My 3d Printing saga

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Spaceman
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My 3d Printing saga

Post by Spaceman »

I have decided to dabble into the world of 3d printing.

I have got a Malyan m200.

I wanted to create this post to ask some questions.

My first is with somthing like a ant chassis do people use rafts or brims on their prints.

On a more general note. Whats people's prefered choices for geting a stl file (from sketchup in my case) in to a printible file?

Thanks in advance.
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Shakey
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Re: My 3d Printing saga

Post by Shakey »

I don't use a raft, brim or support on any of my prints. But my printer has always been a very good bridging printer so can get away with it and with a high temp heated bed with acetone with ABS dissolved into it as the adhesion surface warping is mostly mitigated. Sometimes I CAD in some supports of my own to help things out.

For sketchup there is a plugin called .stl exporter on the extension warehouse you'll want. I then use Slic3r to create G-code and then printrun/prontrface to actually run the printer. Some programs combine those two into 1 but I like the level of control I have with printrun over my printer.
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Occashokka
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Re: My 3d Printing saga

Post by Occashokka »

My printer is closer to yours in price than shakey's I imagine so I will input what ive Learnt so far, generally I use raft with PLA and brim with abs however you will need some serious adhesion for abs and even then it wants to curl. Same as Alex on the stl exporter for sketch up it seems to be a simple and easy plug in, I also found sketch up doesn't print right unless it's 'water tight' which has been proving difficult so you must really carefully examine exactly what your slicer says it's going to print as I have had sketch up models I thought were good but weren't and only 3hrs into printing did I find it only sliced half
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Shakey
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Re: My 3d Printing saga

Post by Shakey »

Occashokka wrote:I also found sketch up doesn't print right unless it's 'water tight' which has been proving difficult so you must really carefully examine exactly what your slicer says it's going to print as I have had sketch up models I thought were good but weren't and only 3hrs into printing did I find it only sliced half
Grab the solid inspector 1, solid inspector 2 and cleanup 3 plugins. No longer a worry. :)
Nuts And Bots - For all your components and ready built antweights!

Alex Shakespeare - Team Shakey / Nuts And Bots / Team Nuts:
AWS 44, 45, 49, 51 & 55 Winner - Far too many robots!
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Spaceman
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Re: My 3d Printing saga

Post by Spaceman »

Great help.

I have PLA at the moment. Been having issues with it not sticking to the bed. Had some luck with masking tape and a glue stick. What would be good temps to use.

Got solid inspector 2. Will look into the others. Do i need solid inspector 1 also?
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Shakey
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Re: My 3d Printing saga

Post by Shakey »

Spaceman wrote: Got solid inspector 2. Will look into the others. Do i need solid inspector 1 also?
I personally use solid inspector 1 90% of the time. It's only if stuff is really bad I use 2. I find 1 quicker if it's one or two things disrupting the net.

I can't remember my PLA temps, haven't printed PLA in years! Also be warned PLA is a bit too brittle for combat robots.
Nuts And Bots - For all your components and ready built antweights!

Alex Shakespeare - Team Shakey / Nuts And Bots / Team Nuts:
AWS 44, 45, 49, 51 & 55 Winner - Far too many robots!
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Spaceman
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Re: My 3d Printing saga

Post by Spaceman »

Shakey wrote:
Spaceman wrote: Got solid inspector 2. Will look into the others. Do i need solid inspector 1 also?
I personally use solid inspector 1 90% of the time. It's only if stuff is really bad I use 2. I find 1 quicker if it's one or two things disrupting the net.

I can't remember my PLA temps, haven't printed PLA in years! Also be warned PLA is a bit too brittle for combat robots.
Cheers for the warning
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Spaceman
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Re: My 3d Printing saga

Post by Spaceman »

So getting somewhere with pla now. But contemplating switching to abs.

I am not sure my bed will go beyond 60 degrees. Would that and the abs slurry be the best bet to get bed adhesion.

Having fun tho!
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Re: My 3d Printing saga

Post by Occashokka »

Top note: have only been printing abs since start of Jan and have been printing it non stop but I am not that experienced compared to many others who may be more useful or be able to back what I said :)



I use 100 for abs and even using abs presets on my machine it's taken me about 15 prints to even get something to finish, I haven't tried it at 60 but I would assume it would be relying all on the adhesion method chosen being able to control the abs. The reason ABS is hard is it desperately wants to warp throughout the print as temperature change is what makes it warp and there is usually a ~150 degree difference between the nozzle and the plastic on the bed meaning the abs is fighting to lift off on the first layer and I would assume increasing the difference by about 30% would also increase its want to curl by a significant amount
Team Badger
Has a 3d printer now yay
-£4.82+VAT (intact)
-cool modulated printed thingy
-not yet built nasty mean spinnt thingy

I'm gonna build something huge and stupid, try and stop me :P
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Spaceman
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Re: My 3d Printing saga

Post by Spaceman »

Wow.

Abs printing may be a bit of a issue then
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