Welcome to the SeeMeCNC Community

Hey all, I've been having just a bitch of a time trying to print with PLA. I've been printing in ABS for months now, and I've dialed it in so that my prints have been looking really, really nice. But because I want to print some larger objects, and my ABS attempts warped (which I was half expecting), I decided to give PLA a shot.

I'm running an E3D V5 hotend, with the fan at full power of course. My first issue was with jamming, but a couple drops of Canola oil on my dust filter fixed that. Now, the issue is that prints just look...horrible. Some layers are solid, some look starved, there are little gaps showing up all over the place...I just don't get it.

I've tried a variety of temps between 200 and 220, my printing speed is 80 for perimeters and 100 for infill, and I've been using kisslicer. Any thoughts?

whats ur suck/wipe/prime settings?

Do you hear clunking from the ezstruder?

whats your layer heights/nozzle size?

try 30mm speeds

Wipe is turned off, suck and prime were at 5 for abs, but I've been trying 9 for PLA, not sure if it's made a difference. There aren't any weird sounds from the ezstruder. Layer heights I've tried are .1 and .2mm, and I'm running a .4mm nozzle. I'll try slowing way down tomorrow, but it's just such a painful thought to triple my print time when the things I've been trying to print have already been around 6 hours. >_<

So it looks like the problem is that my ezstruder is skipping, which isn't a problem I had with ABS. At 30mm/s it's definitely improved, but still not totally solved. I took apart my ezstruder, cleaned out any plastic shavings and dust, but I'm not sure what else I can do...thoughts?

when you feed pla by hand does it easily pour of the end or does it still have some resistance? if you feel some resistance try upping the end temp by 5 until it pushes easily but doesnt ooze. if your using stock hot end be careful because max temp will be about 245c

You can't print PLA with an E3D? I'm having the exact same problem, and most people here thought the cause was the SeemeCNC hot end. I'm currently printing at 35mm/s with no skips, but any faster and it becomes a problem. I was going to order an E3D with the hope of fixing it, but I guess that's not the problem.

Even at 30mm/s I'm still getting just a little bit of skipping, and yeah, it's an e3d hotend. I'm running 1.75mm PLA, so maybe switching to 3mm would help the hobb in the ezstruder grab the filament, but that would mean having to change my hotend, as the e3d is designed for 1.75, so I'm loathe to do that.

Does anyone have an idea of how to get the ezstruder to grab the filament more securely? Maybe a stiffer spring?

E3D prints pla just fine. Try Increasing your extruder current in the firmware. Also, try extruding 30-40mm through rephost at 100mm/s. Does it skip?

Isn't 200-220C a bit hot for PLA. I've been having great results at 185-190C....granted this is with the stock Rostock Max hot end and SeeMeCNC trans-green PLA at 40-50 mm/sec.

0110-m-p wrote:Isn't 200-220C a bit hot for PLA. I've been having great results at 185-190C....granted this is with the stock Rostock Max hot end and SeeMeCNC trans-green PLA at 40-50 mm/sec.

I am using SeeMeCNC blue PLA and I got my best speeds at 195C.

Glacian22 wrote:Even at 30mm/s I'm still getting just a little bit of skipping, and yeah, it's an e3d hotend. I'm running 1.75mm PLA, so maybe switching to 3mm would help the hobb in the ezstruder grab the filament, but that would mean having to change my hotend, as the e3d is designed for 1.75, so I'm loathe to do that.

Does anyone have an idea of how to get the ezstruder to grab the filament more securely? Maybe a stiffer spring?

Did you see my thread about the EZstruder skipping? http://forum.seemecnc.com/viewtopic.php ... 4&start=30 I printed a new extruder with an adjustable tensioner, and it helped, but I can't print that much faster than you can. The fastest I've gotten without skipping is 45mm/s, but I have to watch the print to make sure. I usually print at 35mm/s and go do something else. I think the EZstruder would skip even more with 3mm filament. 1.75mm is easier to push and more flexible. A direct drive extruder is pretty weak. The only solution I can think of for 80mm/s is a geared extruder with more grip and more torque. The problem with this is that the pneumatic fittings could fail.

