1 Topic by jooshs (edited by jooshs 2012-10-02 14:48:58)

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Topic: Week 1 Solidoodle II Print Challenge (double helix)

It was mentioned on the site suggestions that it would be cool if we had a difficult print section or something to that effect.  Brad, would you mind if we had a weekly challenge with a sticky that could somehow be archived by week for a challenging print each week?  This seems like it would be a great way to share information, share slic3r profiles, and discuss techniques for better printing.  Not sure how the challenge goes at thingiverse, but maybe whoever selects the challenge on week 1 will select the winner for that week and it can't be their own print.  The winner then would select the print for the following week.  I would envision that the person who selects the challenge is responsible for generating a cleaned up .stl file and doing an initial print on the first day and then could submit another one when they are through with fine tuning...  Additionally, you should have to write a short paragraph describing what you did and share your profile to encourage sharing of experience and information.  If it is good, people will learn what to do and if it is bad, people will learn what not to do.

I was just browsing through Thingiverse and thought that the double helix would be a cool starting point that would test bridging, flow rate, and cooling.  I have attached the .stl.  Here's to hoping it gets a lot better!


http://img205.imagevenue.com/loc224/th_189472150_doublehelix_122_224lo.jpg

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2 Reply by IanJohnson

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Re: Week 1 Solidoodle II Print Challenge (double helix)

Sounds good. That's exactly the way it works at the RepRap forum.  I think someone even hide that print once.

3 Reply by jooshs

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Re: Week 1 Solidoodle II Print Challenge (double helix)

Just to clear it up as well, how do you embed pictures in posts?  It seems silly to have a bunch of links to have to click to see the pics instead of just scrolling from one to the next.

4 Reply by ch355ma5t3r

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Re: Week 1 Solidoodle II Print Challenge (double helix)

I'm not sure on how to embed the pictures in the post but I love the idea of the difficult prints and sharing how we did them.

5 Reply by Brad

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Re: Week 1 Solidoodle II Print Challenge (double helix)

For sure the weekly challenge is a cool idea!

Should I sticky this thread?

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6 Reply by jooshs

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Re: Week 1 Solidoodle II Print Challenge (double helix)

I think a better way to do it would be to make its own forum.  That way every week there would be a new thread and it would be easier to organize each weeks activity.  Then people could go back and look at particular prints and read through each week.  Maybe you could just move this thread over to the new forum and have it start week 1's print competition.  By the way, Brad nobody has answered yet... How do you post pics in postings rather than having a link for one that you have to click on?

7 Reply by lawsy

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Re: Week 1 Solidoodle II Print Challenge (double helix)

jooshs wrote:

I think a better way to do it would be to make its own forum.  That way every week there would be a new thread and it would be easier to organize each weeks activity.  Then people could go back and look at particular prints and read through each week.  Maybe you could just move this thread over to the new forum and have it start week 1's print competition.  By the way, Brad nobody has answered yet... How do you post pics in postings rather than having a link for one that you have to click on?

This is what the original request asked for. It also allows users to post up files they need help with, without clogging up the other forum sections.

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8 Reply by lawsy

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Re: Week 1 Solidoodle II Print Challenge (double helix)

Here's my first effort. Looks like a good model to play with my retraction settings. Whenever I have the fan on, I get that really fine stringing.

http://imageshack.us/a/img43/7102/doublehelix.jpg

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9 Reply by jefferysanders

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Re: Week 1 Solidoodle II Print Challenge (double helix)

I am back to bed level issues again, my back spring wants to change its position every 2nd or 3rd small print or in the middle of large prints, I constantly have to check the bed level before the prints and like clockwork it changes enough to ruin .10mm prints. I have to add some washers to keep the springs from biting down into the bed material and insulation in various spots which is causing the random bed level issue for me. I did confirm they are nearly the same springs (one has a little bit extra coil and is a bit more shiny than the other two but the measure and feel out nearly the same).

Make sure you keep up with what settings you used to achieve each print or better yet even post the config & settings under each picture to keep it really helpful.  Also if you can add a picture of the object mid print and then fresh off the bed.   I will edit this post with my result as soon as I am up and running again.

10 Reply by Jon

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Re: Week 1 Solidoodle II Print Challenge (double helix)

This is the result from my double helix print.  Expert model, printed with the case off.  No extruder fan, standard settings.


http://i.imgur.com/uFT9a.jpg

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11 Reply by jooshs

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Re: Week 1 Solidoodle II Print Challenge (double helix)

That is really impressive for standard settings and no extruder fan.  I'm assuming it is with abs?  Standard settings meaning in Skeinforge?  It took me several attempts to even get the print to finish and never without hanging plastic.  I wonder if the white is a little easier to print with.

