After some advice/tips on printing tall and thin objects. I have had a look through some of the other related posts and have tried to incorporate some of those changes into my prints, but still battling with it.
Prints over 75mm tend to topple over once they reach 75% or above. Note that I have small items 80mm tall, fall at 75%~ as well as items 200mm tall fall at 75%, so doesn’t seem like it is directly related to the height of the object.
For reference the thing I am trying to print now is Ahsoka Tano’s lightsabers from Star Wars for a friend who is into Cosplay. Link to the thingiverse page below.
The bits in question are the outer and inner chamber.
What I have tried…
Rotated both parts 180degrees so they are printing on a more solid base, compared to thin walls,
Turned on rafts and supports. At varying sizes and densities.
Slowed travel and infill speed (by 50-75%)
Re-leveled the bed and set extruder height prior to printing
Putting blue tape on the bed with and without glue. Tape was also placed before and after the leveling. After to shrink the distance between the nozzle and the bed
Using the snapmaker PLA with the factory settings in Luban
Anyone have additional things I could try? I am trying to avoid printing them horizontally (which I tried) but got a really bad rippling affect (no photos) where you can very clearly see layer lines, and it appears that the layers have not adhered.
I was able to get ~175mm tall cylinders of about 40mm diameter to print reliably. It required a very wide raft (roughly 1/3 the height) and a lot of supports, and both of these required airgaps in order to make the raft and supports removable.
Slow the speed waaay down. You might want to do this midway through the print, say at about half-height, using the touchscreen controller. Remember the table moves when the print head travels along the Y-axis, so minimize Y-axis moves if possible, enable jerk control or other acceleration settings. Might want to configure the linear advance K-factor as well.
Try to watch one of the prints to determine where it is failing. Generally the problem is the print wobbles or comes unstuck, but sometimes it could be overextrusion (filament buildup on the nozzle which causes it to stick to the workpiece) or the nozzle actually hitting the workpiece (unlikely without the print coming unstuck but possible).
cheers, actually caught the last print fail, well kind of, its in a black box, with black filament, but i had noticed a very subtle wobble in the print, then it looked like the print head hit it, (but could also be over extrusion as you mentioned) which broke it off the raft and the supports.
Didn’t realize i could slow it down mid-way, so that’s something ill look at next
I’ve used chopsticks and either blue tape or hot glue gun to add support/stability to a tall skinny cylinder I printed. I just waited until it was about 100mm and then paused and added them and then resumed. Reset them again after another 100mm.
so to follow up,
I took one of the prints that was giving me a lot of grief (4 failed prints, with no success) sliced in Cura, with the “fast” profile and supports turned on. Printed without issue.
At about 70% i dropped the speed to 90% then at 90% dropped it to 80%.
Trying another “problem” print with the same settings now, to see if it was potentially how it was sliced, and printed
Awesome! It might be worth adding a Z-hop, or experimenting with that, if you haven’t tried it. when you have two vertical “slits”, you end up with two “towers” forming and the Z-hop would lift the nozzle and move when going in between the two.
I am trying to print the 10 cm version of this Thing (link) under the following conditions:
Printrbot Simple Metal, fully dialed-in, with Cura as the slicer. I have a fan shroud.
Buildtak, freshly cleaned with isopropyl alcohol. I’ve also tried Elmer’s glue stick.
Inside a sealed enclosure that holds 30 °C.
Esun white 1.75 mm PLA, with moisture absorber in the enclosure with it.
190 °C extrusion temp and 0.5 mm retract.
With an oversized 30-line brim to prevent warping, which works very well.
I get a third of the way through, and then the part comes loose from the brim. It looks like the hot-end is creating lots of friction during extrusion and it basically levers the part loose. How can I fix this and do tall prints more reliably?
Things I’ll try tonight:
Instead of a brim, use a 5mm raft with a 0.1 mm air gap; I’ve had parts with the default 0.22 mm air gap be knocked off too.
Increase temp to 195 °C; less viscous, so less friction?
Cut off the object bottom by 1 mm to produce a larger contact point.
Are you sure you’re on the right forum? Use a thick brim and also try tree or other supports. A raft will make it more likely to detach as you note there’s an air gap. Print slower.
Use a thick brim and also try tree or other supports. A raft will make it more likely to detach as you note there’s an air gap. Print slower.