Solved Extruder WAY above the bed.

[DatDrunkDude 0]

Hello Everyone, this is my first post so hopefully everything goes well:

I have an Ultimaker S5 with materials station that I have been using for work for about 9 months now. I have had pretty good success printing Tough PLA with PVA supports, and am now trying to print using the Ultrafuse 17-4PH filament with the 0.4 CC core (using the material profile from the Market). All I want to print is a small test cube as a learning tool, but I am running into a big problem.

 

I slice the model and load it into the printer. It does the auto-leveling and all the start up stuff it normally does, however when it comes time to start extruding, the nozzel is about an inch above the print bed and creates and unholy (and massively wasteful) mess. I haven't had this issue before and I can't really find anything here that seems to be similar to my situation.

 

I have no idea what this issue is or what info I should provide because I still classify myself as "below novice" when it comes to this.

 

So here is what I have at the moment:

• Ultimaker S5 w/ materials station
• Core 1/2: 0.4CC/0.4BB
• Ultrafuse 17-4PH SS filament 2.85mm
• Cura v. 5.50

Any help would really be appreciated! Keep in mind I'm maybe only one step above "have you checked to make sure it is plugged in" levels of know-how.

[Slashee_the_Cow 438]

I'm just going to tag in @gr5 as they're the local Ultimaker expert.

[gr5 2,235]

It's easy in cura for your part to be up in the air so that could be it.  It could be a lot of other things.  Please post your project file here.  Not your model.  Your project file.  Do menu "file" "save project as" and post that here please.

[DatDrunkDude 0]

Here is my project file. Thanks for the help @gr5!

d3_ TestCube.3mf

[gr5 2,235]

When I sliced, it looks like this.  Is that what you get also?  With the brim and it firmly on the bed?  I guess I should have asked this earlier.  I assumed it would be "up in the air" in the PREVIEW screen.  Could you verify that please?

 

I'm thinking the problem is hardware related and possibly intermittent.  I would:

1) Try it again (see if it's a rare issue and also if it's intermittent)

2) Try an old print with a filament you've used many times before to see if it does it with that also (to see if it's somehow related to the material profile)

 

What surprises me is that it does the active leveling just fine.  It has to have extremely repetitive and fine control of the Z axis (the bed height) to complete active leveling without errors.  So maybe it's some kind of firmware bug.

 

I guess now I want you to send me the gcode file (ends with .ufp) that is the exact same file that causes the problem so I can look at the gcode in there.

 

Another thought is some kind of plugin that you installed alters the bed height at the start of the print.  Do you have extensions/plugins installed into cura?  If so that will show up in the ufp file when I look at it.

[ahoeben 1,991]

It seems you have the Z-Offset plugin installed. If so, make sure the "Extensive Z Offset Processing" is checked, or set the Z Offset to 0.

[DatDrunkDude 0]

Hello guys and thanks again for all the help!

 

@gr5, yes I get the exact same thing when I slice: cube and brim are firmly attached to the bed in CURA (I typically toggle the "drop model down" option off and then on again to make sure). I'll go ahead and run it again and then do a run with an older project and my normal PLA. I do have the Z-Offset plugin installed and set to -0.1mm and it didn't appear to cause problems with other prints.

 

I'm not sure if this matters, but I ran my other parts using CURA on my old workstation, this is my first slicing on my new rig.

 

@ahoeben I found the "Extensive Z Offset Processing" setting and it was deactivated. I think that is what it has been in the past because I did not even know it was a setting until now. I'll give it a try too and keep you guys posted.

 

In the mean time here is the .ufp file.

d3_ TestCube.ufp

[gr5 2,235]

G92 E0
M190 S100
M109 S225
G280 S1
G0 Z20.001
G1 F2700 E-6.5
;LAYER_COUNT:165
;LAYER:0
M106 S127.5
M104 T0 S240
M204 S1000
M205 X20 Y20
G1 F600 Z2.14 ;adjusted by z offset
G92 Z2.24 ;consider this the original z before offset
G0 F9000 X158.782 Y135.383 Z2.24
;TYPE:SKIRT
G1 F600 Z0.24
G1 F900 E0
G1 F1500 X156.189 Y137.246 E0.04805
G1 X153.711 Y137.85 E0.08643

So the problem is in the 5th line of code.  Sort of combined with the G92.  But the problem is basically in that 5th line of code.  I have no idea if it comes from a plugin or something messed up with the material profile or what.

 

The G0 Z20.001 tells it to move the bed 20.001mm below the nozzle (I usually think of it as the nozzle moves but actually it's the bed but positive numbers here are more separation between nozzle and bed).

 

Then later the G92 Z2.24 tells the printer "hey I know you are at 20.001 but I want you to forget that and you are currently at 2.24.  So z=0 is now 2.24mm below here (nozzle closer to bed by 2.24mm).  So Z=0 position, while it should be touching the glass, nozzle is 17.761mm above the bed.

 

So basically it prints almost 2cm high from there forward in the gcode.  This is all near the very begining of the gcode.

 

I would disable both plugins and look at the gcode. It's a pain - change the ufp extension to zip, then extract the file in the "3D" folder called model.gcode.  Then search for "Z".  There are a bunch of Z's in the comments at the top but pretty soon they are very rare and sparse throughout the file.

 

 

[DatDrunkDude 0]

G92 E0
M190 S100
M109 S225
G280 S1
G0 Z20.001
G1 F2700 E-6.5
;LAYER_COUNT:165
;LAYER:0
M106 S127.5
M104 T0 S240
M204 S1000
M205 X20 Y20
G1 F600 Z2.24
G0 F9000 X158.782 Y135.383 Z2.24
;TYPE:SKIRT
G1 F600 Z0.24
G1 F900 E0
G1 F1500 X156.189 Y137.246 E0.04805
G1 X153.711 Y137.85 E0.08643

 

This is the first time I've ever looked under the hood of what's going on, so my knowledge here is very beginner. Thanks for being patient with me.

 

I did what you said -disabled my plugins, restarted cura, and resliced. I see that it still has the "G0 z20.001" and the G92 line is now gone, everything else looks the same.

 

[gr5 2,235]

Oh!  much better.  It should work fine now.  You need both the Z20 and the G92 so since one of them is gone it should work fine.  I marked it as the solution but in the unlikely event there is still a problem I can "unmark" it as the solution.  Let us know.

[DatDrunkDude 0]

I loaded the file and it looks like it's printing where it should (the extruder is no longer about 2cm above the bed).

 

So I decided to see what would happen if I re-enabled the plugins one at a time, starting with Barbarian Units, and then z Offset. Both times the "G92" command is no longer there. So I guess the z Offset plugin didn't initialize correctly or something.

 

Thanks so much @gr5 and @ahoeben!  😁

[ahoeben 1,991]

11 hours ago, DatDrunkDude said:

So I guess the z Offset plugin didn't initialize correctly or something.

Please read the documentation of the plugin:

https://github.com/fieldOfView/Cura-ZOffsetPlugin

 

On an S5, the "Extensive Z Offset Processing" option must be checked, or you get exactly the issue you have. It is checked by default for Ultimaker printers that use the "Griffin" gcode flavor.