Best object to calibrate for optimal settings?

[JAY]

Looking for a good object to print to help me dial in great settings for my Rostock. I printed the stienforge bridge and it came out alright, some of the corners were a little fuzzy but is this object supposed to give me feedback of my current settings. If so what should I look for on that print to guide my settings?

I printed an iPhone 5 case and the long lines helped me realize I needed to adjust my x axis screw. Stuff like that is what I'm looking for here. Any suggestions?

[Jimustanguitar]

The old standby has been to print a .5mm thick thin-wall test cube. Unfortunately, the newest versions of the Slicing programs seem to have trouble with this part now. They either turn out a really wavy inconsistent thin-wall (slic3r), or they refuse to slice something smaller than nozzle + 10% (Cura).

At the very least, I would tune in your hot-end thermistor and measure your steps per mm on the extruder. Those two EEPROM settings and a good bed leveling / delta radius adjustment will eliminate about 90% of the calibration woes that people tend to fight with. After those, you should be able to do the 20mm solid cube and judge whether or not you want to tweak the extrusion multiplier.

The problem really is that every single print will require a little bit different finesse, so you can only calibrate so much before you need to just make tweaks on the fly and use your own judgement. There isn't 1 right setting that will always work, there's always a little bit of judgement and experimentation involved.

[texsc98]

Just posted out on Thingiverse the object I created & have been using for single wall calibration for quite a while because I couldn't get the single wall cube to slice properly in KISSlicer... It's a single wall cylinder http://www.thingiverse.com/thing:133050 designed for 0.55mm extrusion width

I actually like it a lot better than the cube because it does not have the "corners" that can sometimes cause issues... Well they used to at least before my carbon fiber arm upgrade

[JAY]

I have been printing a double cylinder on a platform and I can't seem to get the cylinders with consistent layers. What do the walls of my cylinders tell me about my setup?

[JAY]

Also, I am sure my hot end tip is aligned with my bed. I have the height perfect between the bed and hot end and I have run the 3 scripts, one for each axis and adjusted my cheapskate screws. I have done this several times and even bought another .05 hot end tip because I thought the other might be off. I notice this effect most of all on the first layer obviously. What is going on here? I will say that I have not done the DELTA_RADIUS adjustments at all...

[JAY]

It appears that the walls of my cylinders (1mm thick) are too thin for the Rostock Max to print. 2mm walls print better. I obviously still have retraction issues.

[geneb]

I've printed about 80 single wall (.60mm) tea light holders that contradict that statement.

Regardless, you've got other problems than just retraction. It looks to me like the flow rate is wrong - have you properly calibrated the EZStruder? 92.65 is a good starting point, but you may have to adjust from there. (A red flag on the flow rate is how the perimeters of the flat platform have a HUGE gap between each perimeter. It should appear to be one solid block of plastic).

How did your hollow cube turn out?

g.

[JAY]

Sorry I'm not seeing flowrate. I'm using repitier host. Are you speaking of the slider on the Manual Control tab of Repitier?

[geneb]

The flow rate is the rate at which the hot end extrudes filament. You're basically under-extruding. This means that the extruder is delivering less filament per extrusion command than the slicing software thinks it is.

Print the hollow cube and cancel the print after 10 layers or so and post a top-down photo of it here.

g.

[JAY]

Alright I will do that. Just so I'm printing out the right hollow cube, can you provide me a link for it?

[geneb]

It's the "calibration cube" that I list in the assembly guide.

g.

[JAY]

Oh the Skeinforge Bridge Calibration Cube. Yes, I'm noticing the perimeters aren't as one solid piece like you said. So where is the flowrate setting? The slider on the manual control tab of repitier?

[geneb]

Try tweaking your extruder steps per mm setting. The "default" is 92.64 (if memory serves). Bump it up by .5 and see how it goes. Tweak it until you're getting perimeters that actually meet.

g.

