Serious safety concerns with living in same room as PLA 3D Printer?

You are probably pretty safe printing PLA

Regarding emissions, the following recent report, Emissions of Ultrafine Particles and Volatile Organic Compounds
from Commercially Available Desktop Three-Dimensional Printers
with Multiple Filaments, indicates that PLA is a pretty low emitter (1/20th of nylon) and most of what it out-gasses is Lactide which is low on the harm scale.  That said, everybody's nose sees things a bit different and people tolerate smells differently. Note also that we used to think lots of things (like asbestos) were harmless that we know differently now.  Note also in the figure below from the report that all PLAs are not created equal.  Dremel PLA produce way more nasty stuff than FlashForge PLA did.  I am also sure additives, colorant, and fillers can change this a lot as PLA filaments aren't not all PLA.

Regarding the fire safety issue.  Note that there is a BIG difference between a kit and a "product".  Since you are the manufacturer of the printer for a "kit", the packager of the "kit" is not responsible for the fire or electrical certifications of the final product.  This does open the door to some risks.  The biggest risks are electrical safety; but, fire safety can be an issue as well.  I would say that the risk is likely higher to you personally when the printer is NOT in your bedroom as if it catches fire when you are sleeping, you will likely catch the fire faster if it is in your bedroom.
From a practical standpoint, I have heard several people complain that they can't sleep when the printer is printing when the printer is in a separate room.


While printing a roller stamp or rubber-roll from a flexible material such as [hard]TPU, [softer] TPE, or even a [super soft] foaming flexible filament is certainly possible. In any case, this would create soft, somewhat squishy prints. These prints will work quite easily as a stamp or woodblock printing stock, transferring ink from a pad to paper. The print pattern will depend a lot on how soft the stamp is: the harder, the sharper it will print. A massive roll of this material can behave akin to a rubber roll as one uses it in linoleum printing.
A foaming filament might be able to take a little paint in its airgaps, but it will never be as soft and contain as much paint as a foam lacquer roll - making it at best an improvised tool, or one that is chosen for a specific artistic purpose. It behaves more akin to closed-cell foam, while foam brushes and rolls from artist supply are typically open-cell ones. So if you go for a roller-stamp, you'll need to have an ink reservoir in the shape of a soaky-roller that isn't printed.
To top it off, it is nearly impossible to print a hairy wall painting roller: the hairs used in them can't be achieved with common print materials and slicers at the time. Even if stringing creates hair of similar dimensions, they are not affixed well enough to not get lost in the paint and can't be reliably created on demand.
Notes on pricing: One of the few options for foaming print materials is colorFabb, who was the first to offer such. Most of their foaming filaments cost around 50 €/kg, their flexible NinjaFlex costs about 80 €/kg.


What makes 3D printing noncompetitive for medium production runs?

TL:DR

3D printing is great for low quantities of items, but terrible for large quantities of items.  This is a continuous scale and as your quantity grows, the drawbacks of 3D printing become more pronounced.  In your situation, you seem to be dancing in the nebulous zone where there isn't really a good answer as to which production method is better.  It's more of a question of price vs speed.

There are several factors that limit additive manufacturing technologies (in this answer I'll just talk about FDM since you're asking about a plastic item) from being practical in large scale manufacturing.

Time

Compared to injection molding, 3D printing takes a very long time.  An injection mold can make 72 plastic caps in 3 seconds.  While I don't have a source, I would expect a similar item to take at least 5 minutes to be printed.  In order to produce an average of 24 caps/second, you would need 7,200 3d printers working without down time.  That doesn't take into consideration ...

Labor

Every 3d printed object needs to be removed from the print bed by hand.  That requires a person to be there ready to remove the item.  It's possible to have automated print removal, but for now I've yet to see it as a standard option on any machine.  An injection model machine can just pop the parts out into a box.  Even with the capability to remove the parts extra labor is still required for 3d printing because ...

Quality

Injection molded parts are as smooth as the mold they were made in.  While failures still exist even for molded items, their relatively cheap production cost and very quick production time ensure that an occasional failure won't be problematic.  3D printing on the other hand is still prone to variations in the final product.  For a few items, it's sensible to hand finish the parts with filing, sanding, or other reductive manufacturing techniques, but for many items this quickly become burdensome. Also, given the long production time compared to injection molding, even 1 discarded product will result in a long time required to produce a replacement.


A close inspection of what happened when printing the first layer resulted in this:

The missing steps on the new print came from the nozzle scraping too close to the print surface, which lead to no first layer
Readjusting the Z-axis end stop, which had moved down, resulted in no more lost steps, but the print not sticking for the first test.
Releveling the bed and making sure the bar was parallel to the bed resulted in a perfect first layer.
Lost steps and under-extrusion could not be replicated after 48 hours of rest for the printer.

I have no idea why the print had failed due to under-extrusion during the print, but apparently, my immediate tests were flawed enough to not detect the first layer height resulting in getting almost no extrusion. This I mistook for massive under-extrusion, making me believe something else was at fault.


You are correct about the walls. Using a Solidify object modifier is probably your best bet. A low Thickness: value (0.1 is probably good) helps keep the walls thin but strong. You can monitor the thickness while you adjust the value from Wireframe view.

Additionally, and this is probably the most important thing to know, your mesh must be clean. By clean, I mean it must all be one piece. No separate cubes, cylinders, etc. that you added while modeling, just one solid piece. Think about it this way. If you have added a cube and part of that cube is inside the rest, it might look good from the outside. But the 3D Printer isn't printing the outside, it's printing everything. So that wall, albeit hidden, that is present on the inside of your mesh will be printed.

Bad:

Good:

Lastly, if you have parts of your mesh that can't be printed from the bottom up, or wouldn't stand by itself, consider adding supports. You can always cut these off later.

Leg added because it wouldn't stand by itself:


Cura settings for Fabrikator Mini V2 Turnigy or Malyan M100

I googled your machine name and found this HobbyKing page.  There is a link here to CURA settings.

Page with CURA settings


How is my Prusa Mini damaging its X axis belt?

I followed up with Prusa on this recently (a few months later) and they confirmed that there were issues with some belts but that this has been fixed in production.
To provide a better guarantee of quality, I opted to replace both the X and Y axis with genuine GATES 2GT PowerGrip GT3 belts. This has fixed the problem for me.


Has anyone rebuilt Prusa3D firmware for the Genuine Pruse i3m3s?

The Prusa Firmware on GitHub is the very latest version -- it's the code repository Prusa uses for development.  My suggestion is that you don't use it unless you're planning to do firmware development or testing, because like any such software, it tends to have bugs.


Nozzle moves very slowly from home to start position

I had the same problem, and I solved it by changing the Z-Axis Feed Rate to a much higher value (1000 mm/min.) in Repetier Host via Config -> Printer Settings -> Printer.


No, due to 3 reasons
PET is not (easily) printable.
There is a lot of confusion on what Filaments you can buy: most times filament branded PET is actually PETG, sometimes PETT.
PET is not an easily printable material at all. With expert knowledge and the right machine settings it can be printed, but even then, it is not as easily recyclable into a useable 3D-printer-filament as you might think. You need full reprocessing capabilities, which means the need for machinery to allow thorough cleaning, grinding to dust, melting it up, pelletizing and finally extrusion as a fresh filament.
The closest related material that is easily printable is PETG, a modified PET that also contains glycol. You can't convert PET into PETG with home or hobbyist applications at all - they are totally different in their chemical behavior, even as just one material was added in production. PETG is not brittle like PET, it does not haze on heating, but it ages in UV light, scratches easily and can't be autoclaved like PET. But the chemical modification has to be done during the initial manufacturing of the material, and it is a huge mess to try to recycle the two together, which can and will happen if you try to work with material you source from recycling.

“When they’re processed together, PETG melts and becomes sticky while PET remains solid. PETG sticks to PET chips and forms large clumps that pose processing problems.” Resource Recycling (magazine/blog)

3D printed objects are very unlikely to become food certified.
You can't easily manufacture (certified) food-rated printed products, like food containers due to the requirements that a machine that manufactures food-certified products needs to comply to. I advise looking at this answer regarding food rating for more elaboration.
It is hard to print really transparent with FDM.
Due to the method how FDM works - extruding lines next to each other - it is often impossible to print fully transparent objects right of the bat - there is almost always air inside a printed object, and there are so many boundaries between the extrusion paths that refract and change the photon paths that the best one can achieve somewhat easily is translucent (=semi-transparent). Read this answer for further information.
But if you manage to get the object really solid, you might get some near-transparent, icy results from some orientations while looking in others still will look matte.
To get them fully transparent you then will have to post-process them to become fully transparent by grinding the surface up to 4000 grit, but that is very labor intensive and most likely not possible for the inside of a bottle. To be clear, you spend hours polishing one surface.
Could it be economic in the slightest?
On a side tangent, the viability of printing a bottle via buying new ones will need to be expored. Shapped PET Bottles with caps start at \$0.01 per piece and top out at \$1 per piece - you get the better prices if you order in larger quantities. You will have to compete with getting under \$1 per bottle, or rather with what the price of a typical bottle you want is.alibaba.com
A typical PET bottle ordered from China weighs 30 g for a 300 ml bottle, and the particular example I looked at comes \$0.22 to \$0.28, depending on the bottle cap, with a minimum order of one parcel with something around 300 items. That seems to be in the average range.
A roll of 1 kg of PET(G?) filament starts at ~\$30 at the moment. That is the weight of 33 shaped bottles per roll. Your print will most likely be heavier than the blown up bottle to get it watertight, but let's just assume you might manage the same weight. Then it's about \$0.90 in the material alone - so we are at more than 300% of a bought product with cap already!
Atop that comes the running cost of the printer, which depends on your print time, printer and electricity price. I know my hobbyist machine comes, maintenance and electricity combined, down to 0.21€/h, so roughly \$0.25. Printing a bottle will take several hours.
PET preforms that can be blown up to almost any bottle shape, type and size and ship much cheaper come to prices due to better density. Which means you compete against \$0.015 to \0.15 per bottle in material costs.
Conclusion
It is not economically viable to even attempt to print bottles beyond a prototyping stage.


Print paper or cellulose - any recyclable filament?