Osr, that's simply untrue about the EZstruder.

I'm not married to the Ezstruder - I will happily upgrade, and have already, any part on the machine that I think would benefit from it - (carbon arms, E3D, and a Smoothieboard on its way)

You absolutely can print PLA faster than that with the EZ.

I JUST printed a 481g PLA part with the following settings

E3D V5 .6mm nozzle

Cura 13.11.2
.35mm layer
25% infill
.66mm extrusion width
205C hot end
Print speed: 70
Retraction 4mm @ 80mm/s


Not all machines are the same, but modding your extruder so that you have marginal increase in "results" suggests, as was stated in your forum, that the problem is not with the EZstruder.

Cope, I don't know what that part is but it looks damn good. It's amazing the differences in the machines.
You print stuff like that with little problems and others with close to the exact machine physical characteristics
can't print a part the size of a soda cracker without problems. At least it keeps the forum active.

Thanks. I don't know what it is either. Outside print job. Some prototype of something. There are 81 other parts that go with it.

It will pay for my shiny new Xbox One

thankfully I'm not limited to 30mm/s, otherwise it'd be about 200 hours of print work...

To give you guys an update on how my troubleshooting is going, I ran an experiment. I printed a vase, so I had a really smooth and even output of filament. I put an indicator on my ezstruder, and marks on my filament. That way I could easily keep track of what the struder was doing in relation to moving the filament, and I found that while the ezstruder continued to spin smoothly the whole time, occasionally the filament would stop moving for a couple seconds. So it looks like the extruder motor isn't having any difficulties, but that the filament isn't being gripped hard enough perhaps? This might add some weight to some of Osr hypothesis. If there's some variance in the spring tension across ezstruder units, then maybe a weaker one shows up occasionally? I'm about to test increasing the tension by putting a slightly stiffer spring in. I mean, the worst that could happen is I totally chew up some filament, right?

Have you measured your filament? If you have a bad spool that isn't consistent in diameter, you could also have the same issues you're describing.

Also, what is your extruder motor current currently set at?

one possible negative from applying too much pressure to the filament is that you can grip it so hard that you change the diameter/shape enough to change your extrusion characteristics in an unpredictable way...

I've measured the filament diameter as being between 1.74 and 1.85, but I don't have a way to measure roundness. My motor current is currently...huh, very high. I must've played around with it a while ago, because it's at 210. Guess I should try lowering that.

cope413 wrote:Osr, that's simply untrue about the EZstruder.

I'm not married to the Ezstruder - I will happily upgrade, and have already, any part on the machine that I think would benefit from it - (carbon arms, E3D, and a Smoothieboard on its way)

You absolutely can print PLA faster than that with the EZ.

I JUST printed a 481g PLA part with the following settings

E3D V5 .6mm nozzle

Cura 13.11.2
.35mm layer
25% infill
.66mm extrusion width
205C hot end
Print speed: 70
Retraction 4mm @ 80mm/s

2013-12-07 08.47.20.jpg

Not all machines are the same, but modding your extruder so that you have marginal increase in "results" suggests, as was stated in your forum, that the problem is not with the EZstruder.

I'm glad your EZ struder is working well cope413. I just want to figure out why mine isn't. I had decided that there was probably something creating extra friction in my SeemeCNC hot end, but Glacian22 has the same problem with a different hot end. I think it's pretty likely that there is something wrong with our EZstruders. The printed part I made let me tighten the filament and at least make my printer usable. Before I added that part, the drive gear would shave off filament intermittently at any speed, and I had to watch every print to make sure it didn't fail. Now that I've tightened it down, the motor skips steps instead of grinding away filament.

