New to 3D printing
- Thread starter jmsvuk
- Start date
tamuct01
Well-known member
I'm not familiar with that particular printer, but I would start with some simple calibration prints (like the Benchy) to make sure your settings are working reasonably well. From there, printing other people's designs will get you familiar with how to print various materials, using supports, etc. As you progress, you may want to start making your own designs in CAD and printing those. The usual resources are very good: Thingiverse for models, YouTube channels such as MakersMuse, 3D Printing Nerd, and Tom Sanladerer have very good tutorials.
jmsvuk
Member
Great looking project.
BrickPlane
Member
If your prints are turning out like crap...
You've spun your wheels trying to diagnose any possible mechanical issue...
To the point that you are considering putting it out on the curb with a free sign...
Check your slicing software!
I got an Ender 3 a while back, twas my first printer. After setting it up, initial prints looked shockingly good. Then, suddenly, my prints were garbage. Presented as bed adhesion problems and extrusion issues. Spun my wheels for weeks on it, replacing springs/tubes/etc, until I finally gave up and stopped printing for months. Which really sucked since the printer was a gift from my wife and she saw me not using it.
One day I opened Cura to give it another try, and there was an update available. Updated, and now my prints are magically back to really good. To the point that Cura has updated again and I'm scared to install the update.
You've spun your wheels trying to diagnose any possible mechanical issue...
To the point that you are considering putting it out on the curb with a free sign...
Check your slicing software!
I got an Ender 3 a while back, twas my first printer. After setting it up, initial prints looked shockingly good. Then, suddenly, my prints were garbage. Presented as bed adhesion problems and extrusion issues. Spun my wheels for weeks on it, replacing springs/tubes/etc, until I finally gave up and stopped printing for months. Which really sucked since the printer was a gift from my wife and she saw me not using it.
One day I opened Cura to give it another try, and there was an update available. Updated, and now my prints are magically back to really good. To the point that Cura has updated again and I'm scared to install the update.
skymaster
Elite member
how many hours?
Robert S
Well-known member
I am a newbie to 3D printing as well so my comments might be the blind leading the blind but, I'd say the most important thing I have learned is to have a sense of (dark) humor. My printer has basically been running almost 20+ hours a day for an entire week and I am almost done with the LW-PLA parts for my first fully 3D printed plane. I have probably another 2(ish) days of printing left for the PLA parts.
Sometimes, after hours (days) of things going right, at the last minute, things just go wrong and 8 hours of printing is FUBAR with less than a few layers of a print to go. For example, I started the messed up print shown below just before I went to bed. By my calculations it should have finished a few minutes before my alarm went off at 0500. When I came down, the body was on the floor and my print head had been apparently just spitting out material for about 30(ish) minutes. It looks like it was almost done when catastrophe struck.
Although I'm not sure exactly what happened, my guess was that it had gotten taller (and the CG was higher) and fell over because the bed was moving and the base could not hold it in place. I printed it again exactly like I did the first time except I made sure to use plenty of adhesive and I made the brim 5mm wider than the widest diameter of the part. It worked perfectly the second time with just a couple of very small, almost trivial, changes.
I just had to take a deep breath, laugh, put on some Cheap Trick and move on.
Sometimes, after hours (days) of things going right, at the last minute, things just go wrong and 8 hours of printing is FUBAR with less than a few layers of a print to go. For example, I started the messed up print shown below just before I went to bed. By my calculations it should have finished a few minutes before my alarm went off at 0500. When I came down, the body was on the floor and my print head had been apparently just spitting out material for about 30(ish) minutes. It looks like it was almost done when catastrophe struck.
Although I'm not sure exactly what happened, my guess was that it had gotten taller (and the CG was higher) and fell over because the bed was moving and the base could not hold it in place. I printed it again exactly like I did the first time except I made sure to use plenty of adhesive and I made the brim 5mm wider than the widest diameter of the part. It worked perfectly the second time with just a couple of very small, almost trivial, changes.
I just had to take a deep breath, laugh, put on some Cheap Trick and move on.
