best quality with Colorfabb PLA/PHA

[futur3gentleman 1]

2015.09.18 Update: I discovered that my problems were not with the filament, but with the Teflon spacer. I swapped it out and all of my issues went away. The Colorfabb is actually printing at 210C and at 55mm/s right now which is blowing my mind. I have printed over 500 hours and my spacer looked pretty bad when I took it out. I commented more about it in this post: https://ultimaker.com/en/community/view/16129-ultimaker-2-grinding-at-feeder-mechanism?page=1&sort=#reply-118866

Previous post: I just purchased & used some Colorfabb PLA/PHA in White for use with my Ultimaker 2 and have had terrible experience with it. It is worth noting that White is a difficult color to get right for filament so if you are ever going to experience problems with a filament it will likely be white.

I am able to get semi-decent quality with it at 229C (no less) and 25mm/s. Even doing this results in stringy prints at times, but it is much less worse than when I tried to run it at 50mm/s.

I tried some generic white PLA which worked fine, and previously I used a roll of white Form Futura which worked perfectly. It really seems like ColorFabb is to blame here as repeated tests with their filament still produce poor prints when other rolls don't even flinch.

Edited September 18, 2015 by Guest

[gpb01 23]

@futur3gentleman:

Just finished a print of about 5 hours with "Colorfabb PLA/PHA White" on my Ultimaker 2 ...

Coming from other filaments, was not initially easy to understand how to use, but now these are my settings:

T° = 220° , Bed = 60° , Flow = 110% , Fan = 50% , Speed = 40 mm/sec (first layer = 15 mm/sec) , Layer = 0.1 , Nozzle = 0.4 , Initial layer = 0.3

BUT ... I'm using the "Olsson Block" and this "Fan Base UM2", so ... probably some parameters should be adjusted for your UM 2

Hope this help ...

Guglielmo

[LePaul 321]

I have a spool of white ColorFabb PLA/PHA I will be opening soon

However I have had some great prints on my UMO with ColorFabb PLA/PHA Black

[frederiekpascal 193]

@futur3gentleman:

Just finished a print of about 5 hours with "Colorfabb PLA/PHA White" on my Ultimaker 2 ...

Coming from other filaments, was not initially easy to understand how to use, but now these are my settings:

T° = 220° , Bed = 60° , Flow = 110% , Fan = 50% , Speed = 40 mm/sec (first layer = 15 mm/sec) , Layer = 0.1 , Nozzle = 0.4 , Initial layer = 0.3

BUT ... I'm using the "Olsson Block" and this "Fan Base UM2", so ... probably some parameters should be adjusted for your UM 2

Hope this help ...

Guglielmo

 

May I ask why your flow is on 110% and why your temperature is on 220°?

I got the same configuration as you (UM2 with Olsson) and I'm printing perfectly with a normal flow of 100% and a temperature of 200°C max for 40mm/s...

On a speed of 30mm/s I'm printing on 195°...

Just wondering

[frederiekpascal 193]

 

@futur3gentleman:

Just finished a print of about 5 hours with "Colorfabb PLA/PHA White" on my Ultimaker 2 ...

Coming from other filaments, was not initially easy to understand how to use, but now these are my settings:

T° = 220° , Bed = 60° , Flow = 110% , Fan = 50% , Speed = 40 mm/sec (first layer = 15 mm/sec) , Layer = 0.1 , Nozzle = 0.4 , Initial layer = 0.3

BUT ... I'm using the "Olsson Block" and this "Fan Base UM2", so ... probably some parameters should be adjusted for your UM 2

Hope this help ...

Guglielmo

 

May I ask why your flow is on 110% and why your temperature is on 220°?

I got the same configuration as you (UM2 with Olsson) and I'm printing perfectly with a normal flow of 100% and a temperature of 200°C max for 40mm/s with Colorfabb PLA/PHA ...

On a speed of 30mm/s I'm printing on 195°...

Just wondering

 

[ultiarjan 1,223]

Here's a small sample of the impact of temperature and cooling.

Olssonblock + original UM2 fan setup

It's a 70% scaled model of the flowalistik serie.

Left = 35mm/s 190 celsius, right = 35mm/s 210 celsius,

Both colorfabb red at 100% fan, you see at 210 all the overhangs are sagging.

So print cooler when you can, see how cool you can go without getting underextrusion.

Exception of course if you need strong mechanical parts & strong layer bonding, in that case print hotter..

[gpb01 23]

May I ask why your flow is on 110% and why your temperature is on 220°?

 

Yes, sure

Just because I have made many tests and these are the settings that have given me the best results

Please ... keep in mind that I have old roll of PLA/PHA ColorFabb (more that 9 months) and, although closed, are still aged and are still more difficult to print than fresh ones.

Guglielmo

[gr5 2,173]

Most of my printers I always have flow at 100% but I had one printer for a month that absolutely needed higher flow. Never figured out why (yes I checked steps/mm).

[hafoora 1]

Hi, I had the same issue with colorfab for a while till I measured the diameter of my nozzle, which turned out to be above .5mm. I modified the settings to reflect .5mm nozzle diameter and it is now printing clean. I hope this helps.

Standard settings, I also lowered the temperature to 195C, minimum specified

[LePaul 321]

I thought all printers shipped with a .4mm nozzle? How does one get a .5mm? An "opps" in manufacturing?

[ultiarjan 1,223]

http://e3d-online.com/E3D-v6/Extra-Nozzles/v6-Extra-Nozzle-3mmx0.50mm

[hafoora 1]

sorry i wasnt clear in my post, my nozzle is not new, its worn after some usage and changing materials.