I’m wondering if one of you Simplify3D experts out there might be able to help me out.
With most of my prints in either ABS, PLA, or PETT the first centimeter or so of filament doesn’t stick to the build plate. This “unstuck strand” will curl up and cause problems after the nozzle comes back around for another pass. I’ve been able to prevent this from affecting my prints by incorporating larger skirts around the part and basically “grabbing” the first centimeter of filament and snipping it off with scissors. It isn’t an elegant solution, but it’s been working (mostly) so far.
Does anybody know if there’s a setting I can tweak in Simplify to remedy this? I’m thinking it has something to do with retraction, but changing the retraction settings for the whole print seems a little clumsy. Note that I’m pretty confident my adhesion methods are sound; I’m using the right amount of pva or kapton on top of my boroscilicate and I don’t think that’s really where the fix lies. Also note that my start script mirrors the behavior of a makerbot, where the nozzle extrudes a line along the front of the build plate before retracting and starting the skit (this is where the problem begins).
If you can offer any help I’d really appreciate it!
Mmmm. Weird. may it be a sign of slight underextrusion?
You mention PVA and Kapton. first one is a filament used for supports, right? Maybe you ment blue tape? What are you printing with? If PLA, blue tape is a start but only with perfectly leveled plate, and the brand matters a lot. kapton would do but is not a always enough depending on PLA brands. Some brands are really too elastic… If ABS, then kapton on top of whatever may do the triuck but only with high temp. Especially for the first millimeters. I mean, I have a hard time imagining it is S3d that does that… :-/
If it is, you could always test with a small square (1 layer) somewhere on the plate that s3d with start the print with. If it does the trick, then we can consider it being an s3d … very weird… bug
Hi @slugw0rth Simplify does have a ridiculously large retraction setting for the FF Pro (12 or 15mm I think) so that might be an issue. I use mine with a retraction setting of 4mm and I suspect even that is too high.
What temperatures are you using for the materials and the bed? Possibly too cool?
How close is your bed calibrated? I know it’s not the same machine (or filament) but I had this problem on my Prusa i3 Mk2 with ColorFabb XT and it turned out simply to be that I was calibrated Z-wise too far from the bed. Easy to fix on the Prusa with the live Z adjust, on the FF Pro you’ll need to recalibrate.
@greenlee’s suggestion is pretty good. Lower the amount of material extracted in your start script in s3d.
However, you say you are printing on Kapton, on top of glass. This is strange to me. I am not saying it is a bad approach, but once most people put glass on thier bed, they dont use Kapton at all.
Use a glue stick, or even better, coat the build plate with Aquanet Super Hold hair spray, and you will see you get great adhesion.
