Cura 15.06 / 15.04: Spiralized Vase, Stutter Scar

[lars86 42]

I'm not sure what is going on here, but with a very clean, fully solid model of a very circular vase, I bring it into Cura, set the shell for one pass, enable spiral outer contour, infill is 0, and uncheck solid top.

The layer view looks perfect, but in the same spot on each lap (but not every single lap) Cura makes a little stutter move with the print head. It basically moves backwards 1-2mm then forwards. It is almost hard to see with your eye unless you are looking for it, but the print shows a telltale scar.

It seems to migrate diagonally up the print, and doesn't happen on every single layer. Is there a setting that can avoid this bug?

Edited July 8, 2015 by Guest

[nallath 1,120]

Could you post a picture of this?

[lars86 42]

Could you post a picture of this?

[lars86 42]

Repetier shows it, but I can't see the move in Cura layer view.

Edited June 2, 2015 by Guest

[lars86 42]

Here is the Gcode:

https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/60958586/Doggy%20Vase.gcode

[nallath 1,120]

That is weird. Could you post an issue on the github about this?

[mechamecha 64]

Yeah, the only time I tried out the spiralize feature, nearly a year ago, I got the same type of scarring. It was especially noticeable because I was using blue t-glase.

[lars86 42]

That is weird. Could you post an issue on the github about this?

I haven't used Github much, so not exactly sure of the process.

[hp-65 4]

Yep, here's your code, visualized:

Coming from the right, going too far, then moving back

with the G00 command...

[nallath 1,120]

https://github.com/Ultimaker/CuraEngine/issues <- There is a new button issue.

It helps if you post the following things;

1. What did you do to cause the problem? (Steps of the problem, data we can use to reproduce it)

2. Why do you think this is a problem (eg; What did you expect would happen and what actually happend)

[lars86 42]

Thanks, submitted it.

[lars86 42]

Well, I wouldn't hold your breath for a fix. They don't seem to care in the least:

https://github.com/Ultimaker/CuraEngine/issues/214

This is the first time I've heard the Ultimaker crew have such a bad attitude.

[SandervG 1,521]

Hi lars86,

Thank you for your message. Sorry to hear your idea is not being acted upon.

It would be an improvement for sure, but currently we are also working on The New Cura which keeps our dev. team very busy. So even though it would be an improvement, it may not receive our priority right now like BagelOrb says. Since Cura is open source, perhaps you could be part of the solution?

[lars86 42]

Hi lars86,

Thank you for your message. Sorry to hear your idea is not being acted upon.

It would be an improvement for sure, but currently we are also working on The New Cura which keeps our dev. team very busy. So even though it would be an improvement, it may not receive our priority right now like BagelOrb says. Since Cura is open source, perhaps you could be part of the solution?

 

It turns out that the link I followed to report the bug is for the new Cura development. I tried the same print in the latest Cura beta, and found a similar bug exists in the new engine as well. I documented it, and uploaded all pertinent files.

I'm happy to help, but not sure what else I can do. I'm a mechanical engineer, not a programmer. I have plenty of improvement ideas for the build platform, hot end, print head, etc

[gr5 2,170]

This is a recent (ish) problem with Cura.  The position where each layer starts changes a bit on each layer. I would guess this was introduced roughly in December.  Cura worked fantastically well even 2 years ago.  So I would try one of these older versions.  In fact I recommend 13.01 (jan 2013).  also try 13.04 which was a completely different slicing engine - and much slower!  But it worked fine:

http://software.ultimaker.com/old/

You can install multiple copies of Cura (one windows - don't think it works on Mac) and they are treated like different programs.

Edited June 6, 2015 by Guest

[gr5 2,170]

This is the first time I've heard the Ultimaker crew have such a bad attitude.

 

Daid is very nice in person but can sound harsh at times in his quickly written comments.  Just to help you understand how spiralize works - and how slicers work:

First realize that STL is a list of 3D triangles with no relationship between the triangles (STL doesn't say which touch each other).  The slicer intersects a plane (current slice) with every triangle.  Some intersect the plane as a line (the rest don't intersect at all).  Now you have a bunch of random line segments in no particular order.

Next the slicer tries to figure out which line segments are associated with each other although the endpoints are often slightly different due to floating point rounding.  You should end up with a bunch of looped chains of line segments.  You then print *inside* those loops (or outside if it's a hole inside a larger loop).  Anyway there's lots more details (special cases for bridging, multiple passes, infill, overhangs, line segments too short, and more).