12 Reply by Jon

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Re: Week 1 Solidoodle II Print Challenge (double helix)

It is ABS and yes, standard settings in Pronterface and Skeinforge were used to produce the double helix.  I have a spool of black filament on the way, I'm interested to find out if the quality is consistent across colors.

13 Reply by goofygrin

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Re: Week 1 Solidoodle II Print Challenge (double helix)

So did you guys print this without support?

14 Reply by jooshs

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Re: Week 1 Solidoodle II Print Challenge (double helix)

I'm pretty sure no one used support. I'm still really impressed with Jon's stock print. Mine was a struggle to even finish and I had to have z lift so the sides didn't break.

15 Reply by goofygrin

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Re: Week 1 Solidoodle II Print Challenge (double helix)

ok.  I printed with support and it printed, but it's crazy.  I'll try without next time smile

16 Reply by IanJohnson

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Re: Week 1 Solidoodle II Print Challenge (double helix)

You will get the best results with Skeinforge, if that isn't what you are already using.  There are some self intersections, and Skeinforge handles them better than Slic3r for this model.  Slic3r tries to start some of the crossbar layers in midair.

17 Reply by goofygrin

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Re: Week 1 Solidoodle II Print Challenge (double helix)

Ya I use slic3r only.  Guess I need to setup skeinforge.  Off to the wiki I go (although I need to do something in an ini file I think the last time I tried to use it it had the axes wrong or something -- this is not in the wiki).

18 Reply by solijohn

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Re: Week 1 Solidoodle II Print Challenge (double helix)

IanJohnson wrote:

You will get the best results with Skeinforge, if that isn't what you are already using.  There are some self intersections, and Skeinforge handles them better than Slic3r for this model.  Slic3r tries to start some of the crossbar layers in midair.

I wonder what the actual difference algorithm wise is? This is something that is a little too mysterious at the moment.

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19 Reply by IanJohnson

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Re: Week 1 Solidoodle II Print Challenge (double helix)

It's hard to say, and I've had it go both ways with problematic STLs.  I've had models that Skeinforge couldn't handle and only Slic3r can slice, and vice versa.  You can generally get anything fixed for free as far as manifold edges, holes, etc except for self intersections.   You can't really predict what a slicer will do with those.

20 Reply by solijohn

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Re: Week 1 Solidoodle II Print Challenge (double helix)

IanJohnson wrote:

It's hard to say, and I've had it go both ways with problematic STLs.  I've had models that Skeinforge couldn't handle and only Slic3r can slice, and vice versa.  You can generally get anything fixed for free as far as manifold edges, holes, etc except for self intersections.   You can't really predict what a slicer will do with those.

I'm surprised we haven't seen a computer scientist give a nice break down of how this works. Kliment has implied to me that the math is intense, and perhaps this why things aren't 100% clear.

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21 Reply by jooshs

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Re: Week 1 Solidoodle II Print Challenge (double helix)

I would like to know if there is a way to go in and edit the path of the layers manually if you're not pleased with them. I am not afraid of the math to create the slices, but don't know where you could access it to change it. The print I made quite a while ago of the bahtinov mask still never came out quite right because neither gcode gave paths that created consistent bar thicknesses and still occasionally started in the middle of a bar. Both of those those things drastically affect the effectiveness of the mask.

Here is the print I am talking about.


http://www.soliforum.com/topic/76/bahti … -settings/

22 Reply by goofygrin

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Re: Week 1 Solidoodle II Print Challenge (double helix)

You can always go edit the gcode... but that's like going from a 3d model down to the assembler used to blit the data to the video card...

I'd like to be able to change the way the slicer slices based upon where in the model it is... like .3mm on the gross sections, but .1mm in the fine sections.  But that's wishful thinking big_smile

23 Reply by IanJohnson

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Re: Week 1 Solidoodle II Print Challenge (double helix)

You can kind of do that in Slic3r.  When printing .1mm, tell it to fill every three layers so the fill goes in at .3mm.

Skeinforge 50 has "skin" which can divide the perimeters of at .3mm layer into 3 .1mm perimeters, but the steps between layers still happen at .3mm.

24 Reply by lawsy

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Re: Week 1 Solidoodle II Print Challenge (double helix)

If you want to see how the Slic3r does its job, poke through the source code on its Github (not that it will be very easy to understand).

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25 Reply by solijohn

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Re: Week 1 Solidoodle II Print Challenge (double helix)

lawsy wrote:

If you want to see how the Slic3r does its job, poke through the source code on its Github (not that it will be very easy to understand).

Well, it's not necessarily the most legible thing. I think we would all love to see a code review.

Edit: I just find perl coding to be vague in general, I'm not implying he did a bad job.

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