CURA Ultimaker Cura 4.0 | Stable available!

[kmanstudios 1,120]

2 hours ago, ahoeben said:

Now you have a choice, even if you don't like the default option.

I am always up for options :)

 

[alan-bc 1]

If I could add a feature request, it would be to add the option to run the program with Imperial units.  I don't mean simply STL input being scaled appropriately, I mean every setting related to a distance measurement available as mm or thousandths of an inch, cm or inches.

 

As it is, I get to haul out a calculator and press buttons hundreds of times, doing something these computer things are pretty good at by themselves.

 

Strangely, among all the engineering software out there, only 3D printing software is so myopic.  I'm unaware of ANY other CAD program that does not allow you to select the units you choose to operate in.

 

(If "most of the world is metric" is the criteria, why are the menus in English?  Why not Mandarin, Hindi and Spanish, those three covering off about 80% of the world's population?)

 

I don't want to start a flame war about switching.  I'm fully "bilingual", as it were, 1 cm and 1 inch both having perfectly clear meanings to me.  But after 50 years as a machinist, having started in Imperial, Imperial is my preferred choice, and all my measuring equipment, from calipers to micrometers to dial gauges to rulers to digital readouts are all imperial.  All my machinery is Imperial, including my Austrian made EMCO lathe!

 

The internals could remain metric, as could the config files.  But if "Imperial" was selected in the preferences, then whenever a distance was shown, a divide by 2.54 could be performed.  And when exporting GCode, a G20 would be used (with suitable scaling) instead of G21.

 

Again, I can easily do this manually and indeed, do so now.  But really, in 2019, do I need to use a calculator when sitting in front of a computer?

 

 

 

 

 

[rburema 26]

Hi @alan-bc Concerning languages, translation options are available 'out of the box' from the Preferences menu (the Polish language is currently missing due to a misscommunication, but it's a pretty solid list otherwise including among others Standard and Taiwanese Chinese and Spanish, which you mentioned ... sadly, we don't seem to have Hindi).

 

Concerning Imperial Units, while it's not exaclty what you asked for, there is a plugin that might help depening on what you need: it converts Imperial units to Metric, available in the Marketplace.

 

edits #1 & #2: fix typo's

Edited April 12, 2019 by rburema

[MIO 8]

13 hours ago, alan-bc said:

If I could add a feature request, it would be to add the option to run the program with Imperial units.  I don't mean simply STL input being scaled appropriately, I mean every setting related to a distance measurement available as mm or thousandths of an inch, cm or inches.

 

 

 

I understand it must be a hard time for you guys. But keep using the Imperial system (Which cannot be named a system given the fact that there are no any logical correlation between units!), will make it even harder. The mordern world is build on relaiable standards that everybody use. You may already noticed i write this in English. That is the given standard for international communication. The Metrical system is the given standard for international measurements.

I think the Imperial system is an tumor of the standardization of measurement. Feeding it will make it an even greater problem. I would recommend the United States of America and some developing countries with them, to ban every occurrence of Imperial units and switch over to Metric as fast as possible. That will be the least painful way. Later or sooner you will use it anyway.

 

Edited April 12, 2019 by MIO

[Brulti 177]

I learned recently that the USA isn't using the Metric System due to pirates, even though it was officially placed in the law. The more you know, and how small events can have big effects! 😉

 

@MIO This forum is hardly the place to have that good old discussion about Imperial vs Metric and which system is best, and @alan-bc specifically mentioned that he wasn't looking to start a flame war about switching. This thread is about CURA, and if having the option of switching to Imperial units helps @alan-bc and other users in their everyday use of CURA and their UM printers, then I'm all for it.

 

I have literally zero knowledge of the amount of work that coding such a thing would require, plus testing and such, but, from the user point of view, I would agree that it would be useful feature for those who are in countries that use Imperial units. After all, we can already chose the language and the currency units to use, and the software let me put it in French and the currency in $, for example, without a fuss.

