Screen v gCode Layers v Pause at Height

[DaHai8 69]

Riddle me this:

Why do the Cura Screen Layers start at 1 while the gCode Layers start at 0 (zero)?

Why does the "Pause at Height" Post Processing Extension use millimeters instead of Layer Numbers?

Basically, the way it stands right now, if I want to pause the print at a particular height to change filament I must:

1. Enable Layer View in Cura and note the layer number I want to print with the new color on.

2. Subtract 1 from that because gcode layers numbers start at 0 while Cura layers start at 1

3. Save the gcode out to disk.

4. Search for that Layer # and write down the Z height it prints at

5. Delete the gcode save in step 3

6. Go back into Cura and edit the Pause at Height to insert the correct Z height in MM

7. Save the gCode again and print it.

I'm thinking that if Cura starting number layers in the Layer view at 0 and the Pause at Height plugin used layer numbers, it would make swapping filament and the like a whole lot easier.

Or am I missing something supidfyingly obvious?

[berndjm 15]

Mmmh ...

doing a little mathematics would make the life easier ;-)

Assuming you have the following in your print profile:

Layer Height: 0.1mm

Initial Layer Height: 0.2mm

No you want to Pause at Height at Layer No 10

So you have 1 x 0.2 + 9 x 0.1 = 1.1 mm

No fiddling with layer numbers and so on needed ...

[DaHai8 69]

Then add a raft and its another variable to factor in.

Question is, why should we have to?

[berndjm 15]

Shure, you're right, "why should we have to" do such calculations when a clever software can do this automaticly.

I only want to show that the 7 steps in your post are not necessary if you do a little math ...

[DaHai8 69]

Well, to paraphrase Barbie "Math is hard" , so I wrote a new plugin: Pause at Layer

Ok, basically I just took Pause at Height and modified it to work off Cura GUI Layer numbers instead of Z mm values....

For anyone interested, I'm happy to share the code here or anywhere it is appropriate to do so. Just let me know.

Example print:

I didn't get all the Black out of the print head before printing with Golden, so there's a bit of a bleed-in between the two. My bad, not the plugin's.

Edited August 7, 2016 by Guest