Cura 4.5 no material profiles (loaded)

[edit-mesh 1]

I recently updated to cura 4.5. But under preferences it doesn't show any materials, the Appdata->Roaming->cura->4.5  folder is empty. When i go to the marketplace it tells me all generic and unltimaker profiles are installed. i can install additional materials, they show up as xml files in materials folder, but somehow  cura won't load them. can my ultimaker2 read material profiels in xml format?  I already deinstalled every old versions and cleand my user account data, but nothing changed.

[LUIZDOILE 0]

Same problem.

Ultimaker 2 does not appear the materials. The other newer Ultimakers have the feature.

Edited April 18, 2020 by IRobertI
Edited to remove giant text

[edit-mesh 1]

hmmm, sad that ultimaker don't support their old mashines in newer cura builds :-/...

[DivingDuck 87]

Well, you are using an UM2. It is supposed to use materials that Ultimaker provide with this printer.

 

Anyway there are different solutions/workaround posted in the past in the forum. One is to change the machine flavor to Marlin.

 

An other solution is to modify an existing profile:

Add a new UM2 printer profile and rename it to e.g. Ultimaker 2 Copy.

Then go to your cura configuration folder: Click in Cura --> Help --> Show Configuration folder.

There is a folder called machine_instances. In this folder you will find your machine files. There should be a file named like Ultimaker+2.global.cfg. When there are more than one file with this name check the content of each. There should be one that include in the section [general] the name you have given this printer by renaming the profile (for this example Ultimaker 2 Copy, see below).

 

For the next step please close Cura and then open this file with an editor and add:  has_materials = true in the section [metadata]. Here is how the file looks like when you add that line:

 

[general]
version = 4
name = Ultimaker 2 Copy
id = Ultimaker 2

[metadata]
setting_version = 12
group_id = f85b237e-c0b3-410d-b0d7-4b7b44498f89
type = machine
has_materials = true

[containers]
0 = Ultimaker 2_user
1 = empty_quality_changes
2 = empty_intent
3 = um2_normal
4 = empty_material
5 = empty_variant
6 = Ultimaker 2_settings
7 = ultimaker2

Save the changes and close the file. Then run Cura. You should be now able to select Materials.

 

What does this modification? In the original definition files this option is set to false as UM2 manage materials via firmware. You can find this definition for Windows10 here:

c:\Program Files\Ultimaker Cura 4.5\resources\definitions\ ultimaker2.def.json

 

When you are unhappy with the results you only need to delete the printer in Cura and you are fine. -->Preferences -->Printers -->choose the former created printer and hit Remove. Or change the active printer.

 

[ahoeben 1,763]

12 hours ago, DivingDuck said:

An other solution is to modify an existing profile

 

Could you say what the benefit of this (much more involved) second solution is?

[ahoeben 1,763]

14 hours ago, edit-mesh said:

hmmm, sad that ultimaker don't support their old mashines in newer cura builds :-/...

 

The Ultimaker 2 and Ultimaker 2 Extended never had materials in Cura by default. This was by design. The Ultimaker 2 introduced the concept of UltiGCode, where you would be able to slice once and print in "any material" selected on the printer. So not having materials available in Cura for these printers is intended as a feature, it is not a bug.

 

At the time, "any material" was mostly just PLA and ABS. Apart from some temperature and cooling (fan) differences, you pretty much use the same gcode files for those materials. The printer would change those settings on the fly. Since then though, Ultimaker has come to the realisation that to really support different materials, you need to slice with different parameters. So with the Ultimaker 2+ and newer, they made it possible to select materials in Cura again. But the feature not to have materials for the Ultimaker 2 has not changed. Note that the Ultimaker 2+ still will not let you change temperatures by default, because you are still supposed to select a material on the printer. I think that is a rather silly situation.

 

It has always been possible to change the gcode flavor from UltiGCode (labeled "Ultimaker 2" in Cura) to Marlin to remove this feature and restore selecting materials for the Ultimaker 2 in Cura.

[DivingDuck 87]

1 hour ago, ahoeben said:

 

Could you say what the benefit of this (much more involved) second solution is?

For the one who start the thread, it is maybe easier to use the first mentioned solution and this is why I put it on first place. By the way, thanks for adding your background information. This should be pinned in a Q&A section for UM2 printers    :)

 

For myself I prefer using the second way as I'm using except of one printer only self build printers. I got too often painful experiences from new Cura versions that screw up my profiles what end in a lot of scrap and waste time. Using that way I have more control about my printer profiles and do not need to start from scratch with each version change.

 

(I am thinking for example about these Creality profile disaster in the past or those never ending questions about wrong calculated/estimated print times because of, sorry to say, highly questionable default values for non UM printers.)

 

Beside of this, there are other printers that have this problem too, like Tevo Black Widow, where the first solution will not work. :)

 

[edit-mesh 1]

Thank you very much  @Diving Duck and @ahoeben for the workaround and further explanations!!!

Since i wasn't printing that much different materials the last 2 years, i was wondering because my Ultimaker original (Marlin) somehow (somewhen) was showing Materials and the Ultimaker2 not. And it's no fun having 20 different materialsettings namend "custom1 - 20" on your UM2, because you're not able to export material settings/names ( didn't think about changing the printer 😎)... so now i know a little bit more about g-code flavor 🧐 Thank you guys!

 

 

 

 

[tinkergnome 924]

1 hour ago, edit-mesh said:

And it's no fun having 20 different materialsettings namend "custom1 - 20" on your UM2, because you're not able to export material settings/names

 

As a side question... Why is your printer not able to export/import the material settings?

Method #2 from the FAQ worked just fine back in the days.

 

https://support.ultimaker.com/hc/en-us/articles/360013127919-Custom-material-profiles-for-Ultimaker-2-and-Ultimaker-2-

 

 

[edit-mesh 1]

Best example of how to ask the right question 😳!!! Separately from not  not caring much about (saving) different materials, i apparently  never read that FAQ 😎. This helps a lot of course ! Thank you tinkergnome and sorry for the late answer.