Filament made of Polylactic acid (PLA) is usually made of biological materials (such as corn), and can therefore be considered bio-degradable in most cases.

Whether the filament is 100% bio-degradable (and non-toxic for the surroundings) will depend on the specific formula used by each individual filament manufacturer. (Many manufacturers include various additives to achieve particular effects, such as glow-in-the-dark, metallic finish or extra strengh.)

Woodfill PLA-like filament might be of extra interest to you, not only because it typically is bio-degradable, but also because it will give you the look and feel of being bio-degradable.

Hope that helps!

PS: there are multiple other filament types that are either recyclable, bio-degradable, or both, although PLA might be the most commonly available of them all.


Does this microstepping test result indicate need for TL smoothers?

It's worth remembering that the smaller the fraction of the step, the less torque is going to be available at that step. here is one link but there are many others that explain it as well. it looks to me like you have inconsistent friction in your system, or possibly some flex/warping of the frame. it might also be easier to see with a smaller nozzle

edit because i forgot to actually answer the question: no, by itself it does not indicate that smoothers would help. this does not mean that they wont, just that this does not look definitive to me


Why do 3D printers have only one limit switch?

In principle you only need the minimum axis position (or the maximum), the offset to the bed and the size of the bed in the direction of the axes. Fortunately, you can specify this in the firmware:

E.g. in Marlin Firmware offsets are defined as travel limits:

// Travel limits (mm) after homing, corresponding to endstop positions.
#define X_MIN_POS -33
#define Y_MIN_POS -10
#define Z_MIN_POS 0
#define Z_MAX_POS 240

Bed size:

// The size of the print bed
#define X_BED_SIZE 200
#define Y_BED_SIZE 200

Do note that some printers do have maximum endstops on top of minimum endstops. This is handy in case of layer shifting (e.g. caused by the nozzle catching the print as such that the belt skips notches and as such redefining the reference frame) to prevent the carriage from destroying the printer at the maximum of the axis.


How to programmatically resume a paused print in Marlin

The correct Marlin-command to unpause seems to be setUserConfirmed(). I have tested that it works.


Even though each path, in theory, is concentric around the center point of the arc, the pathing does not always work out that way - especially around corners and radii.

While your 1.2mm walls should always allow for three 0.4mm paths, if the slicer rounds down the overall thickness to 1.19mm, it will not detect enough room for three 0.4mm paths - but three 0.39mm paths should still fit, even if the slicer determines the thinnest part to be 1.17 mm.


Nema Stepper used in Flashforge 3D printer

Nema 17 is about the physical size of the motor, ie screw hole placement. It doesn't specify anything about the power of the motor. If you are looking to replace the motor, you need quite a bit more info than that it is Nema 17, such as the steps/rotation and the holding torque.


Bubbles are a defect.  Two problems can occur:

The air in the bubble will be under pressure when heated and can cause a little blow-out when the plastic sides of the bubble are soft enough that they can no longer contain the pressure.  Depending on where this happens, it can either result in little spatters of filament being spit through the nozzle at the printed object, expanded craters which could increase the diameter of the filament and make extrusion more difficult, or, if at the end of a print job, the expanded filament may cool and be too large diameter to feed for the next print job.
If the air escapes without causing any other problem or it was created by cavitation, the volume of the bubble causes under extrusion, since it represents missing plastic.  The extrusion volume is controlled by driving a specific linear distance of filament and assuming a specific filament diameter and 100% plastic.  Underextrusion hurts print quality, print strength, and surface finish.

Bubbles in the filament indicate a failure in the filament manufactury.  As @Granny said in the comment, this is defective filament which should be returned for a refund.  If you use it, understand that it will not give results that are the best your printer can deliver.


Makerbot Replicator 2 restarts after preheating the hbp

Clues so far:

You changed your hardware to add a heated bed.
You've had the same symptoms with three different firmware versions.
Your Replicator 2 reboots right after preheat, regardless of temp set.

My Assumptions

You have not tweaked firmware or other settings that could cause both the heated bed and hot end to draw high loads simultaneously.  (By default Makerbot handles this in firmware, avoiding situations that could over-tax the 9.2A power supply which isn't really enough to handle preheating both at the same time.)

Potential Problems: Listed starting with the easiest to fix...

No problem, carry on: If you are printing from the USB cable, a restart after preheat could be a normal condition.  The Replicator 2 reboots to reset inputs when you start a print over USB...this is normal.  So, if you're preheating with the buttons and then you start a print, this would be expected behavior.  Try printing from SD card and it shouldn't reboot.
Power Supply voltage switch: Make sure your power supply voltage input switch is on the correct voltage, either 110 or 220.  Having it set to 220 when you're using 110 can cause reboots due to insufficient power. (brown-out)
Wrong heated bed: If your heated bed draws too much power (it is higher power than the Replicator 2 can support with that power supply), you may get reboots due to insufficient power. (brown-out)
Short somewhere: A short somewhere in your system could cause too much power draw.  This could be somewhere in your heated bed, your hot end, or other.  Inspect carefully around the areas where you moved wires.  You could have a frayed wire contacting the frame, a screw shorting between two wires, or a little stray "hair" of copper wire sticking somewhere it shouldn't.  This too will cause a reboot due to insufficient power. (brown-out)

I hope this helps.  For further reference, read this thread as I believe it has some relevant info.  :-)


Laser engraving software for Boxzy 3D printer

Autodesk must have been reading your mind.

A brand new video just got posted today from Autodesk on how to do this in F360.


Anyone know how can I solve this ?

In order to know how to fix it, you must first diagnose what the problem is.

Two things you should verify in Slic3r:

Check that under "printer settings" the Z offset is really what you want it to be (if you don't know what that is, you want it at zero).
Check that in the preview (Plater plane, the "preview" tab is on the bottom), you can actually see the bottom layers being generated by the slicer (you can verify this by moving up and down the slider on the right of the main window).

If both of these checks are positive, then the problem is probably not with the slicer but with the printer or printer setup.  The ultimate proof of this would be to try another slicer like for example cura.

If the problem is with the printer, the only obvious one I can think of, is that the bed is too high, the nozzle touches is, and the plastic cannot be extruded for the first few layers.

You can confirm or refuse this hypothesis by simply observing the printer while in operation. If it is the case:

you should observe the nozzle moving "as if" it was extruding the first layers
the nozzle should be touching the bed
very little plastic should remain onto the bed
you should hear some grinding or clicking noise from the stepper motor of the extruder (as the printer will try to push the filament, but the filament will have nowhere to go)

If you realise this is the problem, stop the print immediately: this is the typical situation in which you could generate a clog in the cold end of your extruder, which is not a permanent damage, but fixing it is a somewhat complex and tedious procedure.

The good news is that if this is the problem, the solution is trivial: you should simply set the nozzle height correctly.  How to do this changes from printer to printer and you should refer to the user manual of your printer.  Here is a video showing a few of the most common method to achieve that.


Is your BL Touch a v3 (likely if you've only just purchased it)? If so, make sure you're using the bugfix version of Marlin 1.1.9, which supposedly fixes the compatibility issues. I say supposedly because there's also a capacitor on the mainboard that can be removed to fix the issue, and once I removed it (and commented out the specific v3 bits in the firmware) the BLTouch performed noticeably better than when relying on the bugfix firmware alone.

Teaching Tech on YouTube has a few BLtouch Ender 3 videos, covering the changes for configuring the bugfix firmware and the removal of the capacitor.


This was likely due to reaching the limitations (maybe minimum step rate) of the stepper drivers which were 4988 drivers. I updated them to 8825 drivers which were able to support a speed of F20 correctly. I have not yet tried them at lower speeds.


Adjusting Z-axis (Monoprice Maker Select)

I sawed off about 2 mm from the (bed) screw in the photo so it wouldn't catch on the screws of the Y endstop. It now works as before.

If somebody has a more cerebral solution I will gladly `accept' it.


You do not need to adjust the area yourself for Marlin 2.0, please look into probe.h and into this answer.

You only need to enable the offsets:

#if PROBE_SELECTED && !IS_KINEMATIC
  #define MIN_PROBE_EDGE_LEFT MIN_PROBE_EDGE
  #define MIN_PROBE_EDGE_RIGHT MIN_PROBE_EDGE
  #define MIN_PROBE_EDGE_FRONT MIN_PROBE_EDGE
  #define MIN_PROBE_EDGE_BACK MIN_PROBE_EDGE
#endif


Out-gassing of printed material when heated

This is not an answer to your question, but it relates to outgassing so I am sharing it here.

I have used the acetone vapor method of smoothing the surface of ABS prints.  It works really well, and the surface becomes much smoother and glassy.  I printed a large coffee mug (lets, for the moment, ignore food safety issues) and made it very smooth.

After a couple of weeks to allow the acetone to fully evaporate, I poured a nice, hot cup of tea.  Unfortunately, the acetone had not fully left the print, and the surface was immediately covered with dozens of bubbles as the acetone evaporated and pushed against the ABS.

This effect was only because of the acetone.  Another cup that had not been vapor smoothed worked perfectly and was unaffected by the hot water.

I have not seen similar outgassing from PLA, ABS, Nylon, or PETG.

If I may hazard an opinion about the substance of your question...

I don't think that outgassing is the biggest contributor to the aging of prints and their properties changing.  I suspect that (perhaps not in order) these are larger factors:

exposure to UV light.  UV light breaks polymer bonds and reduces
the strength of plastic.
absorption of water vapor, which can both expand the material which causes stress, and chemically break polymer bonds.
long-term crystallization of the material
fatigue from repeated sub-failure stress

NASA used to have resources that spoke to outgassing rates related to suitability for space applications.


