My Flashforge Printer Journey.

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FWLR
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Re: My Flashforge Printer Journey.

Post by FWLR » Sat Jan 02, 2021 1:16 pm

I have done what you have posted Trevor, but with two cut off and turned the bigger print to 45deg's. That is it printing in the photo I have just posted.... :thumbright:

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Re: My Flashforge Printer Journey.

Post by FWLR » Sun Jan 03, 2021 11:05 am

Well that didn't work out at all. The platform stones print on the right was the cut and the one on the left was scaled...A complete disaster both of them. The cut one did two rafts and went on to do the longer one, it got to the stage it decided to go over to the smaller one and it missed the raft completely so I had to abort it. The scaled one is self explanatory...To small..

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BE2D8092-872D-41B3-93AC-A69A65D59A1C.jpeg (1.71 MiB) Viewed 4033 times

I am going to try with Trevor's way of doing it later on...

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Re: My Flashforge Printer Journey.

Post by philipy » Sun Jan 03, 2021 11:26 am

FWLR wrote: ↑Sun Jan 03, 2021 11:05 am it got to the stage it decided to go over to the smaller one and it missed the raft completely so I had to abort it. The scaled one is self explanatory...To small..
I wonder if the second one wasn't quite on the bed before you sliced it? I've had a similar problem when multiplying things and arranging them before slicing ( i.e. draw one axle box then copy & paste 3 times and move them around on the bed to fit). They may LOOK as though they are on the same plane but if one is just a couple of pixels higher than the other, when the Slicer sets the base level one of them actually has a minute gap under it and won't print properly or even not at all.

Since the slab size was just what I decided it would be for my own platform, not any particular scaled size, it doesn't really matter what the actul dims are and your scaled down one looks fine to me.

OTOH, I generally get worse results when trying to print different sized objects at the same time, so I'd try just printing the larger one by itself. The actual print time will be the same for each so you only lose a few minutes whilst removing the first print and then setting it going again.
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Re: My Flashforge Printer Journey.

Post by FWLR » Sun Jan 03, 2021 11:51 am

Hi Philip,
I tried to print one only but my machine said the other was not on the platform so it wouldn't start....How do I delete the other one so I can print the one on the platform. :?:

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Re: My Flashforge Printer Journey.

Post by philipy » Sun Jan 03, 2021 12:04 pm

FWLR wrote: ↑Sun Jan 03, 2021 11:51 am Hi Philip,
I tried to print one only but my machine said the other was not on the platform so it wouldn't start....How do I delete the other one so I can print the one on the platform. :?:
The fact that it says one is not on the platform lends weight to my suggestion above.

I don't know your slicer and it appears to have abilities that I've not come across before. However I would suggest that you neeed to go back to the point where you split my original drawing and then, when you move the two parts around, I would expect that you can delete one of them. Then save it and re-slice the one thats left
Philip

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Re: My Flashforge Printer Journey.

Post by SimonWood » Sun Jan 03, 2021 2:04 pm

FWLR wrote: ↑Sun Jan 03, 2021 11:51 am I tried to print one only but my machine said the other was not on the platform so it wouldn't start....How do I delete the other one so I can print the one on the platform. :?:
Select then one you want to delete by clicking on it. The selected item is white, other items are grey.

To delete: Cmd-Backspace (or via the menu Edit > Delete). Only the selected (white) item will be deleted.

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Re: My Flashforge Printer Journey.

Post by FWLR » Mon Jan 04, 2021 9:38 am

Thanks guys. I tried doing it Trevors way and it did it easily. There was no stopping me from then on :lol: :lol: :lol:

Although I did see another way, before I downloaded to Tinkercad, it put a popup with some setting on which had something like width, height and length. So I shorted the length from 200mm to 120 and then downloaded it to Tinkercad and it seemed to work. Haven't got around to printing it yet though, still looking after Anne, who is not very well indeed. She comes first before anything else....

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Re: My Flashforge Printer Journey.

Post by philipy » Mon Jan 04, 2021 10:45 am

FWLR wrote: ↑Mon Jan 04, 2021 9:38 am
Although I did see another way, before I downloaded to Tinkercad, it put a popup with some setting on which had something like width, height and length. So I shorted the length from 200mm to 120 and then downloaded it to Tinkercad and it seemed to work. Haven't got around to printing it yet though,
Experimenting and learning for yourself is much the best way of doing things. You may well find a way of doing something that nobody else has discovered.
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Re: My Flashforge Printer Journey.

Post by Trevor Thompson » Mon Jan 04, 2021 10:53 am

Glad you got there!

Trevor

It is through make in mistakes that we all learn new skills!

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Re: My Flashforge Printer Journey.

Post by philipy » Mon Jan 04, 2021 12:23 pm

Trevor Thompson wrote: ↑Mon Jan 04, 2021 10:53 am
It is through make in mistakes that we all learn new skills!
I should be the most skilful person on the planet in that case! :roll: :lol: :lol:
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Re: My Flashforge Printer Journey.

Post by FWLR » Mon Jan 04, 2021 12:25 pm

philipy wrote: ↑Mon Jan 04, 2021 12:23 pm
Trevor Thompson wrote: ↑Mon Jan 04, 2021 10:53 am
It is through make in mistakes that we all learn new skills!
I should be the most skilful person on the planet in that case! :roll: :lol: :lol:
......... :laughing3: :laughing3: :laughing3: .....