[JAY]

Ok I'm testing bumping the extruder step up .5. Thanks for your time.

I have another question. Every 7 seconds my rostock makes this clack noise. I noticed it's coming from the area where the steppermotor thats feeding filament. It only happens when I'm infilling which requires continuous feed. It looks like the extracter steppermotor is reversing, maybe too fast to grip on the filament itself and so it makes that clack noise. I see filament dust coming out of the EZextruder when I hear the noise and if I watch closely at melted filament coming out of the hot end during a solid infill line, the "clack" will happen and the line of filament on my infill is weak. It's not even at a point on the print where it needs to retract so I can't image this is a retraction setting. Not really sure what's going on there. What do you think?

Again thank you for your time.

-Jay

[lordbinky]

You may want to try and turn up the current limit in firmware for just the extruder. Search the forum there's a few discussions over that topic.

[Eaglezsoar]

Do you have a fan blowing on your Rambo card driver chips? You could be experiencing a reset of the extruder driver because of heat.
Get a fan blowing on the Rambo card and see if that makes a difference.

[JAY]

I tried a fan directly on the board and it didn't help at all...Then I took a short video of the rostock making the clacking noise and tightened a zip tie around the extruder stepper motor shaft. What could this be? It's always done it.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N2Zi7toq ... e=youtu.be

[JAY]

As far as my perimeters not making contact with eachother-I've been doing what geneb suggested and here are my results. I have 7 prints here. I'm incrimenting my Ext. steps in my EEPROM configuration .50 on each print starting from 93.20 on the far left to 95.70 on the far right. And the last picture is of me bumping it up to 100.

[lordbinky]

Check how you have your cable routed to your extruder and if it is run alongside other motor cables go ahead and seperate them. Minimizing the amount the stepper motor wires are parallel to each other or or endstops will help keep many mysterious issues from arising, wires crossing perpendicular are fine.

[geneb]

Just for grins, try bumping up the hot end temp by 5 degrees or so. That "bumping" sound you're describing sounds a lot like what would be called "skipping". This can happen if the hot end is too cold for the filament feed rate or your stepper drive is too low, or a combination of the two.

If it comes to it, I can help you over a Google Hangout session later this week - I'm taking three days off to help my wife set up her new classroom (first year teacher at 45! I'm so proud of her!). I'll have some spare time to try to help if i can.

g.

[JAY]

Love it! Teaching ain't easy.

I'd like to do a google hangout when you have the time. Shouldn't take long.

[geneb]

We can try for this evening (pacific time, I'm on the west coast). Email me and we'll go from there.

g.

[JAY]

Just wanted to follow up here with my findings. The clacking noise and the thin perimeter issues I was experiencing were definitely related. As I took my hotend apart I noticed a bulge in the high temp tubing.

The first couple weeks of my issue I thought the bulge was normal and it served as a "stop" for the high temp tubing as it protrudes into the brass tip. I had never taken the hot end apart before so I never knew what it was supposed to look like. I decided to post a picture of it and ask if it was normal and Geneb pointed out that it was definitely not normal.

So the clacking was from the high temp tubing constricting filament flow which forced the expect ruder stepper to skip as it was trying as hard as it could to push through the obstruction. The small perimeters not touching together on their sides was do to the reduced flow rate provided by the constriction as well. The final symptom was me having to throttle down my federate slider to 80 or even 70 to stop the clacking and create better perimeters. I was avoiding the real problem which was the bulge in the high temp tubing in the hot end itself.

Overheating the PEEK on my first couple of days with the Rostock while calibrating it is the reason my high temp tubing developed the bulge. I did this by stretching my hot end thermistor wiring just enough so that the thermistor wasn't in contact with the hot end. I couldn't see this disconnect because of the High temp RTV applied to the area. As the hot end heated up with little or no feedback from the thermistor, it melted the PEEK an deformed the tubing inside.

Hope this helps!