Edited April 12, 2019 by Brulti

[MIO 8]

@Brulti True, but it makes an good argument of not implementing such request in Cura.

 

[Brulti 177]

1 minute ago, MIO said:

@Brulti True, but it makes an good argument of not implementing such request in Cura.

 

 

@MIO From my point of view, it doesn't. Not putting Imperial units in CURA won't force people to change. Those who live in the USA and other countries using Imperial units, or who work with or for companies using Imperial units will still have to use Imperial units in their everyday jobs and lives.

 

The only that would change is if the law in those countries changes and they impose Metric once and for all. Much like when the Euro was imposed in many EU countries. We'd still be using our old national currencies if there hasn't been for a change in law that forced everyone to switch and said that the only valid currency was going to be the € from 01/01/2002.

[ahoeben 1,948]

16 hours ago, alan-bc said:

The internals could remain metric, as could the config files.  But if "Imperial" was selected in the preferences, then whenever a distance was shown, a divide by 2.54 could be performed.  And when exporting GCode, a G20 would be used (with suitable scaling) instead of G21.

 

Question: what nozzle diameter does your printer have? If I were to guess, I would say 0,015748". Is that a nice number to have all widths depend on? What is the wall width if use 3 extrusion thicknesses? 0,0472441". Do you really want to think in those numbers? 0.4mm and 1.2mm respectively sound like much more workable numbers.

 

I have never seen a 3d printer that is based on imperial units. 3d printers are intrinsically based on metric units. This may be different from CNC machines, I don't know. But Cura is designed for 3d printers.

[alan-bc 1]

17 hours ago, alan-bc said:

If I could add a feature request, it would be to add the option to run the program with Imperial units. 

I will reply to my own quote as a means of replying to all and getting it in a single message.

 

I'll begin by saying that I'm not American, I'm Canadian, and my country is officially bilingual linguistically.  French and English are enshrined in law as equal, with all packaging, labelling, instructions and so forth required to be bilingual, all government services available in both languages, etc.  We are also "bilingual" in terms of measurements, with metric being the preferred choice of units but imperial being perfectly acceptable as well.  Admittedly, old folks have problems visualizing a mm, but youngsters have little idea what an inch is.  The reality is that it doesn't matter; young or old, we have no real concept of a light-year or an angstrom, they are just units we deal with.

 

My problem is that I wish to have a better understanding of the 3D printing process at a LOW level.  My Tevo Tarantula turns out quite acceptable parts BUT the first ones were just OK.  So over time, I've updated the printer enormously to the point that there's very little left of the original.  Of course I've stiffened it substantially, mounting it to a 1/2" thick solid aluminum base, ACCURATELY squaring and reinforcing all corners.  I've gone with linear slides, servo motors and ball screws, external heating controllers and so forth.

 

But even so, there are anomalies in the parts produced that I don't quite understand, and I'd like to understand.  To that end, I'd like to do away with the existing firmware running on Arduino boards and go with the same CNC software that runs all my subtractive machining devices (and does so perfectly.  When I hear people talking about "missing steps", I just cringe.)

 

And I want to use the units I'm comfortable with, and experienced with, and in this day and age, that's not too big an ask, especially, as stated before, every other "engineering" like software package allows it.

 

Now, some of the problems are with the process itself.  Cura, for example, supplies extrusion parameters to 5 degrees of precision.  That's 100 angstroms!  Really?  We're asking that cheap Chinese stepper motor to slice to angstrom accuracy?  There just aren't enough microsteps in the world to do that.

 

But others?  I'm not so sure.  Acceleration, maybe?  Could too rapid a direction change (or too slow) affect accuracy?  Do we need to adjust extruder temperature based on feed rate? (A directional change almost always results in some sort of speed change.)

 

Anyway, I'd like to find out.

 

Now, to respond to just a few of the posters who took the time to write ...

 

Brulti, let me ask you, do you drive a car?  If so, what size are your tires?  16"? 17"? 

