New to 3d Printing!

[BTerrier]

Hello,

Brand new to this forum and to 3d printing. Have been interested in 3d printing for some time and finally decided to purchase my first printer. Just placed an order for a Monoprice Maker Select V2. Hope this printer will work out well.

Looking for a good place to start and any recommendations/advice you guys can give me would be great. (or even a link to read up) Pretty good with tech, diy, and mechanics, so I think I can pick up the basics pretty quickly.

Any assistance would be appreciated.

Thank you in advance!

[Pixel Armory Bert]

Hi there,
Bert here from the YouTube channel Pixel armory.
I would be happy to help you get started and printing like a pro in no time. Feel free to contact me about any advice or general questions regarding 3d printing.
You can check out my channel if you want to learn more about 3d printing.
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCfY...kVkgtE5rC126yg

[wirlybird]

Start with PLA and do your calibration cubes and small simple prints to get a feel for things. I know you want to jump in and make a jet engine or plasma rifle, I sure did, but resist the urge for a bit to get familiar with things.
Things will go wrong and it will seem impossible at times but just persist and research, research, research and in time you will look back and be amazed at how far you come in a short time.

[BTerrier]

Thanks, I will definitely start small with PLA. I did order a roll of pla with the printer.

The printer should be coming sometime tomorrow, so I will be sure to do some more research tonight. I am sure I will be back on here soon as I start to play with it over the weekend.

Start with PLA and do your calibration cubes and small simple prints to get a feel for things. I know you want to jump in and make a jet engine or plasma rifle, I sure did, but resist the urge for a bit to get familiar with things.
Things will go wrong and it will seem impossible at times but just persist and research, research, research and in time you will look back and be amazed at how far you come in a short time.

[BTerrier]

So, I received the printer yesterday and succesfully completed a test print via the SD card included with the printer utilizing the sample filament as well.

Downloaded a file from thingiverse and used CURA to slice. Loaded up a roll of Hatchbox PLA....cant print for longer than 2 min without destroying the print.

Re-leveled the bed and tried another downloaded file, same issue. So I printed another file from the included SD card. Prints okay again, not perfect but acceptable for a second print.

What am I doing wrong? What can I do to resolve this issue?

[wirlybird]

Did you get a good print with Hatchbox?

Try to see what temps the print on the card are using.

[BTerrier]

Yes I did get a decent print with hatchbox. Here is the gcode for both:

Looks like it isn't much of a temp difference. And I am not sure but I dont think decreasing temp would solve the issue. Not sure what the terminology is, but it seems as if it wont print solid lines....gaps between filament and kinda curls up not sticking properly.

But as I said, I am a total noob. Never printed prior to last night, so I def have a lot of learning to do. See gcode below.

Gcode for Included SD Card Print:

M190 S50.000000
M109 S195.000000
;Sliced at: Mon 14-09-2015 12:12:50
;Basic settings: Layer height: 0.1 Walls: 0.8 Fill: 20
;Print time: 1 hour 53 minutes
;Filament used: 2.729m 8.0g
;Filament cost: None
;M190 S50 ;Uncomment to add your own bed temperature line
;M109 S195 ;Uncomment to add your own temperature line
G21 ;metric values
G90 ;absolute positioning
M82 ;set extruder to absolute mode
M107 ;start with the fan off
G28 X0 Y0 ;move X/Y to min endstops
G28 Z0 ;move Z to min endstops
G1 Z15.0 F4800 ;move the platform down 15mm
G92 E0 ;zero the extruded length
G1 F200 E3 ;extrude 3mm of feed stock
G92 E0 ;zero the extruded length again
G1 F4800
;Put printing message on LCD screen
M117 Printing...



Gcode for File Sliced With Cura:

;FLAVOR:RepRap
;TIME:33788
;Generated with Cura_SteamEngine 2.3.1
M190 S60
M104 S200
M109 S200
G21 ;metric values
G90 ;absolute positioning
M82 ;set extruder to absolute mode
M107 ;start with the fan off
G28 X0 Y0 ;move X/Y to min endstops
G28 Z0 ;move Z to min endstops
G1 Z15.0 F9000 ;move the platform down 15mm
G92 E0 ;zero the extruded length
G1 F200 E3 ;extrude 3mm of feed stock
G92 E0 ;zero the extruded length again
G1 F9000
;Put printing message on LCD screen
M117 Printing...

Did you get a good print with Hatchbox?

Try to see what temps the print on the card are using.

[BTerrier]

Was finally able to make a few prints other than the samples loaded on the SD card. I switched to a different slicer briefly and was able to print a buddha model. Came out okay, but wasn't great print quality.

Then went back to cura to see if I could get a print. I noticed that I couldn't get it to print properly because I was using a "brim" support. For whatever reason it continuously curled up off the bed and created a mess. Once I switched to a "raft" it printed great. Also, I feel that the quality of the prints in Cura are much better than craftware. I can't be entirely sure because I used different models for each and only used craftware for one print, but I did notice a difference in print quality.

[curious aardvark]

you need to raise the temperature - not lower it.
And just tell us what the settings are it's easier :-)
I'm not used to having to find stuff in gcode lol

Print bed should be 60 not 50. Makes more difference than you'd think.

Also try printing at 0.2 or 0.3 layer height, makes life easier and things don't look much different. Plus stuff happens a lot faster than it does at 0.1 :-)

Print area cooling fan should be on all the time.

(looks on net) Ah right - you've got a wanhao duplicator i3. v 2
That's what you want to search for when looking for information on it.

My standard pla print temp is 210. Sometimes 215, never lower than 205 - but 99% is done at 210.

What is your printing speed and movement speed ?
If it's in the code, I can't see it.

Probably best top start somewhere around 40mms for both. Keeping the movement speed the same as the printing speed helps quite a bit. Particular with taller prints on a i3 type system.

[BTerrier]

Ok, so I have been able to print using cura. I am not sure exactly what the solution was to be honest with you, because I changed a few things around. Stock settings on cura were 200 print temp and 60 plate temp. I also changed that to 210 and 70. Seems to print fairly well now.

The print speed was at default of 60mms and 200mms for travel. I will set both to 40mms to see if that helps.

Also, at 0.2 layer height, I am getting a some air gaps between layers in some spots. Not horrible, but is this normal at 0.2? 0.1 prints great, but if I can get better quality prints at 0.2, it would speed things up a lot.