First of all, let's look at what the filaments are:
PLA & PVA Filaments
Normal PLA and Water-soluble PVA contain for the most part the material on the tin, its precursors, and possibly some modifiers. These are only suitable for thermoplastic processes like injection molding or  FDM/FFF (Filament deposition modeling/Fused Filament Fabrication) printers - the finished polymer can't be made back into a UV-curable resin easily. Both materials are chemically rather well bonded and are not very reactive at all. They are biodegradable and not a lot of toxic waste. PLA needs very strong chemicals such as dichlormethane to go into solution, but PVA is water-soluble.
Resin
Almost no cured resin (as in post-polymerized) is water-soluble, your webshop might have a misnomer as it meant to write the proper name: water-washable, which is meant to reflect the ability to put the unpolymerized monomers into solution in water.
eResin
eSun offers an eResin-PLA-Bio-Photopolymer, which is similar to PLA, but it is not the same material you get for an FDM printer. You see this most easily by checking the density and the MSDS: Real PLA has a density of 1.21–1.43 g/cm³, eResin (as the bottles are labeled) has a density of merely 1.07-1.13 g/cm³. This is a totally different material in the bottle! It is most likely a resin mix that is based on lactic acid monomers and a UV-active acid that can bond the monomers, creating a structure that does contain lactic acid groups and the binder - but most certainly it is not chemically identical to PLA. It contains, according to the MSDS, Polyurethane acrylate as the 'binder', 1,6-Hexanediol diacrylate Monomers, and about 10 % photo inhibitors and pigments. The main selling point seems to be, that comparable to PLA, it would be made from a renewable source to a larger part. The chemical reaction that leads to the completed resin is a question I have pitched on Chemistry.SE.
It needs to be cleaned with IPA (isopropyl alcohol) or another organic solvent like any standard resin and you are not allowed to rinse the material into the sewer: it is classed as a LONG-TERM AQUATIC HAZARD - Category 4 and its MSDS contains:

Solubility：Soluble in ethanol, ethyl acetate, benzene and other organic solvents, insoluble in water

water-washable eSun Resin
eSun offers no water-soluble resin at all, they offer a water washable resin, which means that it is supposed to be less toxic than standard resin and safe to rinse effectively without IPA, creating less toxic waste in the process. The MSDS for this is not (yet)) available so I can't evaluate this. However, I have requested the MSDS for the evaluation of safety procedures needed and hope to hear back from them soon. This resin is most certainly not PVA, but it seems to be chemically somewhat similar to their other resins.


How to control 3d printer printing in metal?

Pronterface would control the printer, but you would need a slicer that could give you g-code that works with said metal printer. Being it would be using metal, most of those are powder based, using a laser to sinter. The slicers for FDM based machines would not create the correct g-code for the application. I know there has been some effort around powder based printers (both metal and plastic) but I do not know of any software that has resulted from these efforts.

This wiki index for powder printers may be of some help to find out what software they are working on, most likely a custom solution.
http://reprap.org/wiki/Powder


Ender 5 hotend and bed cooling down while auto bed leveling

For Marlin firmware, you should check the setting PROBING_HEATERS_OFF in Configuration.h file:
//#define PROBING_HEATERS_OFF       // Turn heaters off when probing
#if ENABLED(PROBING_HEATERS_OFF)
  //#define WAIT_FOR_BED_HEATER     // Wait for bed to heat back up between probes (to improve accuracy)
#endif
//#define PROBING_FANS_OFF          // Turn fans off when probing
//#define PROBING_STEPPERS_OFF      // Turn steppers off (unless needed to hold position) when probing
//#define DELAY_BEFORE_PROBING 200  // (ms) To prevent vibrations from triggering piezo sensors

It is probably enabled in your case. You may want to switch this off and reinstall firmware to maintain constant heating during probing.
However, you may want to take into account possibility of electrical or magnetic intereferences during probing from heaters and their circuits. Disabling them for a while may eliminate these influences and give more reliable measurements. Unless the bed ot hotend are unable to maintain stable temperature for a while and cool down too much (e.g. bed changing shape). So may want to experiment what works the best in your case, maybe including other settings listed in given section.


OctoPrint won't stop my print with a pause

If you want to pause at the Octoprint command streaming level rather than at the printer level, have your slicer emit the Octoprint @pause command rather than real gcode for pause. This will cause it to go into the paused state and not send any further commands until you hit resume.


Ultimaker Cura 4.8 / How to specify bed (Print) Area?

The print area settings would be in the Preferences > Printers. Select the particular printer on the left side pane, then click the "Machine Settings" button.

You will need to set a printing offset (M206) in Marlin: via Start G-code in Cura, or any other suitable way (LCD configuration, configuration files, etc.).


Does auto leveling result in sheared prints?

Using automatic bed leveling assists you in getting the print to stick better to the build platform as a result of the print head following the un-uniform geometry or tilt of the build plate.

In, e.g. Marlin Firmware, the bed level correction is fading out over a predefined distance, this is determined by the constant #define ENABLE_LEVELING_FADE_HEIGHT in the printer firmware Configuration.h file  and the height can be set with M420 Z<height> (see here).

M420 S1  ; Enable compensation using current grid/mesh
M420 Z10 ; Gradually reduce compensation until Z=10

Yes, a cube will not be perfectly cubic, that is why even with auto bed leveling you need to provide a bed as level as possible, it only should correct for very small deviations.

When the print is smaller than the fade out height, you would indeed get a sheared print, if larger, then the top of the print would be level with respect to the reference plane (this is the level of the x-y plane, basically the level of the hot end carriage). Note that that still can be skew if the printer is improperly calibrated (e.g. when using 2 Z steppers or misalignment of the height on either side).


Marlin: Making any GPIO pin HIGH for a given time

As explained in the comments by Tom, you can set any port directly from G-code using the M42 command. To set pin 22 "high", you need to call M42 P22 S255. There is no parameter to add time to the command, so you need to add that yourself using G4 (dwell or pause) to specify how long the printer needs to wait for the next instruction, e.g.:

M42 P22 S255 ; Activate solenoid/relay
G4 P2000     ; Dwell/pause for 2000 milliseconds (2 seconds)
M42 P22 S0   ; Deactivate solenoid/relay

As an alternative, you could use the existing fan if that fan is unused in your machine (or add an "extra fan" in the firmware and send the value 255 to that fan). To use the existing fan:

M106 S255 ; Activate solenoid/relay
G4 P2000  ; Dwell/pause for 2000 milliseconds (2 seconds)
M107      ; Deactivate solenoid/relay

How you add an extra fan is already described (for a specific RAMPS board) in this answer. However, the answer is valid for other boards as well, as long as you have exposed pins you have access to (or if you can solder directly to open pins), you can use the described technique.

The G-code to activate the "extra fan" (solenoid) is M106 P1 S255 disabling would be M107 P1. Note that there is an option/parameter to add time (Bnnn Blip time - fan will be run at full PWM for this number of seconds when started from standstill) to the M106 command, but that is only implemented in RepRapFirmware. An alternative is to use G4 (dwell or pause) to specify how long the printer needs to wait for the next instruction (M107) is being parsed, e.g.:

M106 P1 S255 ; Activate solenoid/relay
G4 P2000     ; Dwell/pause for 2000 milliseconds (2 seconds)
M107 P1      ; Deactivate solenoid/relay


How to get consistent and accurate readings from thermocouples?

Thermocouples work by passively generating VERY small voltages via the Seebeck effect -- usually a few tens of millivolts. They're literally just a pair of wires made from two different special alloys, electrically connected together at the "hot" end. That wire junction can be mounted inside whatever kind of attachment tip or lug is desired.

The fact that they're very simple and passive devices makes them extremely precise and consistent between TCs of the same type, MUCH more so than thermistors. Any type-K thermocouple in the world will give you the same accurate output +/-1-2C or so. You can even cut a thermocouple in half, re-twist the ends of the wires together, and it'll still work!

However, the very small (millivolts) signal they generate is quite susceptible to electrical noise and circuit design. The signal voltage has to be greatly amplified to be useful. So it doesn't take much EMR from your heater or stepper wires to interfere with the TC reading. A frequent problem with TC circuits in 3d printers is the dreaded GROUND LOOP -- if the "hot" tip is electrically connected to the hot block, voltage and current on the heater and motor wires can induce small currents through the TC wires that totally screw up the millivolt signal. The amplifier picks up these stray voltages and it throws off the temp read. So, there are some important guidelines for keeping noise out of the TC wires:

The TC wires must be electrically insulated from the mounting hardware (eye lug, thermowell, whatever your extruder has). You can check this with a multimeter -- you want infinite / out of range resistance from the TC leads to the mounting tip and hot block. While you're at it, make sure your heater cartridge wires aren't shorting to the hot block -- that's unsafe and can also cause problems with TCs.
Keep the two TC wires close together, and not immediately parallel to noise sources like PWM-controlled heaters or stepper wiring. If you must run the TC in a bundle with the other wires, TWIST the heater/stepper wiring pairs. (For steppers, twist each coil pair to a different pitch if possible. You don't need to twist the separate coil pairs to each other.)

Another common issue with TC circuits is the COLD JUNCTION COMPENSATION. A thermocouple doesn't measure tip temperature, it measures the DIFFERENCE in temperature between the hot tip and the cold junction where the TC is connected to either the amp or copper wiring. The TC amp has an onboard thermistor that it uses to add the temp at the cold junction to the measured signal from the thermocouple. There are a few things you need to do to make sure the cold-junction compensation works properly:

You should run TC wire all the way from the "hot" tip to the TC amp. You CAN splice it and install plugs, but only with more type-K TC wire and proper type-K thermocouple plugs. These use the same metal as the TC wire so they don't generate undesired junction voltages that interfere with the TC signal. If you splice copper wire between the TC and the amp, any temp differences along the copper will not be measured! This is a particularly big problem if you splice to copper inside a warm enclosure and then run copper to an amp outside the enclosure.
The amp should not be super hot. The onboard thermistor is designed to accurately measure temperatures reasonably close to room temp, not hot-block temps.
There should not be large temperature gradients near the amp or between the TC wire termination and the actual amp chip. Place the amp far enough away from the hot end and other heat sources (like stepper motors) that it isn't experiencing weird temp profiles.

If you do the above, the TC will output a good signal, and the amp will read it properly. But there's one more hitch. The mainboard has to know how to understand the amp's output. 3D printer control boards that are designed exclusively for TCs, like Mightyboards, usually use digital communication between the amp and the main control chip (MCU). This is high-reliability and does not require any special firmware configuration -- support is baked in. But if you're strapping an external TC amp onto a board that is expecting thermistors, you will have to tell the firmware how to read the signal from the amp. The most common technique is for the amp to output a linear voltage signal to the MCU's normal thermistor input (ADC). Then you configure the firmware to use the appropriate "thermistor table" (really a voltage lookup table) for that particular amp. Depending on your controller board, you also may need to make sure the regular thermistor pull-up/pull-down resistors aren't affecting the amp's output.