 

And if, as you suggest, my country forces me to work in metric only, what about my existing machines?  I have four lathes, two big and two very small, two CNC and two manual, two from Europe, two from the US.  All have imperial leadscrews.  I have three milling machines, one manual, one large CNC, one small CNC (that I use for routing printed circuit boards).  All are imperial.  Indeed, the PCB machine uses a 100,000 RPM spindle from Germany that takes 1/8" toolbits.  Not 3 mm or 4 mm, 1/8".

 

What would you have me do with these otherwise perfectly functioning machines?  Replace all the leadscrews?  Of just replace the dials with some that don't stop on an even number?

 

 

ahoben, of course I would not describe my nozzle diameter as 0.015748", but neither would you describe yours as .0400000 mm.  Six degrees of precision is ridiculous.  0.0158 is a more sensible number, but even that would be foolish as it's just not possible for any reasonable machining process to repeatably drill a hole accurate to a ten thousandths of an inch (or .00254 mm).

 

Just for fun, I used the good graces (and fancy equipment) of my former employer, a university, to examine a batch of "0.4mm" extruder nozzles.  All varied in size, from .35 mm to .45 mm, with most falling between .37 and .43.  Our guess was that the Chinese started with a small bit and just drilled and drilled and drilled until it broke, the bit getting duller and duller and therefore drilling larger and larger holes.  Without having the means to measure the nozzle on my machine, I could reasonably use any value from .014 to .017 for a nozzle diameter and still be "in the ball park".

 

(It occurs to me just now to maybe do some testing with ".4 mm" nozzles that are actually a bit bigger and a bit smaller.)

 

And I HAVE seen a 3d printer based on Imperial units.  It was an industrial device that cost half a million Euros, and for that money, you got to pick the units.  (You got to pick everything!)  That is, for every setting, there was a box to enter a value and a drop down list for the unit.  So you could enter .4 and pick mm while I could enter .016 and pick inches; the machine didn't care.  (Frankly, for the nozzle diameter setting, I'd probably pick the same as you, but for velocities, I would absolutely pick IPS .. inches per second.)

 

Yes, the inexpensive little devices we all use in our homes and small shops might be metric, but I bet if Prusa lived in the US and designed his printer there, imperial could well be the standard.  Many times, things are the way they are because they started some way, it worked and we just kept on doing it that way.

 

 

These will likely be my last words on the subject and indeed my last words to this forum, as the general tone here is more confrontational than I'd hoped; there's other software and other forums.   

 

Thanks to all who responded, online and off, in a positive manner.

 

[Brulti 177]

@alan-bc I believe there's been a misunderstanding over what I was trying to say. I was only trying to point out that MIO's reasoning to not include an option to switch to Imperial units, which basically boils down as: 'not putting imperial units in software will force people to switch to metric', was flawed as people like you have to work with imperial units anyway, and the only that would change was if the countries using the Imperial system would decide to phase it out in favor of Metric.

 

In the hypothesis that it would happen, I would imagine that existing machine and stuff using Imperial wouldn't be outlawed on the spot, but allowed to keep operating until they break down and then be replaced with metric-based machines. Much like we had the Euro and Franc (I'm French) coexist for some years so people got used to it, and some more years with prices displayed in both currencies everywhere.

[Trueblondegod 1]

Does anyone have errors on um3 ‘exceeds  build volume’

[jeb1 1]

fusion 360 just added display in both units, I love that

[ahoeben 1,948]

With the architecture of Cura, supporting displaying and entering every metric unit in imperial units would be a lot of work, and the chance of screwing things up for all users (not just those wanting this feature) would be high. As a contributor to the project I don't foresee it happening "any time soon" (or at all, really, unless a very big client needs it).

[jeb1 1]

you can enter almost any measurement into fusion, I sometimes use mm and sometimes inches

[MIO 8]

On 4/13/2019 at 9:50 PM, ahoeben said:

With the architecture of Cura, supporting displaying and entering every metric unit in imperial units would be a lot of work, and the chance of screwing things up for all users (not just those wanting this feature) would be high. As a contributor to the project I don't foresee it happening "any time soon" (or at all, really, unless a very big client needs it).

