1 Topic by pirvan (edited by pirvan 2016-12-19 15:02:16)

  • pirvan
  • pirvan
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  • Registered: 2013-03-27
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Topic: Form 1 printing troubles

There hasn't been much movement in this forum in a while, so I though I'd post a little quickie here.

As some of you may have already seen on the projects forum, Ive been working on an Imperial knight model, which I will be printing on my Form 1+.  After printing a few pieces at 100nm (.1mm) resolution, I wanted to try a 50nm print to get some improvement on the surface.

Unfortunately, the print was totally ruined, because the supports didn't print right.  The base and first 4mm of support print perfectly, but after that, everything turns to crap, the supports look all chewed up, as if they deteriorated while printing, so of course, the rest of the model fails, requiring a tank clean up, and straining the remaining resin through a filter to remove any partially cured particles floating in it.  A really messy job.

FormLabs support, while very prompt with their help, have yet to figure out what's going on.  They first thought it was an issue with the optics, so they had me clean the main mirror and the galvo mirrors, then they had me adjust the build platform height,  but the problem persists.  I can print perfectly at 100nm, but I can't print without failure an the higher resolutions (50nm and 25nm).

So for now I'll be using 100nm, until I can get this issue sorted out.

To print or, 3D print, that is the question...
SD3 printer w/too many mods,  Printrbot Simple Maker Ed.,  FormLabs Form 1+
AnyCubic Photon, Shining 3D EinScan-S & Atlas 3D scanners...
...and too much time on my hands.

2 Reply by pirvan

  • pirvan
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Re: Form 1 printing troubles

Well it looks like the problem was caused by the power supply.  When I bought the printer, it didn't come with a power supply, so I ended up trying a 20V 5A power supply I had around, and it worked just fine.  The factory supplied PSU is 24V@ 3A.

So I've been printing away with the 20V PSU for nearly a year, and everything was honky-dory, at least until I tried to print stuff at 50nm.  I'm not really sure how or why the printer would work fine with 20V @ 100nm prints but fail at 50nm, but I bought a 24V @ 5A adapter, plugged it in, and I can now print at 50nm.

Haven't tried 25nm, but that's on the list.

To print or, 3D print, that is the question...
SD3 printer w/too many mods,  Printrbot Simple Maker Ed.,  FormLabs Form 1+
AnyCubic Photon, Shining 3D EinScan-S & Atlas 3D scanners...
...and too much time on my hands.

3 Reply by carl_m1968

  • carl_m1968
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Re: Form 1 printing troubles

Tighter resolution requires more voltage to be and current to be applied to the galvos that drive the scanning mirrors.

Printing since 2009 and still love it!
Anycubic 4MAX best $225 ever invested.
Voxelabs Proxima SLA. 6 inch 2k Mono LCD.
Anycubic Predator, massive Delta machine. 450 x 370 print envelope.