Firmware - when or even if to change.

I know nothing about the creators firmware.

Is it pure makerbot - or is it adjusted by flashforge ?

Apparently I have both version 1 and version 7.2 (think that's what it said)

Then there's the little voice in my head (the one that makes me root android stuff) that says: if you changed the firmware you could get repetier host and cura to talk directly to the printer.

The more I use makerware - the louder that voice gets.

Are there any other firmwares out there I could use - and if they don't work, how easy is it to reflash with the one I've got at the moment ?

Having bricked an iphone in the past - I'm not going to flash unless it's risk free :-)

Sailfish is pretty risk free. It is worth the change. I think the only way to go back is if you have a handheld programmer.

Flashforge firmware is essentially Makerbot's with a few tweaks. It even says press M when done, even though there isn't an M button.

This is good timing. I was just about to bring up a firmware question of my own. :)

I have the PowerSpec 3dX version of the Flashforge Creator X. I use both replicatorg and makerware to print. Starting last night, every time I try to use makerware, it fails, and a dialog pops up advising me that I have old firmware.

It's rather tacky that it waits until after the heating cycle is done to advise me of this, but that's for another time.

I have two questions, actually.

The main question is, if makerbot is offering to upgrade my firmware, should I do so? Am I going to brick my printer, or will the native makerbot firmware install and run in the flashforge/powerspec printer?

The second (and moderatly related, I think) is, I can use makerware, though it identifies my printer as 'eeprom_err', and if i try to connect to it as a replicator dual that connection fails and I have to restart services to get a connection back. Is there any tweak one can do to cause the printer to be recognized more easily?

Thanks in advance for any help here.

John

Quote:

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Originally Posted by curious aardvark

I know nothing about the creators firmware.

Is it pure makerbot - or is it adjusted by flashforge ?

Apparently I have both version 1 and version 7.2 (think that's what it said)

Then there's the little voice in my head (the one that makes me root android stuff) that says: if you changed the firmware you could get repetier host and cura to talk directly to the printer.

The more I use makerware - the louder that voice gets.

Are there any other firmwares out there I could use - and if they don't work, how easy is it to reflash with the one I've got at the moment ?

Having bricked an iphone in the past - I'm not going to flash unless it's risk free :-)

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I am going to give you advice some people here will cringe at.

If it's not broken, don't fix it.

I have never upgraded the firmware in my machine in a couple of years - this is what it prints like:

http://www.thingiverse.com/Geoffro/made

I am running on firmware v1.0. No issue that ever occured in a print, filament or anything that went wrong ever came down to firmware for me - it was always mechanical (or the program I was using)

I thought about upgrading to v7.2.. but I sell alot of things and really, if I break my machine for even a few hours I'm behind on orders, so I just never felt like taking the gamble. I'm sure it's got alot of improvements on the old v1.0
That being said, don't be afraid of flashing it - they are a simple AT Mega board, and worse case scenario, it's almost the cheapest part of your printer at about $40 for a completely new board (and you could choose from several really)

the main issue for me - is will changing the firmware let me use cura or repetier host ? having spent the last 9 months or so practicing with those - makerware is just awful by comparison.
Yes it does the job, but not well and not easily and only with a lot of pissing about.

If changing firmware won't make any difference to the programs that will talk to the printe:, then yep - not broke, don't hit with a hammer.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Geoff

I am going to give you advice some people here will cringe at.

If it's not broken, don't fix it.

I have never upgraded the firmware in my machine in a couple of years - this is what it prints like:

http://www.thingiverse.com/Geoffro/made

I am running on firmware v1.0. No issue that ever occured in a print, filament or anything that went wrong ever came down to firmware for me - it was always mechanical (or the program I was using)

I thought about upgrading to v7.2.. but I sell alot of things and really, if I break my machine for even a few hours I'm behind on orders, so I just never felt like taking the gamble. I'm sure it's got alot of improvements on the old v1.0
That being said, don't be afraid of flashing it - they are a simple AT Mega board, and worse case scenario, it's almost the cheapest part of your printer at about $40 for a completely new board (and you could choose from several really)

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wow impressed at the stuff you make.

I'm sure that if I ever get filament to stick to something reliably, mine will do as well (even if I can't paint)

So what do you print on, day to day (surface wise) ?

Quote:

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Originally Posted by curious aardvark

wow impressed at the stuff you make.

I'm sure that if I ever get filament to stick to something reliably, mine will do as well (even if I can't paint)

So what do you print on, day to day (surface wise) ?

