Importing Profiles

[Pridanc 4]

Oh wonderful people!

 

After creating a new "custom" printer (Sovol SV-08) to use in CURA 5.8.0,  I then went to import some profiles and got the note below for each of the files. (See picture)

 

As a Justin Case... I've copied one of the files here as the file itself may tell you something?   Maybe when I created the new printer I missed a selection or two?

 

Thoughts? HUGE thanks as always, PDC

Sovol SV08 - ABS.curaprofile

[Pridanc 4]

I see that I left the G-Code flavor choice at Marlin when adding the custom machine, SV-08.

I changed this to ReRap and I still cannot import files.  

Don't break my heart and say I need to move to ORCA... I love CURA! But I am trainable.

Let me know your thoughts and TY.

[Slashee_the_Cow 410]

The gcode flavour shouldn't affect the quality profiles. The error message looks like you based your machine definition (or instance) straight on the basic fdmprinter definition, whereas the profile is for a machine based on something else. I'd stick my hoofs in the profile to see if it looks like I could change that, but I'm computer-deprived for the next couple of days so can't get to it now.

[Pridanc 4]

Thanks Slash. I hear your words but they go way over my head so if you get back from deprivation, let me know your thoughts. As you all know by now, I'm pretty darned clueless.

Sincerely, PDC

[Slashee_the_Cow 410]

18 hours ago, Pridanc said:

As you all know by now, I'm pretty darned clueless.

Not really. The clueless people are the ones who think they have all the clues 🙂

[Slashee_the_Cow 410]

There's one thing which I can't remember if it works or not so I'll document my trial and probably error:

(TL;DR of the good bit is available, just scroll down to the red text)

 

Experiment part one: create a custom quality profile, save gcode, delete profile

1. I've created a custom quality profile with settings I'm not sure I'd ever use:
   
2. Save the gcode:
   
3. Change your object back to a regular profile:
   
4. Open the profile manager (either click the Manage Profiles... button at the bottom of the profile dropdown, in the menu bar go to Preferences > Configure Cura... > Profiles (in the left bar) or hit Ctrl+J)
   
5. Select the custom profile I created, open the hamburger menu (three lines icon, and yes that is the technical term) and delete it:
   
6. Because this an experiment, clear the build plate for good measure:
    (or just hit Ctrl+N)

Experiment part 2: now, can I get it back on another printer?

1. Select a completely different printer (don't know about the Sovol but the E3V3SE profile is based on creality_base, although that derives from fdmprinter anyway):
   
2. Open the profile manager again:
   
   (Some of my custom profiles have swears in the name which is why I was cropping the earlier screenshots)
3. Click the Import button:
   
4. Select my gcode file, and I feel like pointing out that gcode is among the file types it'll take when importing a profile:
   
5. Well this looks... promising
   
6. Okay, so it's got the wrong name (fixing that is a quick trip to hamburger menu away) but it's imported all the settings:
   
7. Just to be clear, I still have the Sovol selected, and I added a cube to the scene:
   
8. And now when I slice it...
   
   🎉 It's using the settings I would never use!

TL;DR: START HERE!

Experiment part 3: does language matter?

1. I'll just pick another random printer from the list and change its settings so it's using something which is not Marlin:
   
   (I have instances of so many different printers because they get added when I open project files helping people from the forums)
2. As we'd expect, it's cleared the available profiles:
   
3. So if I import my gcode file again...
   
4. Well I never did rename this when I loaded it for the Sovol, so I guess quality profiles for completely different printers still have to have unique names:
   
5. All my settings are still there:
   
6. So now if I just select that profile for the cube and slice it...
   
   🥳🎉 It loaded the profile for a completely different printer using a different language fine! 🎉🥳

Sorry if all that was a bit long, but if I just skip to the good bits without going through the process you don't learn so much along the way.

[Slashee_the_Cow 410]

Edit: Like most things, @ahoeben knows what he's doing and I don't. Please disregard this post in favour of my previous post or his solution.