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Re: My Flashforge Printer Journey.

Post by FWLR » Mon Jan 04, 2021 1:51 pm

I have finally got the correct scale for Phillip's platform face. I loaded onto Tinkercad but before I did I changed the setting to 148mm width. I was thinking that because the bed is 150mm it would be very close to the edge and with having rafts it may have caused some problems. I did turn it to sit on the bed at a better angle and then I realised Ii could have put it at 150mm. Oh well I am happy with it. It's all a learning process and I will more than likely make even more mistakes. One thing, the filament that came with my machine has still not run out, it just keeps on printing. The question is, after it does run out mid print, can I load the other reel I have easily enough and do I just load it if it was empty.

Anyway a couple of photos to look at...

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82766E58-F1A6-485E-A7F2-BA5C3AB055C7.png
82766E58-F1A6-485E-A7F2-BA5C3AB055C7.png (904.19 KiB) Viewed 3860 times
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4AF730EC-F6D6-4DC4-B079-04295BC389A4.jpeg (2.34 MiB) Viewed 3860 times

The last photo shows the print at the top with it at 148mm and the bottom one scaled to fit. Big , Big difference..

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Re: My Flashforge Printer Journey.

Post by FWLR » Mon Jan 04, 2021 1:55 pm

By the way, I have kept a record of how long it took to print and how much material.

Took 1hr 24 minutes.

Material 5.86 meters.

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Re: My Flashforge Printer Journey.

Post by Trevor Thompson » Mon Jan 04, 2021 2:16 pm

Ah running out of filament.

I would urge caution here.

I don't think its a good plan to let it run out of filament. When mine is about to run out I try to be around and see that there are but a couple of turns on the reel. I then follow the change filament routine to take the last bit of filament out and load a new reel.

If you let it run out you waste watever has been printed. I cant see a way of getting it to take up where it left off - you just have to throw it away.
So it wastes less to change filament at the appropriate time as above.

Now I might be totally wrong in this but I don't think that you can just feed a new reel in after it has run out. At least I have never just put new filament in to chase the end of the last reel. I have always taken it to bits to extract the end of the filament and cleared the nozzle with the tool provided. Maybe you can just feed new filament in but I haven't because I was concerned that it might make an even bigger jam if the end slid past the remains.

So I think it is far better to change the filament as described in the first paragraph.

Trevor

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Re: My Flashforge Printer Journey.

Post by philipy » Mon Jan 04, 2021 2:33 pm

I agree that once it has run out of filament in the middle you have wasted the print.
A couple of times in my early days I realised too late that it didn't have enough filament to complete, so I put a new reel on with foot or so still to go and then sat and watched it, and manually fed the new reel in, chasing the end. I got away with it a couple of times, as I say, but not to be recommended.

It's fairly simple to do that with my m/c since the feed port is just a hole in the top of the head, but don't know if it is feasible with the flashforge.
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Re: My Flashforge Printer Journey.

Post by SimonWood » Mon Jan 04, 2021 5:49 pm

Trevor Thompson wrote: ↑Mon Jan 04, 2021 2:16 pm When mine is about to run out I try to be around and see that there are but a couple of turns on the reel. I then follow the change filament routine to take the last bit of filament out and load a new reel.
How can you tell when it's about to run out of filament? I find it very hard to judge... Finished my first spool of ABS yesterday, it ran out during a print. (Thankfully it hadn't got beyond the raft...) I still have some of the PLA that came with the machine left, though... but I'm not sure how to judge how big a print I could use it for, short of unspooling it and measuring!

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Re: My Flashforge Printer Journey.

Post by Trevor Thompson » Mon Jan 04, 2021 5:59 pm

Well its a bit hit and miss.

I have unreeled the filament and measured how much was left in the past. That isn't easy because its longer than you think. Obviously the slicing software tells you how many meters a model will use. When it looks like there are only a few layers on the spool there are 2 choices.

Print something small knowing there is sufficient filament to handle that model.

or just keep an eye on it until there are just 2 or three turns left on the spool. It is a bit of a faff and easy to get sidetracked thinking about something else, and then of course its too late.

I just try to pay attention to it!

Trevor

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Re: My Flashforge Printer Journey.

Post by FWLR » Tue Jan 05, 2021 8:06 am

Thanks guys. It's got a bit on it yet ( I think ) well it looks like it has. Like Trevor says, it's really hard to know and that's my worse fear, well it's not a fear is it really, just like Simon has said, if it runs out during a print but it's gone further than the raft would be most annoying. So I guess it's loose a bit of filament to be safe.

Can I ask what nozzle you have bought for your filament Trevor and Simon, and what size. I can't remember what size comes with the machine.

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Re: My Flashforge Printer Journey.

Post by SimonWood » Tue Jan 05, 2021 8:52 am

FWLR wrote: ↑Tue Jan 05, 2021 8:06 am Can I ask what nozzle you have bought for your filament Trevor and Simon, and what size. I can't remember what size comes with the machine.
0.4mm Rod - that's the same as what comes with the machine. I've not tried the 0.3mm nozzle.

It may be listed as "improved version" though that seems to be the only version available - the original version suffered from 'heat creep' causing blockages with PLA at high temperatures.

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Re: My Flashforge Printer Journey.

Post by FWLR » Tue Jan 05, 2021 8:54 am

Have you bought one Simon and from where if you have. :thumbright:

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