So you need to make sure:

You don't have electrical noise issues
The cold-junction compensation is working as intended
The firmware and controller board is configured correctly for your amp chip's output

If you do all that, a TC should give superior accuracy and reliability over a thermistor.


How to set multiple draft shields in Prusaslicer?

You could CAD a 1 layer thick cylinder, and add it to your print and place it around your object. You can create any number of cylindrical shells that way...


It probably won't be fair.
Incidentally, I have a decent amount of experience with 3D printing.
It depends heavily on the particular technology that you're using to do the 3D printing, but nearly all forms of printing aren't perfect--depending on the design you make (solid? honeycombed? hollow?), there will be slight, or not-so-slight variations across the faces, which will result in an unfair die. In particular, the faces that are parallel to the build surface will probably be different compared to the ones that are angled.
You could probably deal with some of these problems with some kind of post-processing, but honestly at that point buying dice would be easier. 3D printing is for making custom or prototype objects, and isn't really suited to mass production of simple shapes like dice.
Even manufactured dice have some imperfections, and a slightly unfair die probably won't make much of a difference in gameplay, but it will be hard for you to determine whether the imperfections from 3D printing are severe enough to make the die unfair without rolling it many times and looking at its distribution. Again, at that point, it's easier to just buy the dice.
That being said, custom d20s can be super cool looking, and if you're going to 3D print something, might as well make it look cool...


Move print bed to front at the end of a print rather than the back

Note that this reference states that:

  Because the behavior of G28 is unspecified, it is recommended not to automatically include G28 in your ending GCode. On a Cartesian this will result in damaging the printed object. If you need to move the carriage at the completion of a print, use G0 or G1.

So you need to use a G0 or G1 move.

When using Ultimaker Cura (like many other slicers), there is built in functionality known as keywords with a complete list found here.

The keyword machine_depth is the one that is of use to you, embed this in your end G-code in between curly brackets and it will expand to the bed size of your machine (replacing G28 X0 Y0):

G1 X0 Y{machine_depth}

For me this compiles to (e.g. for my coreXY printer):

G1 X0 Y300

To set the speed, just add the following command prior to the one above:

G1 F2500

Adding this line before the actual move ensures that the speed is constant, if F2500 would have been included in the move command (like G1 X0 Y{machine_depth} F2500), this defines the end speed, it would start moving at the last speed value prior to the move.

This results in adding the following lines in your endscript:

G1 F2500
G1 X0 Y{machine_depth}


Does an enclosure need a roof to print ABS?

Sides without a top will help.

Sides with a top will help more.

Do you need either? That depends. How warm, how dry, how drafty is your printing room?


Delta printer misalignment at first few layers

Finally I found out that it was caused by not enough torque output by B tower stepper motor. Increasing current didn't work. I replaced the stepper motor and it prints perfectly.


Automatic leveling probe offset; adjusting for one side ruins the other

I have had exactly the same experiences as you did with a inductive sensor on a Prusa i3 clone. It looks as though the bed leveling is not executed, or the level/mesh tilted. Please do note that automatic bed leveling is not magic, you still need to provide a build platform as level (and flat) as possible. A slate of glass is a good build platform surface as the glass production process ensures that the glass is very flat and easy to level.

What I did to solve the problem is that I re-leveled the bed and send the M420 S1 command over USB to the printer to enable bed leveling as I was under the impression that it did not use the grid obtained with G29.

On my CoreXY I also use a touch sensor (3DTouch, which is a BLTouch clone) like you do, even with that sensor I sometimes see that the automatic level is uneven (one side of the skirt has very thin/see through deposition, while the other side appears normal), this is most probably caused by the sensor accuracy (or an obstruction under the probe needle). There is a way to increase the probing accuracy by using double probing where the second probe is advancing slower to the build platform as can be seen in the Marlin Configuration.h file:

// Feedrate (mm/m) for the first approach when double-probing (MULTIPLE_PROBING == 2)
#define Z_PROBE_SPEED_FAST HOMING_FEEDRATE_Z

// Feedrate (mm/m) for the "accurate" probe of each point
#define Z_PROBE_SPEED_SLOW (Z_PROBE_SPEED_FAST / 2)

For double probing you require to set:

// The number of probes to perform at each point.
//   Set to 2 for a fast/slow probe, using the second probe result.
//   Set to 3 or more for slow probes, averaging the results.
#define MULTIPLE_PROBING 2

Side note:
From an earlier posting it appears that you are using the #define Z_PROBE_OFFSET_FROM_EXTRUDER in the configuration file to set the offset. It is much more convenient to set that through the LCD menu (Bed Leveling -> Z Probe Offset: -–-) or send  the M851 Zx.xx directly over USB or load through a .gcode file from SD card to prevent numerous flashing the firmware with alternative parameters. Make sure that you enable:

#define EEPROM_SETTINGS // Enable for M500 and M501 commands

in the Configuration.h file and execute M500 to store the new setting set by M851.


How do I create a STL file from a 2 dimensional grid of data

for that you can use openSCAD.
Data can be represented as a multi-array and we can iterate on it via for loop

// data structure is x,y,z where z is value
arrayOfData=[[0,10,4],[0,21,9],[0,13,8],[0,41,2],[1,0,4],[2,0,180],[7,0,90]];

for(a=[0:1:6])  translate([arrayOfData[a][0], arrayOfData[a][1],0])  cylinder(arrayOfData[a][2],2,.5,false);

And where you get the model it can be intersected with a cube to get the desired shape.


Prusa MK3 heatbed shorted: replace just Einsy or heatbed too?

There should be no need to replace the heat bed.  It wasn't subjected to any unusual loads.
If the bed isn't heating, there could be one of sever problems, but I would start with the fuse.  If the fuse had time to do its job, it would have blown and protected the circuitry.  In your picture, the fuse is the blue component with "15" stamped on top.  There are also two fuses with "5" stamped on top.  One of these may be blown.  If so, replace it and try again.
If the fuses are all good, and everything except the heat bed works, you have probably blown the FET that switches the heat bed power.  If you aren't handy with circuit board repair, you may choose to get an new Einsy controller and then try to repair your old one.  These repairs aren't usually hard because the FETs are fairly large components.


Chamber heating using hysteresis in Marlin

It does work, but you need to reset EEPROM memory once updating the firmware, if you had it enabled, so the values are transferred into the EEPROM and subsequently used.

To reset  EEPROM, send the following command in your 3d printer terminal.

M502

Then, save the firmware default settings

M500


Any experience with nylon drying on heated build platform and printing on paper?

Heating spools on the bed can be an option, but it seems inefficient to me: you lose a lot of heat and an oven would save quite some energy. Also, I wonder whether the open air will reduce the effectiveness even more, since the outer parts and the top of the spool will be colder.


It is possible to "home a printer" without having endstops, technically, you don't require endstops, but it makes your job a lot easier if you want to print something!

Basically, when you don't have endstops or limit switches, you need to define where the head of the printer is located. E.g. you can set the nozzle at [0, 0, 0] (origin in [x, y, z]) and add the command G92 to your print G-code file that it is at that position using G92 X0 Y0 Z0 (or any other location you use, e.g. you could engineer a parking position and refer to that position instead, note that you also need to write the movement commands to get out of that location safely). Don't forget to remove the homing command from your start code in your slicer, replace G28 with the G92 command with appropriate X, Y and Z values.

Regarding the inaccurate repetitive accuracy of your Z min endstop, it might be worth to find out why this is causing such a spread in triggering, maybe you need to invest in some new endstop switches or look more closely to the heated bed attachment to the frame.

Using Z max as a reference point is e.g. used by Ultimaker machines. The heated platform lowers to Z max; the printer knows from calibration and geometry how far it needs to rise to get to Z=0.


Monoprice Select Mini v2 reattach boden tube to feeder head

I had a similar issue with my bowden feed system, those could be the reasons:

the pneumatic connector is not keeping the pressure on the pipe -> replace
the Teflon pipe is faded/worn -> try to cut the end of the pipe
the hotend/nozzle is clogged -> clean/replace
the pipe is excessively bent and gives a lot of resistance -> that usualy needs pipe/tube replacement.
the nozzle temp is to low -> increase printing temperature

In some cases I had to cut the tube above the pneumatic connector and push it down to get it out as there was no way to  pull it back from the collar.


You can show the compile date and time during bootup by changing the constant STRING_SPLASH_LINE2 in Configuration.h:

#define STRING_SPLASH_LINE2 __DATE__ " " __TIME__


@trish Thankyou for your help.

I did purchased the new power supply and everything works fine now.


How to use a BLTouch or equivalent touch probe to 3D scan objects with a 3D printer?

I don't know the probe, but I have used a delta 3D printing machine (of my design) to scan a surface.  It takes some time.

Your resolution will be limited by the probe geometry of the touch probe tip.  You want a Z-probe function that reports the Z-value of the point, not that simply sets Z= when the probe "hits".  The RepRap firmware has this in the G30 command.

You will need to write a loop that probes all points of interest.  This is best done by writing a program (or script) that generates the G-code.  I have a PERL script that generates the calibration mesh for my Delta machine, and I can share that with you.

I edit the script for the area to be scanned.  This includes (in my case) the radius and the resolution.  I then run the script to produce G-code to do the probing.

I send the G-code to the printer with Repetier-Host.  Repetier-Host builds a log file of every character returned by the printer.  The G30 command returns in the log the Z value wher ethe probe hit.

After the G-code is fully executed, I run a PERL script on the log file to extract the Z height of each of the probed points.

What you do with that data is up to you.


How to connect a NEMA 17 stepper to RAMPS 1.4?

There are very many combinations that will work. A bipolar stepper has 2 coils. Swapping the coils, or reversing the polarity of a coil, will simply cause the stepper to rotate in the opposite direction.

On RAMPS, one coil should connect to 1A and 1B, whereas the other coil should connect to 2A and 2B.

On the stepper, one coil is A+ and A-, the other coil is B+ and B-.

A possible wiring is A+ to 1A, A- to 1B and B+ to 2A and B- to 2B, but there are 15 other possibilities. The only "wrong" way is one that connects a coil of the stepper to two different coil outputs on the RAMPS (so connecting, for instance, A+ to 1A and A- to 2A wouldn't work).