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I use Kapton tape for shiny finish on prints and blue tape when it doesnt matter and I need super stick. I used to cover the entire bed in a layer of kapton, which can be tricky so now I just cover as much of the aluminum plate as I need for the build.

I also have a new printer coming with a glass plate which I am keep to try, I have wood filament here I cant use on the current flashforge

and are you using mostly abs or pla ?

Have to admit I haven't tried pla much yet. Apparently it curls less.
Also haven't tried the laywood or nylon yet (got both)
The nylon - apparently - is best printed on a sheet of cold plywood. Can't remember what laywood prints best on.

My next job is calibrating when hot (until reading thread yesterday - that hadn't occured to me lol) and printing a full size abs printing plate.
On the ground the thing abs sticks to best is abs. So hot abs onto cold should stick but not totally bond.
There are a lot of printers on crowd funding sites that claim abs on cold surfaces and most seem to be printing on plastic plates. So I thought I'd make my own.
Preliminary tests with a myriwell 3d pen and a 10x10cm slab of abs would seem to indicate it works quite well.
We'll see :-)

Quote:

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Originally Posted by curious aardvark

and are you using mostly abs or pla ?

Have to admit I haven't tried pla much yet. Apparently it curls less.
Also haven't tried the laywood or nylon yet (got both)
The nylon - apparently - is best printed on a sheet of cold plywood. Can't remember what laywood prints best on.

My next job is calibrating when hot (until reading thread yesterday - that hadn't occured to me lol) and printing a full size abs printing plate.
On the ground the thing abs sticks to best is abs. So hot abs onto cold should stick but not totally bond.
There are a lot of printers on crowd funding sites that claim abs on cold surfaces and most seem to be printing on plastic plates. So I thought I'd make my own.
Preliminary tests with a myriwell 3d pen and a 10x10cm slab of abs would seem to indicate it works quite well.
We'll see :-)

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I use ABS for 99.5 percent of my prints, it's not that I don't like PLA but for my needs, its not strong enough for the quadcopter parts I sell, they need to be solid ABS.

PLA curls just as bad as ABS with the wrong temp, eg. 70c will be perfect, 72c will curl (on my machine with my PLA anyway...)

Laywoo is tricky - just don't buy the cheap wood filament, buy laywoo - better to pay more and know it works. Tape or something porous and dry works best for the wood.
Nylon and Flex is easy, but the flex may not feed with the spring loaded extruder, so you would need to print a new extruder out, I had a tough time with the newer hotends.

I can't agree with the cold print bed thing, I'm sorry I've had disastrous results with a non heated bed even with the lightest of PLA.

Colour ABS I usually use , 228c Nozzle, 108 - 110c print bed.
White ABS is a bit higher tolerance, I print it at 230c as it handles it well.
Kapton/Tape 75ms feed, 110 travel.

PLA I print between 180c and 200c and a 65c to 70c hotbed
Kapton/Tape
80ms feed, 120ms travel

Wood, pain in the ass.
You can extrude it anywhere between 180c and 260c but it's getting it to stick to the bed that's the problem. People will tell you cold plate but I tried dead cold all the way to about 70c and it while hairspray helped and tape helped, the only good prints ive ever done in wood were laywoo.

Flex I print on Blue tape, sticks much better- print at 235c and 65c hotbed - Fast feed.
Nylon - prints a bit like flex, needs more heat on the bed but not as much as ABS. Best stuff you can get. Prints almost look like white resin prints.

it's laywood i have - so you haven't tried printing it on actual wood then ?

Likewise the bods who make nylon 618 say to print onto thin sheets of plywood.

Currently printing my experimental abs printbed.

Tested a small 10x10cm one with a 3d printing pen - and the theory seems to be sound. IE: hot abs sticks really well to cold abs - without bonding.

Hopefully this print will go through without any hassle.

As an aside I seem to have switched my r2d2 noises off, don't half miss them now they're gone. Have to try and remember what I was messing about with when I saw the setting.

I concur with Geoff, "If it ain't broke,...don't fix it!"
Haven't bothered doing a firmware flash, but I guess if one wants to revert, there's the original here;
http://www.ff3dp.com/#!download/c58h
ReplicatorG may not be the fastest or latest "bling(?)" on the block, but in my (2 month experience?) the stock FW seems pretty reliable..not doing production..hobby only.
Cheers!
TD

it's the total lack of any kind of layer control that's causing me grief.

Every other brand/make/etc 3d printer software out there gives you the ability to lay your first layer down, slower, thicker and hotter and then revert to normal printing for the rest.
But not makerbot software. And I haven't been able to even get close to using any other software.