Well slap my tuba and call me Shirley, I think that did it! I dropped my current back to 195 and raised the temp up to 205c, which is when it started requiring a little less pressure by hand. So far I have a very nice vase, time to try more difficult things.

Osr, you've missed the point.

You haven't even solved your printers problems and you're suggesting other people try what you did in order to "fix" their machines.

the motor skips steps instead of grinding away filament.

THAT'S NOT A FIX!!!!!!

I don't want to channel my inner Gene here, but it needs to be said.

There are a few new people on this forum that are in the position where their machines aren't working properly and they're understandably frustrated. You know what doesn't help? Giving crap advice to other people about their machines.

If you've exhausted ALL of the possibilities on this forum, then contact SeeMe. They will make it right. Don't exacerbate the problems that people do have by offering garbage advice.

I'll say it again...

There is absolutely, categorically, 100% no design issue with the EZstruder. Barring manufacturing defects, it operates as intended and is an excellent extruder option.

So then, if yours isn't functioning properly there are 2, and only 2 possibilities

1) You happen to be unlucky and got a defective EZstruder in which case the guys at SeeMe will gladly send you a replacement at no charge to you.

2) Something else is causing the issues.


It's that simple.

What is that "something else"? That's what the forum is for - it could be your hot end, your filament, your firmware, your software, your model, or your environment - there's no telling until you explain it and we work through the troubleshooting steps.

And typically, when someone has a broken or non-functioning item that they are asking for advice on how to repair, the one answer they aren't looking for is "you can't fix it, but you can buy *this* or replace it with *that*"

cope413 wrote:E3D prints pla just fine. Try Increasing your extruder current in the firmware. Also, try extruding 30-40mm through rephost at 100mm/s. Does it skip?

is 255 the max? i have .83 by default it says 175,175,175,255

Yes, 255 is the max. I'm at 205 with no issues, with the stick end I was at 215. I don't think you should need 255, but if you're getting good results, no need to change it

You haven't even solved your printers problems and you're suggesting other people try what you did in order to "fix" their machines.

I recieved my Rostock-Max kit a few months ago, and I have had an almost unusable printer for most of that time. I've adjusted the settings and taken it apart and put it back together multiple times, and it wasn't until I added more force on the extruder bearing that I was able to print PLA reliably. I still can't print as fast as I'd like to, but at least it works now.

You know what doesn't help? Giving crap advice to other people about their machines.

Insulting me won't make anyone's EZstruder go faster. I found a way to improve the performance of mine, and thought I would share it. If it helps someone out that's great. If not, they can just bolt the EZstruder back up. Isn't sharing ideas like this the purpose of a forum?

There is absolutely, categorically, 100% no design issue with the EZstruder. Barring manufacturing defects, it operates as intended and is an excellent extruder option.

If the EZstruder is so great, and I'm just doing something wrong, please help me figure out what the problem is.

*grabs the Gran Torino keys back from cope413*

Experiment:
1. Set your hot end to whatever you expect the temp for your filament of choice to be, and home the machine.
2. Set the extrusion rate to 100 (mm/min I think).
3. Set the extrusion length to 100 and click the extrude button once the hot end is at the target temp.

Does the extruder skip at all during the extrusion of the material? If it does, your hot end temperature isn't high enough to sustain the melt rate required for the filament in use. Bump the temp by two degrees and try it again. Keep going until you get through all 100mm of filament without skipping at all.

g.

OSR, I've had a machine (a Leapfrog) with many woes and many dead-ends, just as you have described. It ended up that the extruder just couldn't run PLA effectively (the company admitted this). I know that this isn't the case with the Rostock Max, since I've printed out some absolutely stellar tests with PLA the last couple of days (I've just finished building mine). There are some things I'm tweaking, but I have no doubts I'll get it looking great.
With that, I reckon you should revert the machine to factory settings/parts, do what geneb says and slowly go through the steps to eliminate the possible causes. Don't give up, you will learn a ton about 3d printing doing this.