FlashForge Creator Pro Tool Failure! Temp limit reached

It sounds like a failed TC amp chip. But we need to rule out some other stuff.

Some important facts about the Creator Pro temp sensor:

If you smash and short the two thermocouple wires together, the printer will simply read room temp.
If you cut or disconnect the thermocouple wires, the printer will report NC for "not connected."
The thermocouple lookup table in the firmware only goes up to 300C.

Seeing a number over 300C means either a bad thermocouple amp chip, or excess voltage on the TC wires due to a short to something else in the hot block. (However, such a short will usually fry the entire controller board to smithereens.)

To rule out stray voltage entering the TC wires, completely detach both thermocouples from the hot blocks and lay them out not touching anything metal. Do you still get an unusually high reading on tool 0?

To rule out an issue with the specific thermocouple, swap thermocouples between tool 0 and tool 1 and see if the problem moves with the TCs.

If the TC is not touching anything, and the problem stays with the tool when you swap wires, and you STILL get >300C reads, the thermocouple amp chip has failed. It is possible to replace the chip if you have (or your friend has) a hot air rework station and some experience soldering. Or you can get a new mainboard from FlashForge.

The next question is why this problem happened. You don't want to fix the symptoms with new parts but have an underlying issue cause the same failure to re-occur after you swap out parts. With the printer on but the heaters off, use a multimeter to check for voltage between the hot block and the printer's ground. Certain types of heater cartridge failure can short the hot block to +24v. This is highly dangerous and needs to be fixed before you continue using the printer. So make sure you check it before trying to repair anything else.


Delaminating in the middle area of photon printer

The print you do is a sealed cup in the position it sits directly on the build plate. As a result, there is a column of resin in the cup as you print and at some point, the weakest spot delaminates, the air gets into the column and drains.
Take the print and either angle it by a few degrees so the hole in the top becomes a vent or add a tiny extra vent-hole.


What is a good book to read about 3D printer settings?

There may be books out there, but purchasing a book isn't in your best interest. The reason so much of the information seems to be from amateurs is because every 3d printer is different.

To find the correct settings for your printer you need to calibrate it based on the material, slicer software, hardware, and firmware. Your best option to find a good starting point is to check the manufacturer's website and look for a forum.

Even using the same printer and material as someone else has the potential to yield different results.


Why is the center of my glass print bed lower than the corners?

This seems to be a common problem with ender-3 and cr-10 printers from Creality. Mine is the same way but not enough to keep prints from adhering.

Typically the aluminum bed is not perfectly flat. If it’s not the glass may be able to flex enough that it can make a difference. There are a few ways to try to fix it.

Shim the low spots in the aluminum bed with aluminum foil or another thin material. Then the glass will sit on a flatter more well supported surface.
Bend the aluminum bed until it is flat.
Add a 5th leveling point under the middle of the bed. You could either make it adjustable which would be tricky to get to or create a support piece accurately or get one close and shim it.

The shimming process is probably the easiest and the one I may end up doing. But whether you shim it or do the other trick you need to measure for points that are out of flat.

If you get a decent straightedge and some feeler gauges and/or or shine a bright light from the other side and look for spots of light between the straightedge and the aluminum bed you can see where you need to shim or otherwise adjust it. You’ll need to move it at various angles through the center and other spots on the bed. That way you can see whether it is just the middle or if the edges are an issue too.

Also, once you check the aluminum bed, check the glass as it may not be flat either.

There was a YouTube video on the cr-10 I think that showed part of the shimming process and checking for level. I’ll try to see if I can find it to add a link here.

I still didn't find the video I was looking for, but here is a useful related one that talks about tramming the bed (what 3d printing people call leveling)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CcAmZqb-ZEE

And here's a reddit thread about the issue. Someone incorrectly says the glass plate can't flex that much but it certainly can. We're talking small tolerances. Even granite slabs flex small amounts.
https://www.reddit.com/r/CR10/comments/7d7gyh/aluminum_bed_warped_cant_get_it_to_do_anything/


What is the best length of the melting zone in the hotend?

Short melting zone melts material in small amount which is suitable for thin layers with small nozzles. In opposite long melting zone can heat big amount of filament which is needed for fast printing and thick layers.

short melting zone

less amount of melted material
thin layer heights
quality printing with details
give more precise volume control with less flow/pressure lag and better retraction performance (thx @Ryan-Carlyle)
nozzles: 0.25-0.8mm (available for E3Dv6)

long melting zone

more amount of melted material
thick layer heights
fast printing with less details
nozzles: 0.4-1.2mm (available for E3D Volcano)

Example

Example of those hotends are E3Dv6 and E3D Volcano

E3Dv6

E3D Volcano with much longer melt zone then v6

Speed comparison video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_PQjwvWoGpk

Speed comparison graph:


Scale down SketchUp live size object does not render completely

You will indeed have difficulties with scaling a model to the point that individual components become smaller than the tolerances of your printer.

It is more likely a problem with your model, having been created in SketchUp. If you use an online model repair service, it will almost certainly return an indication that the model was flawed. Unfortunately, those repair services are not a good choice for repairing a SketchUp model, as the fail points are usually beyond the capability of the software.

Another option would be to load the model into MeshMixer and use Analysis/Inspector to reveal the flaws, but again, the automatic repair feature would likely destroy the model.

Even a program as simplistic as TinkerCAD will do a better job of creating a 3D printable model.

Consider to begin learning a different, perhaps more challenging program such as OpenSCAD or Solvespace, or even more challenging than those, Fusion 360. All of the above are free, while Fusion 360 has the requirement of non-commercial/hobbyist use to remain free.


With regards to the nozzle material, it boils down to two factors: thermal conductivity and wear resistance.
Brass and copper are better at conducting heat, but they have very low wear resistance: use them with abrasive filaments (PLA infused with metal, fiber glass or carbon fiber, as an example) and they won't last a roll. On the other end steel is not a good thermal conductor, and hardened steel is even worse, meaning the filament will get colder within the nozzle, possibly requiring a slower extrusion speed or a higher temperature, but they are quite resistant to wear.
There are other options, like the famous ruby nozzle, which is very wear resistant and, being made mostly of brass, provides a good thermal conductivity, but it's expensive.

Another factor is the shape of the nozzle: some have a very short tip, others a longer one and that also influences the thermal conductivity and the flow rate, but also take into consideration the long ones don't play very nice with very sticky filaments like PETG.

It is a matter of compromise between material, price and versatility, I don't think there is a single best choice.

Usually very cheap nozzles are not machined very accurately, meaning the hole might not be perfectly round or centered, but unless you require a high level of precision they can be considered "good enough": don't get me wrong, I'm not saying those are low importance factors, but you probably won't notice a great difference unless you are using very good filament and printing at high-res.

It will be very difficult for you to damage your printer using a non high quality nozzle, but replacing the nozzle incorrectly (no matter the nozzle quality) can cause damage to the heat block: try not to snap the nozzle thread like I did...

UPDATE

As pointed out in the comments, there are a couple of factors you might have to take into consideration when buying new nozzles: the nozzle body length (there are nozzles with a much longer threaded body, usually referenced as volcano) and nozzles with different thread sizes (M6 for the vast majority, some use M7, very few use a customized system).


In Fusion360, how do I align components according to their a midplane?

There are several ways to lock items together.

Designed in position

When you design the parts from the base up, you should lock the very first sketch to the origin in some way or another. Fusion shows this by making any "well defined" line as black in contrast to blue, like shown here:

Using Components

Once you have bodies, you can pretty much move them around in the timeflow. You then can start to define them as components. Let's assume we have these parts, a bolt, and a part into which it hinges. Of course, these two are modeled "in place" but that hasn't to be:

Now, we want to lock them together... well, first, let's start and put them into components! Highlight one, then choose the "new component" command, and make sure it stays highlighted, from bodies is chosen then hit enter.

Repeat for the other part, so your tree should show 2 components now.

Combine Components as modeled

Now we want to combine them as modeled, right? Ok, let's do that, it's easy! get out the dropdown from the combine menu and press combine as modeled (Ctrl + J)

Now, click both components and at first it will start to shake the screen, having chosen "Stiff" combination. This means the parts don't shift one against the other. If you had them in the right position in the first place, they will stay that way. But there are other ways, which are in the menu that popped up:

If for example, I choose "rotation", I can choose a rotation center by placing a node as seen here:

Creating Joints between Components

Now, what if the components are not in position like the bolt is in the wrong position entirely? Well, start with components, as shown above, then we'll see:

Now, we should use the joint function:

Choose the first Component, then seek the point which face-position (or for cylinders: position on centerline) shall be the first component's joint-point shall be. For our part, let's take the big part's hole. Click the face, then choose one of the available points. For cylinders that's the ends and the center, for faces, it's the corners, center points of the edges and the center. If you hit the possible alignment points in the first place, it skips the second click to choose it. Once that is done, the body turns transparent.

Repeat the same process for part 2 and the magic starts: Both parts suddenly move till the alignment points are in the same position, the screen shakes and BAM! We are at stiff joint again! The menu changes and we can start to define offsets!


Ender 3 display stopped working, how to test if need to replace

This is hard to answer, it depends on your skills if you can can repair it or not. As you haven't changed the firmware, it is unlikely that this is a software issue. If the display doesn't light up, the power to the module may be broken.
If you have an Arduino Uno or similar you can try to upload a sketch and connect the display to see if it works, there are plenty of sites explaining how you should do that (software sketch and hardware connections) based on the pins exposed on the EXP port. Note that you can forget the EXP port that controls the SD card.
Personally, I would just buy a new controller, they are cheap (found on those typical Chinese vendor or auction sites).
What you can do is check whether the printer board still works, if you connect a USB cable directly to the board and connect it to a PC, you could see if the printer responds using a printer application such as Pronterface (part of the PrintRun suite).


You can either flip the connector for the motor around (i.e. plug it in backwards) or (if you are using Marlin firmware) look for the following line in configuration.h:  (using the Arduino editor open the Marlin file For your 3D Printer,  one of the tabs is labelled "configuration.h" click on that tab to bring it to the front for editing.  use the Edit, Find and put E0 in the find box, click find.  When you find the line below

#define INVERT_E0_DIR false

change false to true (or vice-versa). Note that if you go for the connector-flipping route, make sure that you only do this when the printer is turned off.