Spiralize cheats - it just says - hey this layer has e.g. 300 line segments so instead of moving Z up .1mm at the end we will move it .1/300 for every line segment.  And it mostly works.

The next slice above is supposed to start as close as possible to the previous point where you end a slice.  That code seems to be broken or more likely maybe your vase just doesn't have enough triangles to find one close enough.  I guess ideally you want all your triangles to have a vertical edge and hope the slicer uses the vertical edge instead of the sloping edge when picking layer change spots.

Daid says "spiralize is a hack" and it is but intersecting a plane with triangles is easy.  How do you intersect a spiral with a set of triangles?  There's no one correct solution.  how do you pick the center of the spiral?  What if the STL has many posts?  Where is the center one?

Also everyone wants to use multiple threads to slice even faster but to do that you can't have different layers knowing much about the previous layer otherwise they would have to wait for the previous layer to slice.  So it would be nice if you could start each layer at any old random spot.

Ideally spiralize should first find a continuous path as vertical as possible up the side of the vase. I'm 90% sure it doesn't do that - that would be a nice feature for non spiralize prints also!

Edited June 6, 2015 by Guest

[lars86 42]

Thanks makes sense, thanks for posting!

I definitely don't think this issue is a result of lacking mesh density. Here is my model:

It seems to me that you could accomplish it one of two ways:

Find the closest line segment on the next slice to the ending vertex, then linearly interpolate to the nearest point on that segment, and have the first move of the next layer be a print move from the ending vertex to the interpolated close point. This is certainly more intensive in coding and in processing.

An alternative could be just to find the closest vertex on the next layer, which is generally in the same direction as the last print move. You could find the closest two vertices, one should be "ahead" of the nozzle, and the other behind. Then, you look at the average delta X and delta Y over the last 'n' number of print moves, and see which of the two vertices has deltas in the same direction(s). Again, the first move of the next "layer" is a linear segment from the ending vertex to the closest forward vertex.

[lars86 42]

I also agree that any improvements in this logic could help results in non-spiral prints as well. Another reason this should be treated with some significance.

[titanoid 4]

With the Olsson Block and a .8mm nozzle, I do a lot of spiralized prints with 1.2mm walls and .6mm layer height. Good for vases and lamp shades, and I like the fat shiny visible print lines.

But in an otherwise absolutely flawless print this visible scar sucks indeed!

1. So is there a workaround?

2. I didn't test it with the new Cura so far, has someone?

3. And (sadly) is there another slicer that does a "clean" spiralize?

[gr5 2,170]

Try the new cura! The slicing engine was rewritten - I'm sure it has all new bugs! But god rid of many others.

[lars86 42]

Try the new cura!  The slicing engine was rewritten - I'm sure it has all new bugs!  But god rid of many others.

 

Great to see the new version has gone official!

I just tested this spiral vase in 15.06.01 and found that instead of a small stutter backwards at "layer changes", it now rapids forwards leaving a gap. It is actually two rapid moves, one larger and one smaller move. If instead of these two rapids, we made a printing move which ended at the final XY coordinates, it would probably work perfectly. I hope they can fix this!

[titanoid 4]

One of the old Cura versions did that too in spiralize. Think it was 14.07.

So no luck with this...

As the new Cura Engine was built to be enhanced by plugins, I'm hoping that someone who codes will be able and willing to add a new spiral plugin.

Oh, and while we're at this: some more dirty experimental parameters could be added, like this.

Just dreaming around8)

[gothampixel 10]

I would be so happy if this was something that could be fixed. I never understood why Spiralize would have a Z scar as it's slowly increasing the z height the whole time. I gave up on this feature because of the scar.

[eldrick 65]

"You can install multiple copies of Cura (one windows - don't think it works on Mac) and they are treated like different programs."

Of course it works on a Mac. I've had multiple versions installed on my mac several times, due to regression-caused bugs.

And if you want spiralize, try Slic3r - the newest "stable" version is much more Cura-like, with some really useful features.

[lars86 42]

Good call. Slic3r 1.2.9 generates some very nice code for spiralized prints. I like how there is a Z position call on every line as well. Cura seems to post them more sporadically (though I'm not sure there would be a physical difference in the print).

I do still hope Cura can be made right in this sense.