And the annoying thing is if you use raft - it's put down, slower and thicker. So the software can do it - just not without raft.

aarrgghhhh !
:-)

Also loading and unloading filament does seem to be a bit of a lottery. I usually have to click it a couple of times before it works properly. And that's definitely a firmware issue.

But mainly it's the complete lack of layer control.

I didn't really give replicatorg a fair go. after it took 40 minutes to slice a 2cm long elephant, I decided to leave it a lone.
It did seem to have more settings than makerware desktop.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by curious aardvark

it's the total lack of any kind of layer control that's causing me grief.

Every other brand/make/etc 3d printer software out there gives you the ability to lay your first layer down, slower, thicker and hotter and then revert to normal printing for the rest.
But not makerbot software. And I haven't been able to even get close to using any other software.

And the annoying thing is if you use raft - it's put down, slower and thicker. So the software can do it - just not without raft.

aarrgghhhh !
:-)

Also loading and unloading filament does seem to be a bit of a lottery. I usually have to click it a couple of times before it works properly. And that's definitely a firmware issue.

But mainly it's the complete lack of layer control.

I didn't really give replicatorg a fair go. after it took 40 minutes to slice a 2cm long elephant, I decided to leave it a lone.
It did seem to have more settings than makerware desktop.

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The only thing I like about Replicator G is the Gcode editing on the fly, that is really handy. What you are trying to do can all be done in Gcode, it's just a matter of adding it before you print. Let me go through and figure it out,
I know what you are after, you basically just want the first and/or second layers to print slow like the raft yeah?

The way it works, the raft usually prints at %50 of your set feed rate, but in raftless yeah, it ignores it and makes ugly stuff. I had your pain yesterday, needed to print raftless and had about 10 failures.. everything in the book happened... bed level was off,
nozzle dragged on the print... man it felt like I'd never set the machine up and it just came out of the box.

My problem here is the temperature now. In winter it gets down to 0 or below when the wood fire goes out in the middle of the night, and everything freezes, then when we all get up the place is back to 25c, so the machine is really contracting and expanding alot, so thats most likely my cause. It's my first winter living in the bush, never realised how insulated the city is!

haven't started getting into gcode yet.
But yep I'm sure I can sort out my issues.

Can I modify the gcode and then export to x3g files ?

It's all a learning curve.

Yeah winter will be fun - my workshops will be about 10-15c cooler than it is at the moment.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by curious aardvark

it's the total lack of any kind of layer control that's causing me grief.

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You have complete control over that in makerware. You can even change raft parameters, layers, speeds and everything. Temperature settings are kinda flimsy, from my experience printer tends to stop and heat up/cool down damaging the printout.

You want to 'create profile' and 'edit profile' in Makerware, under the Advanced Settings. All the delicious gooey center is in the .json file that you edit with notepad, it pops up when you press the edit profile button.

well actually it just crashed, never opened in notepad.

I've installed proftweak and it launches that now - but it's not exactly in english, if you know what I mean. And makerware has an annoying habit of resetting everything you've changed when you click the create customised profile button, just because it can.
User friendly, it just isn't.

simplify3d looks the business - but not many reviews and not enough to convince me that it's not just people associated with the company. And it's bloody expensive.
They probably aren't - but just because you're paranoid, doesn't mean they're not out to get you :-)

dude those are beautiful prints.. done with supports? or rafters? honestly on the Dreamer I cannot tell the difference between rafters or supports.. I only have a support option and I try like hell to not press that button.. maybe I'll buy some water soluble filament and see if that helps on some of the 45 degree overhang issues i get

Quote:

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Originally Posted by rovino

and see if that helps on some of the 45 degree overhang issues i get

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45 degree's is easy! :) You just build on the curved lip on the outside parameter!!!!

rafts are flat plastic sheets that a model is printed on. Very useful if you can't get filament to stick to the bed all by itself.

Supports are thin columns of plastic that allow the printer to bridge awkward angles or spaces and are removed once the print is finished.

And yeah I've printed funnels with a steeper than 45 degree angle - no problem at all :-)

I upgraded my FF Creator X to Sailfish 7.6 (r1228) and have never looked back. Using Slic3r (and other slicers that use the Sailfish G-Code flavour) is way better than ReplicatorG / Makerware in my opinion (more control, etc).

I posted the brief process I use to print stuff here: http://3dprintboard.com/showthread.p...lic3r-settings

Quote:

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Originally Posted by curious aardvark

Can I modify the gcode and then export to x3g files ?

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Yep; you can run GPX from the command line taking any g-code file as an input.