Cura multi colors are mixed up

[jens3 11]

I designed a testsquare in Fusion360. It consists out of 3 layers. Layer 1 is 25 mm * 25 mm and 1 mm tall and solid, layer 2 is also  25* 25 and 1 mm tall but has the word 'world' cut out of it. Layer 3 are just the letters 'Hello'. The end result is a model to test how letters look like if printed on top (layer 3) of a layer or cut into a layer (layer 2).

I imported all 3 layers from fusion360 into cura (4.1) and assigned layer 1 to the first extruder, layer 2 to the second extruder and layer 3 to the first extruder again.

I then merged the models, sliced it and sent it to the printer. Seems all straight forward or so I thought.

 

The outcome is that the printer does the first layer like it is supposed to do but then something odd happens ... it alternates one layer at a time (0.15 mm/layer) between extruder one and extruder two. The layers are printed as a mix between solid and a layer with the word 'world' cut out. It looks as if it alternates layer one and layer two.

Layer 3, the letters, print just fine as one solid color (although the quality leaves a few things to be desired but that is another issue)

 

Anyway, I tried re-arranging the layers in Cura and re-sliceing but the end results seems to be the same.

 

I have a bit of trouble keeping the layers clear in my mind and in Cura as the color representation in Cura is only a minor shading different but again, this is another issue. Right now I would like to figure out what I am doing wrong with the middle layer of my model that is supposed to print as a solid color but prints each 0.15mm layer with a different color.

 

Thanks

[jens3 11]

Has nobody else run into this issue ?

Maybe I will try changing the way I design this thing in fusion360 to see if that might affect anything for any reason.Maybe the fact that the layers share the same base sketch causes some confusion ... who knows .... weird ....

[AndersK 59]

Done a few as you describe it but never had any issues. 

 

Just one thing I remembered from another field, make sure you have no interference between the different parts.

That can create a mess in many different applications.

Edited July 19, 2019 by AndersK

[johnse 31]

Can you post the project file that did this strange printing? And can you post the Fusion 360 design?

 

In Fusion, did you have 3 bodies in a single component (or the root component, or three separate components? If the latter, did you make sure the origins were aligned?

 

 

[jens3 11]

I am happy to report that the issue seems to have been in my design in Fusion360.

I started from scratch and made sure I used components properly in fusion360, exported the three layers as stl files and did all the right things in Cura and the result printed like it was expected to.

I am not entirely sure what I did wrong but separating things into components is new to me and it is not surprising that I screwed it up. The surprising thing was that I ended up with three apparently good layers that were brought into Cura and all seemed well.

In the past I used separate bodies for my different color layers but that was not practical with text as each letter ends up as a separate body which has to be exported as a separate stl and the whole thing gets very messy very fast. Using components I can export all letters at the same time making it much easier to manage.

Thank you for the assistance !