 

This is the hole reason i would like to force people to NOT use the Imperial units and/or mix it with the metric system. It will result in mistakes and failures. Just a few examples: https://chem.libretexts.org/Bookshelves/Analytical_Chemistry/Supplemental_Modules_(Analytical_Chemistry)/Quantifying_Nature/Units_of_Measure/Metric%2F%2FImperial_Conversion_Errors

 

I think the Imperial unit are so dumb that it needs to be ban all over the world till it is erased from history. Smart people who are grown up with Imperial units hate it too but acknowledge that they are infected with it and it's hard to cure from this tumor.

[kmanstudios 1,120]

Soooo, why dontcha tells us how you really feel 😂

 

In all seriousness, it is very easy to work in imperial and send out as metric. Just takes a bit of awareness so that there is not missed step.

 

In one of my software packages (3DS Max) I can use, say, metric, and type measurements in imperial and the conversion is done for me to the proper units.

 

I also work a lot in metric. Depends on the needs of project I am working on. If I am doing architecture work, I work in feet and inches and then convert the scale to a printer size.. When I am just squirreling about modeling I work in native metric.

 

I also have two 'stage' files that holds a lined off cube that defines the printing area of my S5 and UM3E. This allows me to place my objects or check size restrictions.

[Trueblondegod 1]

Has anyone tried turning off the heated bed after the initial layer?

Cura 4 seems to be on all the time no matter what.

 

Does anyone else have the same issue?

[UMS5_VSM 0]

Has anyone else had an issue with some of the plugin functionality in the new release?  The Autodesk Inventor Integration does not appear to work for me.  I tried re-installing CURA and nothing then I tried uninstalling the plugin but it spins for more than an hour.  Is there any word on this if it is stable or not?  I can export out of inventor but the integration previously available in CURA was much better for my workflow.

 

 

[Sassw 2]

None of the cloud features work at all.

 

Does anyone have a list of which features are actually meant to work? 

 

The ultimaker account online is totally sparse...

[Trueblondegod 1]

On 4/27/2019 at 10:21 PM, Trueblondegod said:

Has anyone tried turning off the heated bed after the initial layer?

Cura 4 seems to be on all the time no matter what.

 

Does anyone else have the same issue?

 

Update, maybe of use to someone, if you use 1degree rather than zero the base is off.

[jeb1 1]

I know at least for PETG if you cool the bed, the print can pop off

I keep the bed hot for the whole print

[Smithy 1,144]

24 minutes ago, jeb1 said:

I keep the bed hot for the whole print

 

Yes, that's the way to go and you should always have the heated bed active. Turning off the heat bed makes no sense and could result in unexpected problems.

[Trueblondegod 1]

for PLA ive never had an issue turning off the bed after the initial layer. I'm making the comment there is a bug in the SW that 0 doesn't reflect true temperature. Otherwise why does cura allow you to change bed temperatures to zero?

 

 Is there an update to the new firmware release date? i think its approaching 2 months now

[latreides 4]

I love how far Cura has come (it has replaced S3D for me as my go-to slicer).  With that being said I find myself constantly frustrated at the new UI and think its a big step backward. 

 

If I had to point to the issue that is the biggest thorn in my side it would have to be the fact that the configuration pane is now layered over the 3d view, rather than actually taking up its own space. I hope that an option is added to adjust this or put it back to its previous behavior.  For now I will likely stick with the previous version.

[rburema 26]

@UMS5_VSM The plugins may (understandably) lag a bit behind the official releases, as they're released by 3rd parties. Here's the webpage of that plugin, so you may be able to contact the author.

 

@Sassw Could you maybe add some reprocude steps and sreenshots? It'll be a lot easier to report to the cloud team that way.

 

@latreides There a plugin that implements your suggestion: look for the 'Sidebar GUI' in plugins. Alternatively: We're looking into the UI complaints, which we hope to alleviate by making the settings (and color) pannels draggable.