What initial layer horizontal expansion values do you use for elephant foot compensation?

[jsw 19]

I've never had any significant issue with elephant's foot, until today when I printed a few small spacers.

 

The pop-up says to use negative numbers to compensate for elephant foot, and I've tried -.05mm, -1mm, -1.5mm with little if any effect.

 

All of those still give about a .1-.2mm ridge on the bottom, which I have to remove with the Dremel in order to get them to fit.

 

I'm curious as to what numbers others are using.

 

Thanks.

[GregValiant 1,112]

0.2 works for me.  I print PLA with the build plate at 50.  That might make a difference as well.

 

If a printer has problems with "Z binding" when it's near the bed then that can look like elephant's foot but it's a mechanical thing and adjusting the Initial Layer Horizontal Expansion doesn't help.  That is actually a popular problem on kit printers.

[jsw 19]

This is an otherwise well-behaved S5, using the default of 60 on the build plate.  This particular print (10mm spacers) is the only one so far that I consider troublesome.

[GregValiant 1,112]

60 is fine.

If it continues to be a problem there are a couple of custom things you can try.

Put a chamfer on the model.  That would hide the elephant's foot.

Go into the gcode and adjust the flow manually with M221 commands.  Maybe the first layer at 90%, the second layer at 95% and then the third layer back to M221 S100.  Something like that would give it a bit of a taper near the bottom.

You are printing with a skirt for build plate adhesion?  For small parts I often use a brim and set the "Brim Distance" to .1 or .15.  It makes it easier to break off and leaves less of an edge for post-processing.