How to format an SD card for Monoprice Select Mini V2?

For an SD card to work with the printer firmware Monoprice suggests to format the SD card to FAT32.

However, the Monoprice Select Mini V2 is not able to read SDHC memory cards, it is advised to use an SD card (smaller than 4 GB) instead.

According to the Monoprice support website: "Why is my printer not reading my SD card?":

  If the SD card is not recognized on the printer or if the files are
  not reading, it could be an issue with the actual card itself. The
  first thing we recommend checking is that none of the print files on
  the SD card contain a space in their name. This shows in the printer
  as an unidentified character and can cause issues. If none of your
  prints contain spaces, we recommend reformatting your SD card.

  Note:  If you choose to purchase an SD card, please make sure that it
  is not labeled HC (High Capacity) as it may not be compatible with the
  printer. This means that the card must be smaller than 4GB in size.

The last part of the support page is probably applicable to your card.

Some further information can be found in What is the largest microSD card that a Monoprice Select Mini can read?, specifically this answer. From this latter answer, I quote:

  Cards between 2 GB and 32 GB might work, depending on the specifics of
  the card

Basically there are no guarantees when using large cards.


What causes bubbles in extruded filament?

Oh yeah, that's simple. You are printing too hot and are literally boiling the plastic. Else you have water. However if it was water you would hear Crackling as it printed. If it is too hot you will not hear nearly as much. I am 87.341% sure you are printing too hot.
Looking at your printing temps you are without a doubt printing too hot.
From this link on 3d hubs.

PLA (Only on Replicator 2) Print temp: 210°C (at 100m/s) Notes: heated
bed optional between 40 and 60°C
ABS (Only on Replicator 2X) Print
temp: 230°C (at 100m/s) Notes: heated bed at 110°C


Fix ghosting problem (damping versus bolting printer to a desk)

Ghosting is caused by differential movement between the bed and the head when the head undergoes acceleration. The forces add energy to a resonance in that differential vibration mode.

By changing how you mount the base, you will change the mode and probably change the frequency.

With the soft mounting, the bed can move more easily.  It will tend to follow the head acceleration better.  The whole system will still ring (you can't get rid of the momentum change), but you can cause the energy to go somewhere else and not excite that mode.

With the base bolted down tight, the base gets stiffer, increasing resonant frequencies.  You also may be making the base more resistant against racking or twisting motions.

It is completely credible that both interventions reduce the problem.  Of the two, I would prefer any intervention that increases the stiffness.

If you know your movement speed (perhaps from your configuration file) and can measure the linear frequency of the ringing, you can determine the resonant frequency that is being excited.  Depending on the frequency, you may be able to excite that frequency with an audio generator and transducer (maybe even just a speaker), such as with one of these: Dayton Audio Transducers.

With the system shaking at the right frequency, you can use your finger to find portions of the frame which are vibrating strongly, or maybe even your phone camera to make a high-speed video of the movement.


How can I rotate a 3D model to be parallel with the build plate?

Some tools like Cura or Repetier Host have slicers that analyses and tell you if it is ok to print or not. Both of them allow rotations.


Printing Filatech PETG with HyperCube E3Dv6 Clone fails after 3 smooth layers

As this is material dependant, you are facing not a printer, but a settings issue: your slicer needs the right settigns to print PETG.

The first layers look good, but then we get signs of stringy printing. Stringy printing usually happens if the filament comes out of the nozzle too cold (I had tried to print PLA at 170 °C and it would look somewhat similar) or if it gets cooled or stretched too much (forced a print failure by speeding up a 60 mm/s print, somewhat similar around 250-300%; though the filament was not hot enough then too). This, in conjunction with the information, that you print PETG suggests the following things to fix:

Reduce or deactivate cooling. PETG often doesn't need cooling at all.
Reduce print speed. As 0scar said, 50 mm/s is a good upper limit on a well honed in machine. As your other layers with 30 mm/s were fine, you could possibly go down to 40 mm/s, if less cooling alone doesn't help.


Ender 3 Pro will not auto home correctly after mainboard & BLTouch upgrades

Resolved : connected the white & black wires to the 5 pin output on the board.  This solved the homing issue.


G-code firmware for handheld plotter (Arduino)

Your question may be useful to people interested in 3d printing (the purpose of this SE Site) so, even though you're not asking a 3d printing question per se, I think this answer will be helpful...

GRBL:

GRBL is a well known and mature g-code interpreter that will run on an Arduino Uno and is free and open source.  Check it out here.

I hope this helps!  :-)


It might seem that common 3D printer materials such as PLA and ABS should be capable of being autoclaved—unfortunately. However, although their melting temperatures are higher than autoclave temperature (typically 121ºC), their glass transition temperatures are below that limit so they can warp or undergo creep deformation.

Sterilization of numerous plastics is described here, with PLA, ABS, and PET all being described as "poor" for autoclaving. For each "good" material on that list, I looked for filament by Googling and consulting material guides from Prusa and Matter Hackers.

Polypropylene (PP) or acetal (POM, also known as Delrin) are the best choices. Filament is available for PEEK, PEI (ULTEM), FEP, PPSU, and PPS but these filaments are expensive (>$100/kg) and require high extruder temperatures (>300ºC).

In contrast, PP is about $50/kg and uses an extruder temperature of 254ºC; POM is similarly priced and uses an extruder temperature of 210ºC. Nylon (depending on the exact type) and HT-PLA may also be worth considering.

"High temperature" filaments are not worthwhile for this application. Again, they're expensive and, more significantly, do not work well with consumer-grade 3D printers. For example, the upper limit for a Prusa i3 MK3s is about 280ºC—the thermistor only is good up to that temperature. Higher temperatures would require swapping out sensors and modifying firmware and building an enclosure. It's been done. Printers designed for high-temperature filaments easily cost thousands of dollars.

This question was previously asked on Reddit a few times but this analysis is more comprehensive.


Why is Print Adhesion almost good, but still not right?

Based on the pictures, this looks like the bed wasn't clean enough, thus why it didn't adhere correctly in some spots. The lifted corner is the worst, but I can see a couple more spots where the PLA didn't stick well enough, though the brim prevented it to completely lift off the bed.

I would advise you to not print with the window open, even if it's only slightly ajar. Weather conditions and temperature will affect the quality of the print, even if it's only a small variation in temperature. I've had enough failed prints due to a shift in temperature to know that, even though PLA isn't affected as much than ABS by temperature changes through a print.

You might also try to increase the bed temperature a bit, up to 70°C or 80°C. I've looked at the recommended temperature for PLA with my UM3E and it says 80°C for the glass bed.

You should always make sure that the glass bed is clean: ie no dust on it and no grease. Yes, touching it with your fingers will leave a thin greasy residue in the form of fingerprints, and even one fingerprint can prevent good adhesion and result in the problem you had.

There are various products to clean glass beds, I've personally found out that the cheap yellow-colored window cleaner from Karcher works wonder. Do not use the standard blue colored window cleaner products: the blue one has a chemical in it that is made with the express intent to prevent anything to adhere to the glass, which is obviously not what we want. The yellow-colored cleaner doesn't have that chemical, and it cleans without depositing an anti-adhesion film on the glass.

If a thorough cleaning isn't sufficient, you can look into various adhesive products. While there is quite a lot of adhesive solutions marketed as being specifically for 3D printing, with insane prices most of the time, I've found that a simple UHU glue stick works wonders. I usually do not need glue when printing PLA, but I use it for Nylon, ABS and other filament that absolutely require it and it's a breeze to work with, and it cleans easily with soap and warm water.


Simplify3D, connection disapear after slice

I've tried that item as well.  In fact, other than the heart, I built a remix  which works better but is still difficult to free up after printing.  Those tabs you're concerned about will print better at a very low (thin) layer setting.

I am pretty sure that the original design is faulty.  All the "leaves" have gears which cause them to rotate when the threaded ring is turned.  But the designer made all leaves identical!  Each one needs its gear's  null-position set differently so that it properly meshes with the thread positions of the outer ring at that leaf's placement.  Some day I may remix to adjust those gear positions....


3D Print A Solderless Circuit Board

I think this was the solution I was looking for, unless someone else knows a method that's cheaper, faster, safer, etc.


Change hotend thermistor input in Marlin

In pins_RAMPS.h you find which pins are used for which thermistor:

//
// Temperature Sensors
//
#define TEMP_0_PIN         13   // Analog Input
#define TEMP_1_PIN         15   // Analog Input

To use the other thermistor, you would need to swap the numbers:

//
// Temperature Sensors
//
#define TEMP_0_PIN         15   // Analog Input
#define TEMP_1_PIN         13   // Analog Input


Infill has minimal effect on the strength of printed parts, so I would expect the part to break in the same spot regardless of what infill percentage you used.
PLA is especially poor in this exact application, and it undergoes significant creep/cold flow under mechanical compression over time, so even if achieved the necessary strength by changing settings (which you can), it would require that you periodically tighten the bolts more and more, as the PLA would slowly deform under the mounting pressure.

Perimeter width and number of perimeters are what primarily influence the strength of a printed object, infill has very little impact on strength in comparison, and unless you're using an exotic pattern like gyroid, what impact it does have is not even close to isotropic (will add strength in some directions while doing nothing in others).  But even then, infill only really has an effect when we are talking about forces that are spread evenly over the entire object, not concentrated strength of a specific spot of the part.  And that effect is always much weaker than what perimeter count or width will have.

Just bump up your perimeters to 4 or even more and that should make a huge difference.

And also, don't use PLA.  I think PETG is a much better choice in this situation.  It is more ductile only slightly less rigid than PLA, making it much more durable overall than PLA, and less prone to cracking under compressive forces.  PLA theoretically has higher tensile strength, but that often doesn't mean much.

I would not recommend ABS, it tends to have similar issues with brittleness and is one of the weaker materials one can 3D print.

