First print with printrbot simple.
Probably not immediately obvious, but this is the 5mm calibration cube. Using the default settings in the getting started guide.
All I have ended up with is a faint line of pla on the print table, and a giant blob of pla stuck to the extruder nozzle.
Slap on a piece of blue painter’s tape to add a little bit more bed height and a potentially stickier surface for the PLA to stick.
Painters tape here must be different.
I have some and it is a slick waxy surface. Tried using it first up and even less of the PLA adhered to the surface.
Ah, yeah, in some cases, you need to wipe the blue painter’s tape with rubbing alcohol to prep it. By “stickier”, I also meant stickier for the PLA to adhere to. The tape isn’t itself sticky on the top side.
On my Simple I have a glass sheet and blue painters tape. No prep on tape needed.
I will be adding a glass sheet so I have a flat bed in the near future. For now I just wanted to print something and get an idea of where I was at.
The fact that it was not extruding anywhere near enough material for where it got to in the print is not a good start.
I have to say however, I am a little disappointed in the Simple as a kit.
The build instructions leave a lot to be desired in a number of places, and the Getting Started Guide is amateurish to say the least.
For something of this nature I would expect a great deal more clarity and explanation of what is going on, and how to do an initial setup.
The lack of explanation as to what a number of the setting in repetier do, and the fact that the getting started guide makes you refer back to an older version of the document to deal with calibrating the bed/printhead alignment is rather disappointing. It was also also out of date with relation to the repetier software and at least one step made no sense.
If I had bought it fully assembled, and was just looking to make a print without any faffing about then I could accept a follow the bouncing ball approach with software settings.
Anyway, after having knocked it off the table, I have given up for the day, and it will probably be another week before I can devote more time to fiddling with the settings.
Just adjust the height of your z endstop. You need to adjust it untill you can barely slide some paper between the nozzle and the bed.
I will be blunt @Jeff_Karpinski , but no instruction would actually have been better than the drek that is currently supplied, particularly for a hobby machine such as this.
I don’t mean to give the impression that I went in to this blind with expectations that it would be perfect prints first time.
If the documentation is going to make me go “what the fuck”, don’t provide it, make me look at the forums, or search other peoples builds. I would have had no issue with that at all, and it’s something I had to do when I started building my own CNC router a few years ago so I am quite used to having to do this kind of research.
However. when the provided instructions follow along the lines of “setting a, setting b, now click print” then I think it’s not unreasonable to expect that something will print even if it’s a twisted mess. Now, a good portion of my time has been wasted and I have to start from scratch with research that I could already have done.
Anyway, that’s my rant over, I feel better and I have a week ahead of me to research the software, and hopefully come up with a few potential solutions to try next weekend.
@pave_spectre I recently built my PrintrBot Simple, and I must say, I felt very much like you feel now. I will try to spare you a bit of time by giving you a few unasked-for hints that I learned along the way:
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Calibrate the steps/mm for each axis. Manually move X, Y, and Z a set # of mm without a stop (in Repetier-Host, so 10 or 50 mm), then measure the actual movement as precisely as possible. In Repetier-Host, under Config menu, select “Firmware EEPROM Configuration”. Adjust the steps/mm by using * <#mm told to move> / <#mm actually moved> = New Setting. Do this for the E (extruder) axis as well (with end hot).
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Get a piece of glass for the bed. Cover it with blue painter’s tape. My glass cost about $2, and made a HUGE difference. The wood bed is pretty flat, but “pretty flat” isn’t quite good enough in this case. I held it in place with a couple of carefully placed binder clips, then printed some hold-downs for it and screwed those to the bed.
-Level that bed! I home the Z axis in each corner and use a piece of paper as a feeler-gauge. I make sure there is some good drag on the paper, but I can move it.
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Keep the filament feeding in as vertical as possible. I had trouble with the filament getting misaligned on the drive gear, causing the motor to skip no matter what current I gave it, or tension I set on the feed, even after I printed a new part with a guide inside (which helped about 50%). I now have my filament on a wire shelf above the printer, feeding near-vertical, and I haven’t had a problem since.
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Make sure the zip-ties holding the bearings are TIGHT. I ended up disassembling mine and replacing the zip-ties with ‘stiffer’ ones, and pulled them with pliers until they nearly broke.
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Make sure the X and Y axis strings are TIGHT. Not just ‘guitar-string’ tight; more like ‘steel-rod’ tight. I pulled mine with pliers levering on the wood as I tightened the bolts.
These few things made HUGE differences in my prints. Good luck with your PB-S, and ping me if you have any questions I might have solved.
Check out the unofficial Printrbot forum, http://printrbottalk.com . There’s a couple thousand members, some of then can help you.
@Carlton_Dodd I appreciate the tips. I will certainly be doing most if not all you suggest at some point. For now I need to figure out what to do so my hot end doesn’t leave a giant blob at the home position but then extrude next to nothing while attempting an actual print.
If your blob is from before starting the print, you need to prime your nozzle which had drooled itself empty. Turning on a skirt or brim, or a raft should be a good first step. Lowering the nozzle temp a bit (5 to 10 degrees) should help too.
The blob you see in the picture is from during the print, and the fine traces of plastic sitting on the table is what’s left of the raft. It actually extruded more plastic while trying to lay down the raft than during the next 8 or 10 layers I let it attempt.
I use painting tape and sand it a bit for the print to stick.
Your problem is most likely that your nozzle do not tuch the print surface, so the plastic do not attach to the tape. Which is why the brim is curled up like it is, also the bottom of the cube never leaves the nozzle and sticks to the printhead, the head from the printhead keeps the plastic melted and while printing the little cube, you end up with a drop like yours.
As said before, adjust your Z-axis, If you print the brim and stops the print,the plastic should be at a hight where the plastic is a little flat on the top, then you are ok and the plastic should stick.
I can at most print two times on my tape, with a light sanding in between.