Month: June 2016

Honest question: Are all 3D printers super unreliable, or is MakerBot solely responsible for this?

We have a higher-end MakerBot at work, and the quality of the machine and prints is a bummer, even compared to our “FakerBot” no-name printer (as we call it).Reliability of the MakerBot is lousy as well. We have read reviews on other printers and none seem to be as bad as those for the MakerBot models. Before buying a second (replacement) printer, we thought /r/3Dprinting would be a good resource. http://ift.tt/1tpo6HQ

More Calibration, and more questions.

Continuing on my calibration adventure with my first printer, I decided that since I was done with dialing in my e-steps and z-offset that I would tackle the problems I’ve seen with ooze on my other calibration objects. Anyway, downloaded an ooze / stringing calibration item and started tweaking away at my retraction settings until I’ve arrived here:http://ift.tt/1XfZRI3: Ignore the broken pieces and clear lack of alignment – the piece was very stuck to the glass, so I basically just ripped it off since it’s just a calibration piece.Slic3r settings: PLA (200 Hot End /60 Bed) 0.1mm Layers 0.9 Retraction 0.1 z-lift 40mm/s Retraction speed -0.05mm Length on restart 2mm Minimum travel on retraction.Looks good until it gets past the 4 inner icicles. After that, it seems like I’m getting a pretty noticeable hit to quality on the perimeter. Is this a problem with minimum layer time like I think it is? Is this an indication that I should start using active cooling now? Also, strangely enough I have another example that printed successfully to the tips of all the icicles where I accidentally set the z-lift as a negative value (-0.05) with no restart compensation and got this:http://ift.tt/25U7xS6 way more oozing and random plastic, but no stringing / defects up top? Considering I was accidentally was pushing the nozzle into the plastic, this came out better than I would have assumed it could have?Anyway, any advice would be helpful since I want to get this sorted out before I try to calibrate anything else to keep it simple and because I’ve seen what I assume are retraction issues on other prints (oozing on corners / layer changes). http://ift.tt/1Xg05yL