How would you print this?

[jimo 0]

Hi there,

I'm pretty much sold on the UM and should be buying one shortly. I am hoping to get some early advice on how this piece(image below) should be printed, in terms of its orientation? At first, I thought laying it down on its back with the detailed face being on top, but after some reading I now understand the top finish face of the print is usually not the best. Is it best to stand it up as you see it in the image? Do you think the ends would need some support? How would you handle this piece, considering I can model in supports or other needs?

I would also like to ask about long print time. Do you think the UM can handle long sessions of printing? If everything was in good order, could it handle a solid week of printing? I understand it would need some work/adjustments during that time, but is it durable enough to do 18 hour prints every day for 10 days?

Big thanks for any help.

[IRobertI 521]

I'd print it as it stands in the right side of the pic. I think you might be able to print that without support with thin layers. I'd mostly be worried about the overhang at the bottom right. But if need be you can just turn on support in the slicer and it'll handle that for you. Since support should only be needed on the right and possibly left side (as seen in the left side of the pic) it will be a quick easy clean as well.

As for reliability and long printing, it'll get the job done. Personally my longest print is only 5-6 hours but others have done 10+ without problems.

edit: Btw, that object there wouldn't take that long to print, not even close.

[jimo 0]

Thanks Robert. Happy to hear your confidence in the machine. Would you stand it up because of the reason I mentioned, that the top face is usually the worst of the printed object? Just trying to confirm if this is a problem or not.

I was hoping to print several of this and similar objects at the same time, making for long prints. Would jumping be a concern here? I've heard certain softwares/parameters are better at jumping between areas of print than others. Any advice on this? Though it is most likely something I will learn as I get into it.

THanks again.

[IRobertI 521]

Yes it's to preserve detail. I'm not sure how to put it into words exactly but if you print that object lying down each layer will see a bigger change from layer to layer. Say you want to print out a football (or soccer if you prefer that name) and you can only cut it up into 10 slices compared to 100. If instead you stand it up the change in geometry gets "spread out" over more layers. Not sure if I'm making sense here but there you go hehe. In addition to that point there will also be a TON of jumps to go between the peaks and that will generally produce worse quality.

What you want to have working well for jumping between objects, or just jumping in general, is what's called retraction. As soon as the printer stops pushing out filament you will have ooze coming out of the nozzle. If the print head moves while it's oozing it will leave strings that needs to be cleaned. With retraction the machine will pull filament back before jumping in an attempt to stop this oozing from happening. These days retraction is working pretty well on the Ultimaker (it wasn't always that way) and you can get quite clean prints even with jumping. This may require some tweaking depending on what you're trying to print though, it's not quite as easy as checking a box in the software quite yet (but the default settings in cura for example are already quite good).

[Daid 306]

As for reliability and long printing, it'll get the job done. Personally my longest print is only 5-6 hours but others have done 10+ without problems.

Two of our robot printers where clocking 72 hours today, and then we had to restart it because the file ran out.

A flat top is the hardest part to get right. I think this photo (one of my first prints) shows most of the problems that you can have:

http://daid.eu/~daid/IMG_20111024_195339.jpeg

Improved print:

http://daid.eu/~daid/IMG_20120930_192508.jpg

Note that there was lots of software improvements between these two prints.

[jimo 0]

Really appreciate your help guys.

If I can ask a little more on this. I also read somewhere, tilting the model will help with the top surface. Is this true? If I built a support base to allow it to stand at an angle, would this help the top? Not that I will do this to the example shown, just to know other options.

So I'm about to buy the printer in the next week or two. What else should I order with it? I've heard of a device to measure the filement, is that still needed? Is that something I can buy at my local hardware? Anything else? I will go with Cura at the start, any spares I should get with the printer?

Thanks again.

[greengecko 8]

I would put it simply, if you print it standing up you can use the higher resolution of the z axis. If you lay it down you could have some problems with warping of the sides (depends how solid you need the print) and also you most likely see some steps on top (also you need retraction).

So I would also opt for standing up.

[Daid 306]

I recommend getting digital calipers and an UltiController. And PLA.

[jimo 0]

A quick question on warping with my same example, in the standing up position. Would placing holes in the back side of this help? Considering the holes won't go all the way through to the detailed face? My guess is yes as it should help ease the overall tension.

2 week wait for the machine has started.