Hi, new guy with questions

[Gamble]

Hi everyone, I just got a 3d printer (in signature) last friday. Started printing right away and things were good for about 2 days then a fan died and one of the axis started to squeal. I have only used PLA so far. Prior to those issues here is what I did.
Layered with painters tape and level the bed and print. I tried hairspray and it worked well too. Tried the bed heated at 50/55/110*C and it all worked great!
Out of nowhere the nozzle would catch and spin parts and not stick. Then the fan died so i exchanged it for a new one.

So i open the new one, level the table and do a test file that came on the SD card on the painters tape. Printed great (except the fact I can't get the raft off clean)
Loaded up a file that I wanted to print (been using the makerbot to slice and export) and it goes to the edge of the board, prints 1 line then goes to the center to start printing and the PLA won't stick to the tape. Tried PLA on blue tape with the heated bed off, on at 55, on at 50 and on at 110. Tried the PLA temp at 210, 215, 220 and 230. Tried some hair spray and it stuck for about 5% then the other nozzle kept hitting the side and dragged it all over. Tried again and same issue won't stick and just globes up on the nozzle. Literally less than 35 minutes of print time because the test print was 30 min.

But why would the test samples print perfect but nothing else? What would have changed in the 2 days to go from printing to being a big booger on the nozzle. I'm pulling my hair out with this thing.


So this brings me to a few other questions. For machines without a heated bed is hair spray a MUST? Any good or clean way to break off a raft? When the first one printed well i could never get it off 100% so I did without and it was perfect.

I'll upload a video and post it shortly so you guys can see and hopefully help me.
Thanks in advance

[Gamble]

Here is a video

[LambdaFF]

I would say you have a straightforward bed levelling + Z height setting issue. Come back to more normal values of temp : ~50°C for bed and 205°C for hotend.

Put everything at temp. Level the bed, tweak the Z height progressively and just use glue on the tape, you should be just fine.

[Gamble]

hmm, i'm not sure on how to adjust the z height unless you are referring to the bed. The instructions are garbage at best for this thing.
Did 2 prints last night both had rafts and they printed good. Did a print without a raft and the same issue above.
So is glue or hairspray a must? Any glue stick will work?

Went to use it this morning and it didn't power on. Re seated the connections and flipped the switch a few times and got it on, started a print and about 5 minutes in the thing just shut off. Tried it again and the print was all jacked up like the video above so I just turned it off and walked away. Are all of these things junk?

[LambdaFF]

On the printrbots, we have a G29 command that uses a sensor on the Z axis to probe points on the bed. Obviously the measurements can vary slightly so it then calculates an average plane for the build plate.

Several advantages :
1/ The Z measurement is quite precise.
2/ This allows to correct the fact that the build plate may not be perfectly 90° with the Z axis (important hypothesis : this works fine only if your bed is really flat).

Then you can use the M212, M500 and M501 commands to tweak the offset of the sensor (the distance from the bed at which it triggers).

If your bed isn't flat or level but the printer thinks it is, you can see how it would drag on the print in progress. If your print warps during print, it no longer adheres to the print bed and sticks up. If that happens, obviously the print head has good chances to drag on it.

So : do you have an auto-levelling (or auto tramming to be precise) feature ? Do you have good print bed adhesion ?

[Mortimer452]

I agree with lambda looks like a bed leveling issue to me. What is your bed made of? My printer used to have an MDF bed and it definitely sagged a little in the middle. I leveled it at all four corners, worked great as long as my parts were close to a corner or edge, but in the middle I had the exact same problem you're having, unless I manually dropped the Z-axis a tiny bit before printing.

If you're using Slic3r, turn on the option to print a skirt 1-2 loops around your print. While the skirt is printing, you can manually turn the Z-axis until you're getting a nice, even line on the bed.