 

Oh, in all that fervour I forgot the original question exactly. Let's have a look at the text contents of the profile:

So I don't know what's with all the nulls and high ASCII characters. Probably some binary data. Not what I'm interested in. What I'm interested in is lines 4 and 18, both of which say:

definition = sovol_base_bowden

Let's see if I can load your ABS profile for my printer. I could use the specific definition (creality_ender3v3se_slashee and yes I'm using my own profile and no it's not just because I was using the printer before Cura had a definition for it) but I'll change those lines so they should on any Creality printer:

definition = creality_base

Okay, save as a different file. Load Cura, switch to my printer:

Go to the profile manager (Ctrl+J or the longer instructions are in my previous post), select Import, pick modified file, cross fingers (if you're dextrous enough to have them):

Awwww.....

Hold on, what's that on line 15?

PK       ! Î:e™·  ·  +   sovol_bowden_extruder_0_#2_sovol_sv08_-_abs[general]

So this is the part that's for the extruder? So what happens if I change line 18 to:

definition = creality_base_extruder_0

Okay, save file, try and import it...

That's a much less fun error. Fortunately I think I might have an idea what the problem is... Notepad++ loaded it with ANSI encoding:

So if I tell Notepad++ to make it UTF-8...

Save it again, let's try and import it into Cura...

Awww, and I thought I was making progress.

So let's look at other lines where it says "sovol":

01: PK       ! áq)Ü   Ü      sovol_sv01_sovol_sv08_-_abs[general]
15: PK       ! Î:e™·  ·  +   sovol_bowden_extruder_0_#2_sovol_sv08_-_abs[general]
60: PK       ! áq)Ü   Ü              €    sovol_sv01_sovol_sv08_-_absPK       ! Î:e™·  ·  +           €  sovol_bowden_extruder_0_#2_sovol_sv08_-_absPK      ¢       Q

Those look more like instance names (based on having a #2 for the extruder) but I guess there's no harm in trying changing them, save file, try importing it...

Damnit Cura, stop raining on my parade! Okay, last ditch effort, instead of aiming at creality_base, I'll change those references to my specific definition (creality_ender3v3se_slashee although I still use the creality_base_extruder_0 extruder train)

😢 I think you've beaten me at this one, Cura. At least for now. Not sure if Notepad++ messed up the encoding or I just don't know enough about the format to manually edit it.

 

Although I just realised I could export one of my own profiles and see what's different:

Okay, so the extruder definition isn't listed next to a definition entry. And it is based on creality_base already. Other than that the only think that sticks out at me is:

setting_version = 23

Your Sovol file says 22. That shouldn't be a problem, right? Oh well, time to change the references back to creality_base and update the version number. I'm not expecting this to work. But surprises can be pleasant.

I'm not surprised. I'm not disappointed though, since my hopes were low.

 

So hopefully you have enough gcode files to import old profiles 🙂 Or @ahoeben probably knows something about the format of a .curaprofile file that I don't.

Edited Wednesday at 12:24 AM by Slashee_the_Cow
ahoeben knows more than me

[ahoeben 1,985]

2 hours ago, Slashee_the_Cow said:

So I don't know what's with all the nulls and high ASCII characters. Probably some binary data.

It is a zip file.

Rename the file to something ending in .zip, and unzip it. Then you get ready-to-use .inst.cfg files.

[ahoeben 1,985]

There's too much text in this post to read all of it (I am lazy).

 

The problem is that the profile is written for a printer based on the "sovol_base_bowden.def.json" file. Those printers come with a certain quality profile referenced by this curaprofile: standard. This quality profile does not exist for printers based directly on "fdmprintder.def.json".

 

In both files in the zip, change "definition = sovol_base_bowden" to "definition = fdmprinter" and "quality_type = standard" to "quality_type = normal".

[Slashee_the_Cow 410]

7 hours ago, ahoeben said:

It is a zip file.

Rename the file to something ending in .zip, and unzip it. Then you get ready-to-use .inst.cfg files.

