cleaned the head multiple times (sometimes it looks like the materials burns a bit) in addition to having cleaned the feeder. We're at 7300 sea level in the desert, so I haven't been worried about humidity. I've been working mostly with PLA as the main material. I use the main settings in Cura and haven't messed with the temperature values. I'm wondering if anybody has any advice? Thanks!