MOST High School RepRap User Experience[edit | edit source]
This page is meant to compliment the full instructions for assembling a MTU HS RepRap found at the MOST HS RepRap build. Please share your experiences with printing, troubleshooting and maintaining your MOST High School RepRap 3-D printer.
| Common Problems and Solutions |
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Printing[edit | edit source]
Share experience with different media; what media (vendor, material, color, etc.), what print settings produced the best result (print speed, bed and hotend temperature, etc.)? Did the media perform differently from others? Any potential pitfalls?
| Nozzle diameter (mm) | Vendor | Material | Color | Print speed (mm/s) | Hotend T (C) | Bed T (C) | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 0.5 | Ultimachine | PLA | Black | 45 mm/s | 210 | 65 | This material prints pretty easily. Results are reproducible and not much intervention is required once slicer settings are correct. |
| 0.5 | Ultimachine | PLA | Yellow | 45 mm/s | 210 | 65 | This material has proven to be more challenging and seems like it might perform better when a lower hotend temperature is used. Also might need to slow down the print speed. |
Printing: end of spool prints differently?[edit | edit source]
I've noticed that as the Ultimachine spool becomes depleted, the filament becomes much more springy, curling into very tight coils. The rate of extruder jams seems to increase, maybe because the filament in the Bowden tube is rubbing more against the sides or there is more friction along the filament path between the extruder drive and the hot end. I haven't come up with a solution to this problem.
Printing: when it gets cold outside, print quality changes?[edit | edit source]
When the outside temperature approached 0 degrees F a couple weeks ago, print quality dropped off. ABS prints delaminated and PLA prints got globby and it seemed like there were more extruder jams. The only solution was to slow the print speed down. A lot. ABS went from 110 mm/s to 60 mm/s and finally 30 mm/s before I could get prints to stay together. With PLA, I haven't been able to recover full quality, but a decrease from 60 mm/s to 45 mm/s seemed to make an improvement.
Yellow PLA issues - supporting the data in the table above[edit | edit source]
After having a lot of success with black PLA, I changed to a yellow spool and have had nothing but trouble. Some prints start OK, but I'm zero for five in print jobs completed without a jam. It seems that something is happening at the hot end to cause the extruder to gouge the filament so it can't be pushed. I've been able to "restart" extrusion by forcing the filament into the extruder by hand, but this has never lasted long before the next jam. I now see how the hot end is the really the big hitter in the mechanics of printing. Maybe we need to design our own?