It terms of ordering a special high strength polymer.... unless printer and hotend is rated for in excess of 400°C, no such 'high strength polymer' exists, at least not that you can print.  PLA and PETG are close to the best you can get, with Polycarbonate inching out ahead but not by a huge amount (~20%).  Despite what filament companies would like you to believe, carbon fiber reduces the strength of PLA, ABS, PETG, PC, and probably nylon, and instead simply makes those polymers more rigid and increases dimensional stability.  The only filaments that would actually be made stronger with added fibers short enough for filament manufacturing processes are ones with glass fiber.  But you don't want to print those filaments, trust me.  They will dull the teeth on your hobbed gear(s), even if made from steel, and will just ruin all but ruby nozzles very very quickly.  And they still wear out ruby nozzles even then.

There are exotic polymers, but none of them print at less than ~350°C, and are generally exceedingly expensive.  All the polymers that can be used at normal printing temperatures are all fairly similar to each other in terms of tensile strength at least.


I've not done much miniatures printing, but I have the same printer and I happen to have the exact same filament loaded.  Also, I've been doing a lot of tuning lately, including this z-brace mod which has improved my overall print quality, so I thought I'd take a pass at printing the Knight from your photos and sharing my findings.

First, I've posted a series of pictures to show my findings.  Overall, I'd say my print quality was better than what you showed in your photos, but still isn't good enough.  I sliced with Cura 15.04.6, and printed from SD card.  Here are my (Full) settings:

Layer height (mm)         : 0.1
Shell thickness (mm)      : 0.5
Enable retraction         : Yes
Bottom/Top thickness (mm) : 0.3
Fill Density (%)          : 20
Print Speed (mm/s)        : 20
Printing Temperature (C)  : 210
Bed Temperature (C)       : 67
Support Type              : Everywhere
Platform Adhesion         : None
Skirts                    : 3
Filament Diameter (mm)    : 1.75
Filament Flow (%)         : 100.0
Nozzle size (mm)          : 0.5

Retract Speed (mm/s)      : 40.0
Retract Distance (mm)     : 7
Initial Layer Thick (mm)  : 0.2
Initial Later width (%)   : 100
Cut off object bottom (mm): 0.0
Travel Speed (mm/s)       : 100
Bottom Layer Speed (mm/s) : 20
Infill speed (mm/s)       : 50
Top/bottom speed (mm/s)   : 20
Outer Shell speed (mm/s)  : 20
Inner Shell speed (mm/s)  : 20
Min. Layer Time (sec)     : 10
Enable cooling fan        : Yes

I do most of my printing with a later height of 0.2mm, but for a detailed mini, 0.1mm is probably the largest that will look good (and probably the smallest possible on this printer.  I normally set most of my speeds to 50 mm/s, with first layer at 20 mm/s; for this I slowed it all to 20 mm/s due to the fine details, and I think it helped.

Temps of 67˚C bed and 210˚C extruder are what I've found to work best on my machine for PLA, after much experimentation, but your machine may vary; I'm not sure how accurate the temperature measurements are on these machines.  67˚C gives me an observed bed temp of 60˚C, but that's at the top surface - I have PEI atop Borosilicate glass, adhered to the bare aluminum bed with silicone-based heat transfer pad.

I think I miscalculated the top/bottom heights and infill.  I'm not used to printing at 0.1mm layer height, but 3 top layers over 20% infill is clearly not enough - see the closeup of the mini's base in my linked gallery.  Next print, I'll either try 0.6mm top/bottom, or much higher infill.

The supports came off easily; I used a pair of sidecutters from my electronics bench.  A little more cleanup with a sharp hobby knife, combined with a better base top layer would probably produce an acceptable result.

There were two major flaws.  The first are the little blobs on many layers; see for example the inseam area on the picture of the knight's back.  Ed Nisley at Softsolder.com calls these "Reveral Zits", and I think the name is apt.  These happen when the print head needs to quickly reverse direction or stop-move-print, but filament continues to extrude.  I use fairly aggressive retraction settings, and I think my print shows smaller zits than yours, but still far too many.  Ed has explored this topic in some depth; it's possible my extruder stepper isn't keeping up with my settings due to mechanical limits.  This is an area I want to pursue, but I don't have time at the moment.  I plan to read Ed's work and try some experiments on my machine to see if I can get better results; I will update this answer if/when I do.  As it stands, most of them are quite small, and could probably be cleaned up with a knife; the worst are those around unsupported areas, such as the back of the shoulder guard.

The second major flaw is the helmet.  It's just... bad.  I'm not sure the printer has much hope of nailing those horns, but overall the head is just bad.  I'm not sure what can be done there.

To summarize:  @disc0ninja's advice on Bed Level and Print speed are certainly the right place to start; You might want to try my Cura settings to see if you get similar results.  Also, the Z-brace mod I linked to above has made a big difference for me; I rarely have to adjust my leveling anymore.  I also plan to try slicing with Slic3r, which I haven't used previously, but have been looking into.  You mentioned you couldn't print with Slic3r, was that USB or SD Card?  I'd suggest trying via SD if it failed during USB printing.

Update 30 Jan 2017:  It took a little doing, but I managed to slice and print this model via slic3r.  I had some issues with the original STL in slic3er, which I ended up fixing with a free trial at makeprintable.com.  I spent a lot of time fiddling with slic3r; it has a lot more knobs to turn than Cura, and I make no claims of having the best settings for this print.  There are so many settings that rather than transcribe them here, I've captured them in my pictures of the slic3er print.

Overall, I feel like the quality is higher.  The "reversal zits" are hardly noticeable; but the big remaining problem is one I didn't fully diagnose in the original Cura print - lack of support for areas such as the shoulders.  Slic3r added more support than Cura, but it's also harder to separate from the base.  The head isn't great, but much better than the Cura print; I don't think my photos show it as well as it looks.  This print has convinced me that there's plenty of quality still to be wrung from this printer; I hope to make time to do some more slic3r prints of this model while tweaking the params to see what's possible.  If I make any big leaps in quality I will update this answer.


How to estimate the printing time of a 3D printer from an STL file?

There is no way to estimate the print time of an STL file directly.

The print time is based on the number of instructions in the g-code file plus the time it takes to move the effector (the hot end) around the build area. The only way to compute that is to know what settings their slicer is using and then slice your stl the way they will; and this is assuming that you have the same slicer software. If you manage to do that, then the slicer software will give you an estimate.

Here is what you would need to do:

Get access to the same slicing software, and obtain a copy of
the profile that they use to slice with. The nozzle diameter, feed
rate, layer height, and infill settings will affect the print time.
Import your stl into the sofware and "slice it" There will usually be a large button that is used to generate the g-code. There are quite a few slicers that will output the print time into the text of the g-code. They may also show the print time on the UI during slicing.

alternatively: Email the stl to the staff at the library, and them to generate an estimate for you. They might just do it.

However, that estimate could be incorrect. It will depend on the printer itself. As an example: the time it takes to heat the bed and the hot end is never included in the time estimate the slicer gives.


I've been using Hatchbox 1.75 mm (but white), and settled on 190°C extruder temp, and 60°C bed. I've had trouble getting some prints to adhere to the bed, but most have been ok; I don't see a clear pattern. I don't know whether it's the fiber or my settings. I'm trying slightly higher temperatures, higher extrusion rates, and other filament brands to see if those help. Will post back if anything clear shows up...


Using maximum width when slicing in Ultimaker Cura

Take a look at this post: https://community.ultimaker.com/topic/15588-cura-23-not-using-full-print-area/. As the raft/skirt/brim will fall outside of the build volume, Cura is not able to slice it. Look at the the answer by @ahouben. He suggests that if you want to use the maximum build volume :

  adhesion type = brim
  brim line count = 0
  travel avoid distance = 0
  horizontal expansion = 0
  support horizontal expansion = 0 (if support is enabled)
  draft shield disabled
  ooze shield disabled
  infill wipe distance = 0

  Note that in most cases brim with brim line count=0 will get you most of the way there

Try this and see if it makes a difference.


The aluminum plate is being heated by the heater element although I suspect the element does not encompass the entire area of the aluminum portion. There are going to be cooler spots on the aluminum but not enough to significantly affect the transfer to the glass.

Once you extend the glass, without a corresponding extension to the aluminum and/or heater element, you are ensuring cooler spots. The glass will be surrounded by air, and begin to conduct some of the heat, certainly, but will also radiate a substantial amount.

If you are printing with PLA, you may get away with doing this modification. Very little of the heat from the aluminum will reach the glass.

A quick check shows the thermal conductivity of aluminum to be 205 W/m K compared to borosilicate glass at 1.2 W/m K in the range of temperature used for 3D printing. I did not research the rate of energy dissipation for the same range of temperatures, but if it's not too high (unlikely), it would still take forever for the unheated areas of glass to reach temperature.

Consider your extension to be an unheated bed and print accordingly.


FMK, I loaded the two STL files, top.stl and bottom.stl into Meshmixer. Using Analysis, Inspector, no errors were found in the models. I then loaded the STL files into my slicer, Simplify3D. Due to common Y/Z exchange, the models were loaded in a vertical orientation. It was simple enough to use "Place surface on bed" to get things "squared up."

The g-code preview showed also no failure points.

My first suggestion would be to ensure that you have your model flat to the bed. I've run into too many Thingiverse models that the creator made with a non-zero planar reference, that is, the model was tilted a few degrees.

You say that you created the model in Fusion 360, which would imply that your model is square to the plane.

I'm not familiar with M3D software, but if you have the option to use a different slicer, use Slic3r or Cura to see if you have the same results.

As it stands, I'd consider no fault in the model files.


How to fix bad extrusion that's likely caused by high pressure in the nozzle

I think you are pushing filament too fast.

Let's go back to the basics: my hotend (old Ubis, ceramic) and extruder can push PLA at 230°C at max 80 mm/s * 0.5 mm line width * 0.2 mm layer height = 8 mm3/s.

At this speed it doesn't extrude very well, there is too much back pressure (see also

            ). That extrusion speed means (I have 3 mm filament) 1.13 mm/s of filament speed (8 mm3 / 1.52 / pi).

You have 0.3 mm nozzle and you print colder, both of which cause more resistance to the flow. If 8 mm3/s is my absolute max, yours should be about 8 * 9/16 (ratio of the nozzle surfaces) = 4.5 mm3/s (really the max).

Considering the different print temperature, I would start limit to 3.5 mm3/s, which is 0.55 mm/s extrusion speed.