Thanks for the timely reminder that I always forget about if something looks weird in a text editor to try renaming it to a .zip file 🙂 

 

But now for @Pridanc we have two solutions 😄 

[Pridanc 4]

OK you two, many thanks and I'll give it a go but

 

....there's always a but....why do I see the word Bowden in some of the words above when the SOVOL is not a "Bowden" reliant extruder?  Ok there is a Bowden tube in the machine to guide the filament here there and everywhere but the printer uses a  DD extruder pushing straight into the hotend.  

 

Regardless, thank you both and I'll see where I get. IF I succeed , you both are brave making that assumption, I will come back and mark this as Solved but until OK to leave it open? 

[Slashee_the_Cow 410]

19 minutes ago, Pridanc said:

....there's always a but....why do I see the word Bowden in some of the words above when the SOVOL is not a "Bowden" reliant extruder?

Probably because the base (although there are some custom ones) Sovol extruder definition is sovol_bowden_extruder_0 and a lot of Sovol print definitions will just use that and for the direct drive machines they'll just overwrite the default retraction settings in the definition for the individual machine (if they're not as lazy as the maintainers of some of the stock Creality profiles).

Just like almost all Creality printers will use the creality_base_extruder_0 definition whether they're direct drive or not (used it for my custom definitions for the Bowden E3V2Neo - which broke long before it got a definition included in Cura - and on my one for the DD E3V3SE).

 

19 minutes ago, Pridanc said:

Ok there is a Bowden tube in the machine to guide the filament here there and everywhere but the printer uses a  DD extruder pushing straight into the hotend.  

What, you have to feed it through Bowden tubing to get it to the direct drive motor (i.e. there's no extruder anywhere along the tubing)? That sounds like bad design to me. Even nice Capricorn Bowden tubing still puts up some resistance and the motor has to work harder to pull it through. On my E3V3SE the only sign of tubing is a reasonably solid (and much bigger than Bowden tubing) bit of PTFE tubing coming out of the top of the hot end that you sit the extruder on top of to get it into position so you can then screw it in (and with both the extruder and hot end in place, you don't see any of that tube).

 

19 minutes ago, Pridanc said:

Regardless, thank you both and I'll see where I get. IF I succeed , you both are brave making that assumption, I will come back and mark this as Solved but until OK to leave it open? 

Your Friendly Assistant Moderator Slashee says: Of course it's okay to leave it open. Plenty of people never mark threads as solved (annoys me a bit... especially if I provided the solution 😄) so even if you forget to do it, by having the intention to now you're still doing pretty well.

[Pridanc 4]

Slash and ahoeben,

Again, HUGE thanks for your consideration.

 

We've all spent too much time on someone else's improperly made profile. Sorry for that!   I've tried most of your suggestions and have gotten nowhere.

 

Meanwhile, I've imported the Voron2 350 machine that CURA has which the Sovol SV08 is based on.

 

Ill start testing this Voron2 350 machine of  CURA's to see how this thing responds. I know it won't be 100% but then I've got nothing now anyway!    

 

I know I'll be back for more and again gigantic thanks for your efforts.  PDC

 

 

[ahoeben 1,985]

On 9/11/2024 at 2:21 AM, Slashee_the_Cow said:

if something looks weird in a text editor to try renaming it to a .zip file

Especially if the gibberish starts with "PK", the initials of the original author of the PKZIP application (Phil Katz).

 

Final tip on this subject: if you install a decent ZIP application such as 7-zip, it will add a handy way to extract files from archives from the context menu in Explorer, even if these archives do not have a .zip extension.

[Slashee_the_Cow 410]

54 minutes ago, ahoeben said:

if you install a decent ZIP application such as 7-zip, it will add a handy way to extract files from archives from the context menu in Explorer, even if these archives do not have a .zip extension.

Way ahead of you on that one. I ❤️ 7-Zip.

[Pridanc 4]

You guys rock. Thank you both for the education. No wonder I enjoy this printing stuff.