Ros tock V3 heated bed not getting hot enough

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baba
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Ros tock V3 heated bed not getting hot enough

Post by baba »

Hey all. I've got a bone stock Rostock V3. The bed tops out at about 87C. I did see it briefly reach 89, but then it could not be maintained there.

I checked the following things out:
Solder connections at the board - I fixed one that looked gnarly
Tightness of the connectors on the power supply ( I have the silver rectangular power supply that shipped with the kit)

I don't really know what else to check out. I am using the stock wiring and the bed itself is a rev8. The printer sits in an enclosure to try and retain as much heat as possible but still tops out at 87. Seems like others can get theirs hotter. er

I have a multimeter so if there is some better way to check where the problem might be, please walk me through it.

Thanks!

Brian
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Re: Ros tock V3 heated bed not getting hot enough

Post by geneb »

Check the voltage output of the power supply when you're heating the bed. It should be ~12v. If it's reading low, there's a little adjustment pot on the power supply (left front I think) that you can use to tweak the output voltage.

Also check to make sure that the compression terminals are all properly tightened.

g.
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baba
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Re: Ros tock V3 heated bed not getting hot enough

Post by baba »

I checked the voltage....12V at the terminal and at the bed.

Is there a torque spec on the screw connections? I have a torque screw driver so I can set that properly if I know what the target is.

-Brian
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Re: Ros tock V3 heated bed not getting hot enough

Post by pouncingiguana »

Brian,

You can safely crank that voltage up to 14V. That'll give the bed more power to play with and might get you up to 100 degrees. I'd try that before anything else.
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Re: Ros tock V3 heated bed not getting hot enough

Post by baba »

OK, so I found a spec online for a similar power supply of 15 in-lb, and I did get a little tighter getting there. I fired it up again, and got up to about 91.3, but then it couldn't stay there. It dropped back down to about 88 and sat there. I just have the printer sitting alone, not connected to a PC, and I used the 'adjust temps' feature to set the heated bed to 100C. I also disabled the timeout due to inactivity. The heated bed light is still on. I wonder what could be happening?

Brian
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Re: Ros tock V3 heated bed not getting hot enough

Post by rootboy »

Is the LED on the bed "On" continuously? In Repetier does the temperature graphs show that the output to the bed is on continuously?

And you can try temporarily driving the bed directly from the power supply (obviously you can't leave it like this). What temps do you get that way?
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Re: Ros tock V3 heated bed not getting hot enough

Post by baba »

The LED appears to be on continuously.

I am using Matter Control, and can't seem to find where to generate a graph. I thought that was the recommended software by SeeMeCnC.

I have not tried driving directly from the PS. I'm starting to wonder....do I need it to get any hotter? I print in PLA, ABS, and PETG. I have had some issues with ABS warping (like everyone else....lol) and thought the temp might help. Perhaps I should just leave it alone?

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Re: Ros tock V3 heated bed not getting hot enough

Post by geneb »

When it comes to ABS, enclosing the printer will help a lot more than making the bed hotter.

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Re: Ros tock V3 heated bed not getting hot enough

Post by rootboy »

Okay, so the controller also agrees that the bed isn't up to temp. That's why it's calling for power continuously. So I think that we can rule out the PID. While the bed is heating, what is the voltage at the bed terminals? Try to measure before and after the connector. This will give us an idea if the connector is going bad. Raising the voltage will help a bunch, I run mine at 13.8 volts with no trouble. But let's make sure that the connectors aren't bad first.

Repetier has the graphs, MatterControl doesn't.

88 is more than adequate for PLA. Marginal for for ABS and PETG. And as geneb says. enclosing the printer is going to help a lot (so says the guy who still hasn't done his).
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Re: Ros tock V3 heated bed not getting hot enough

Post by baba »

If I check the voltage at the power supply end while heating, I get 12.0V +/- 0.1 V. I don't see a difference if I get the tiny bare section of wire (so tiny I have a hard time getting my lead on it) just after the crimp type connector. At the bed end, I get the same voltage at the bare wire before the solder pad, and on the solder pad itself. I did notice the negative solder pad (black wire), had some spots that didn't want to read out. It looks like a good connection though, and I'm using a pretty cheap meter.

I do have an enclosure set up around the printer. Its just a plexiglass box with wooden corners, about an inch wider on each side than the printer. It goes up to about 2" below the bottom of the top case of the Rostock V3 (where the electronics are, so they stay cooler). Also, most of what I read for PETG was to use a 75F bed, but I know ABS is recommended to go from 80-100, with hotter generally better. That's why I'm fussing over this last 12 degrees.

If I up the voltage on the PS, do I have to recalibrate the printer or do anything to the electronics do deal with the extra voltage?

Brian
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Re: Ros tock V3 heated bed not getting hot enough

Post by dc42 »

If you increase the supply voltage then the hot end power will also increase, so you may want to re-run PID tuning. If you turn the voltage above 13.5V then in theory you should put one or two silicon diodes in series with the fans to reduce the fan voltage back to about 12V, however in practice 12V fans seem to tolerate 14V.
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Re: Ros tock V3 heated bed not getting hot enough

Post by Xenocrates »

The only recalibration would be to re-tune the PID on the hotend, and that can often be skipped as well, as temperature regulation doesn't always have to be exact (yet I say that as a guy who hand tunes the PID on mine to swings of less that .1 degree to either side of set point, since I want the practice)
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Re: Ros tock V3 heated bed not getting hot enough

Post by rootboy »

Re-tuning is easy. But I don't recall it making any difference when I did mine. Which was a good thing...

I was hoping that you could see if there was a voltage drop across the connector, but if you start out with 12 volts, and end up with 12 at the bed, then I think that you are good. A picture of those dark spots would be nice...

You can always insulate the bottom side of your bed.

https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:1917197
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Re: Ros tock V3 heated bed not getting hot enough

Post by baba »

Thanks guys....looks like it will be a bit before I can mess with this further. Life is taking over at the moment. I do notice that after fixing that one solder joint and tightening the lugs at the power supply it heats a bit faster, but does not get any hotter. Maybe that means the voltage really is the limitation?

Still wondering if I should even bother messing with it any further.? Seems to print OK at 87C, at least for smaller parts, as long as I have a good spray of the aquanet down there. What kind of improvement in ABS prints could I expect to see if I got another 10C out of it?

Brian
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Re: Ros tock V3 heated bed not getting hot enough

Post by rootboy »

The greatest improvement that I made concerning ABS was to stop using it. Try HIPS instead. It's a lot like ABS, but much easier to print.

But to seriously answer your question, probably better adhesion and less curling. As for getting more heat out of it, try this:

https://www.amazon.com/Pyramid-Compact- ... wer+supply

For $70 it's a bargain.
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