If you print 0.15 mm layers with line width of 0.35 mm, your absolute max printing speed should be 3.5 mm3 / 0.15 /0.35 = 65 mm/s (which is better not to reach, 60 is fine).

Try doing the following tests: after cleaning the driving gear, extrude 50 mm filament at 0.3 mm/s and measure how much filament has been extruded. Then repeat 50 mm with 0.5 mm/s, and measure how much filament has been extruded. Try again at 0.75 mm/s. Obviously don't touch E steps and extrusion multiplier. I'm quite sure that at 0.75 mm/s you will notice a measurably shorter length of filament extruded. At 1 mm/s you will see grinding (but not as much as now).

If you want, try at regular intervals 0.2, 0.3 0.4, 0.5, 0.6, 0.7 mm/s and plot a graph of the actually extruded filament length. It will look like the one in the video (where he extruded a lot more and weighed the filament, which is time consuming and more expensive).

And then switch to 0.4 mm nozzle if it's too slow for your needs.

Additional information

You use 2.85 mm filament with a direct drive, no gears. Judging from your video the radius if the driving gear (teeth) is about 4 mm, meaning 4*2*pi=25.1 mm circumference. The circumference is controlled with 200 steps * 16 microsteps, as result each microstep controls 4*2*pi/200/16 mm filament length, which is 0.05 mm3 and what you extrude along a 0.95 mm length (at 0.15 mm layer height and 0.35 mm line width). Basically your extruder has no control for moves shorter than 0.95 mm, but in fact it's even 4x worse, since you never get a single microstep precision (4 microsteps of tolerance is more reasonable).

You should probably use a much bigger nozzle, or 1.75 mm filament, or a geared extruder, or prints will never be accurate and you will have problems all the time, which you cannot physically solve.


You generated a simple surface. You do however need a closed body to print. You might get away with using that surface as a cutter for a block and removing the top half, but there is an easier way using blender:

Select the whole ara with A
Extrude with E then Z to constrain direction
pull until you have an item that is fully thick everywhere
Scale the currently selected, extruded vertices with S then Z then 0 to force them all into the same plane
possibly move the vertices down till they all are below the bottom surface

Now you have a positive thickness, solid body! Run a simple "remove double vertices" on this bottom if you want to reduce file size, but there you go! Export as STL and print!


Why does my DIY printer start printing in air?

If the cad model was imported from Solidworks into Simplify3D. Push "Center and Arrange" button to place the model in the middle of the Heat Bed. There might be a gap between the object and bed level that is hard to see.


How do I determine that the electronics are working with the test firmware?

Running this kind of test isn't really necessary; it provides a nice test to see if everything is working but so does uploading actual firmware (and this isn't any safer than traditional firmware, at that).

It looks like it runs the steppers in one direction for 5 seconds and then in reverse for 5, which should be more than enough to see them move even with 1/32 stepping (it moves them at 1 step/ms, which would come out to 3/4ths of a turn with 1/200 steppers and 1/32 microstepping).

It isn't necessary to remove any code that isn't used. It does no harm.


Delta printer nozzle not moving square with a perfectly level bed (as if the bed is bent... but it isn't)

Delta radius controls how the print head moves from the outside to the center.  From the comment you posted, it sounds like your radius is too large which is causing it to hit in the center and you need to make it smaller to bring the center up.  This is not always a number you can directly change as it is sometimes calculated using other offsets so you will need to find that in your firmware.  Also after doing this you're likely going to need to adjust endstops for each tower again or the Z travel to fix your 0 point.

I would recommend following the steps listed here for your calibration.


Can carving templates be produced from G-code?

Carving decorative patterns?
If your templates needs to be used like one does a stencil, that's doable... but paper-thin is not as you can't make that with an FDM printer.
But if you allow 0.2 or even better, 0.5 mm thickness, it is as simple as making a vector graphic, importing it into a suitable CAD package, then extruding it to the relevant thickness, and sending it into the printer.
If you really need it to be thinner, invest in a vinyl cutter, and use the same vector graphic to cut a foil template for one use. Upside: you could use the vinyl to etch the patterns in metal.
Carving figurines?
Yes, that's possible too, even easier! Make a 3D model of the finished object in a CAD or 3D modeling software. Either cut up the model right there and export each slice as STL for the printer, or export the whole model and use a secondary software such as MeshMixer to do plane cuts onto the model.
The slices should be at least 0.5 mm thick to allow handling.
It might also be a good idea to use the same model and cut it from a cube, which then is sliced up - that way you get a pattern to press against the outside of the model.


Outputting an STL file that contains multiple objects for import into Blender

Blender imports all STL files as if they are a single object. If you have multiple meshes in the object that you want to be separated, you can press tab to enter edit mode, select the parts that need to be separated, then hit P and separate by selected.

If you want to print those pieces as one part you have to get rid of any internal faces. The easiest way to do that is to select an object and then use the boolean modifier in union mode. Once you have the object that you want to fuse selected and in place, apply the modifier, that should leave you with an object without internal faces.


Export Revit file for Fusion 360 3D Print

In Revit

Use STL Exporter 2019 to customize and export your Revit model to an STL file.

Click Add-in tab -> STL Exporter panel -> STL Exporter.
On the General tab, specify your STL file options.
On the Categories tab, specify which element categories will export to the STL file.
Click Save to create the STL file.

In Fusion 360

Click on a valid project then click the Upload button. Then, click the Select files button and navigate to the STL you wish to import.

After selecting the STL file you want to convert, click the Upload button, this time the one in the lower-right corner of the file upload window. Then, the STL file you selected will be imported into Fusion 360. The process can take a few minutes.


I suggest not gluing it. Starting from the top, make a sandwich this way:
Aluminium with holes for bolts - Silicone heater - Thin cork (the one from IKEA, 2 mm thick for office desks is fine) - Thin plywood with holes for bolts (or other stiff material holding at least 60°C)
This way you use the aluminium and the plywood to keep the silicone heater well in contact with the aluminium, and the cork insulates so that less heat is lost on the bottom side.
Also, cork is fire-retardant.
If the heater fails replacing it is simple.
Also, you can and should cut away from the cork some space for a thermal non resettable fuse at 180°C to cut power if the heater overheats.
In my case I should have used one more bolt, as you can see in the photo.


There are lots of online sources for T-slot aluminum extrusions from ebay to McMaster.  If you want more options do a Google Search.


3D printer get the temperature settings from g-code file. The firmware settings for min and max temperature are just safeguards.

You should verify instructions within the g-code file. If you are not familiar with g-code, take a look to wikipedia. List of g-code instructions for marlin firmware is here.

Instruction responsible for setting bed temperature are M190 and M140. Open your g-code file and search for lines containing them. If you delete these lines then the bed temperature will be not set during print. Additionally it means that it is set by your slicer.

In Slic3r you should check Printer settings → Custom G-code → Start G-code if it contains one of mentioned instructions and possibly remove it.


The  platformio.ini file, given in Zac's comment, does not seem to list all of the boards supported.

However, The Marlin 2.0 32-bit thread appears to have a table that is much more complete (at the time of writing):

Board                           MCU         State            To-Do
RAMPS, etc.                  Arduino AVR    good
Due, RAMPS FD (v2.A!), etc.  SAM3X8E        good
Archim 1.0                   SAM3X8E        ❓unknown    Only US$170!
Archim 2.0                   SAM3X8E        beta       needs confirmation
Re-ARM                       LPC1768        beta       NEOPIXEL_LED,M100,ENDSTOP_INTERRUPTS,Tones,etc.
MKS-SBASE                    LPC1768        beta       NEOPIXEL_LED,M100,Tones, etc.
Smoothieboard                LPC1769        beta       NEOPIXEL_LED,M100,Tones, etc.
Azteeg X5 GT                 LPC1769        beta       NEOPIXEL_LED,M100,Tones, etc.
Cohesion3D Remix             LPC1769        beta       NEOPIXEL_LED,M100,Tones, etc.
Selena Compact               LPC1768        beta       NEOPIXEL_LED,M100,Tones, etc.
Malyan M200                 STM32F103C8     beta       EMERGENCY_PARSER,NEOPIXEL_LED, etc.
Borg                        STM32F765ZGT6   ⚠beta       EMERGENCY_PARSER,NEOPIXEL_LED, etc.
Chitu3D V3.9                STM32F103ZET6   alpha      EMERGENCY_PARSER,NEOPIXEL_LED, LCD, SDCard, MAX6675, etc.
Teensy 3.5                  MK64FX          alpha      (need shields)
Teensy 3.6                  MK66FX          alpha      (need shields)
STEVAL-3DP001V1             STM32F401VE     alpha      (need boards)

From [Question] Most promising 32 Bit Platform for Marlin 2.x

  The reference platform IS Re-Arm with a RAMPS shield. You can find instructions for both obtaining it and getting setup with it at #7076

It appears the you have to use the bugfix branch:

  Right now, there are two branches. Bugfix-v1.1.x and Bugfix-v2.0.0. They are almost identical from a feature set perspective. But Bugfix-v2.0.0 is modified to have a hierarchical file layout. That was needed to clean up the code and to support 32-bit.

  The AVR code is fully debugged and working in both branches. The 32-bit code only exists (and works) in the Bugfix-v2.0.0 branch. And while the code does work... And some people are using it to print, it isn't entirely painless to get to that point.

You may also want to read Recommendations for a good 32 bit microprocessor to run Marlin. To list a few examples:

Atmel ATSAM3x8e on the Due board
Anyhow, there are a lot of 32bit Controller. Take a look at mbed.org for example.
You can use the arm-none-eabi-xxx for STM32, LPC, also the Arduino Due use it
Duet board (now called DuetWifi) is available for pre-order. It has a 120MHz Cortex M4 with hardware FPU
AZSMZ ARM 32bit controller board
RedBear: https://redbearlab.github.io/arduino/package_redbear_index.json

RedBear Duo (Cortex-M3, WiFi + BLE)
RedBear discussion forum

Konekt Dash/DashPro (Official): http://downloads.konekt.io/arduino/package_konekt_index.json

Cortex M4-based global cellular dev kits, support for all board variants, support for USB and over-the-air programming straight from within Arduino IDE

Another link that might be useful is Unofficial list of 3rd party boards support urls, although not all of these are 32 bit.