Im having some problems with .1mm printing (Page 1 of 3)

It's a little weird that you can see fill between some of the lines in the octocat.  It probably won't make a difference, but try it with Fill Every N Layers set to 1, make sure there is no Z Lift and turn off Generate Extra Perimeters.  Maybe try a tallish 1 wall hollow cylinder and see what happens just to make everything simple.

When the bed is in the lower half of the build area, does the top of the Z rod wobble around a lot?

OK so i just tried to print the squirrel again with the same results. I have not found  a suitible stl file for a one wall test cylinder yet. The z rod does wobble. Could this be the cause of my problem?

Ok so I tried this fix here http://wiki.solidoodle.com/z-axis-anti-backlash. It seems to have helped alot.  As you can see from the pics below. The one on the left is from before I used the anti back lash thing and the one on the right is after. I still have bands in my .1mm prints but they are allot fainter.

Interesting.  I would love to see 2 prints of the same thing from each software package.  That might help in narrowing down some of the setting discrepancies.  The biggest thing that stands out to me would be the filament diameter and extrusion multiplier settings being different between the 2 setups.

OK so im still thinking I have a problem with my z axis. This is a print I did of a gift box for the advent tree thing. As you can see it was pretty smooth for the first 5mm or so then the banding started. I can also see the z axis motor moving up and down when I run the bed up. It looks as if the z axis motor is flexing the metal of the bottom of the case. Maybe I should contact support?

Jonathan,
This is very much a z-axis lead screw issue.  What you are seeing for the 1st 5mm or so is the layers being squashed down by the print head which leads me to believe that you may have your bed temp or your extruder temp a little high.  The layers aren't cooling enough so they get kind of moved around when being printed over.  This is masking the banding.

As I've discovered after replacing the lead screw, there is inherent flex in the base of the motor for the z-axis.  There shouldn't be enough flex to knock over small objects, but there will be some.  The real to place to look is at the top of the lead screw.  If that thing is swaying like a stiff breeze is blowing, then you have a bend lead screw.

But your banding is similar to the way mine was.  If you've already calibrated the extruder, levelled the bed and tried all the backlash fixes, then contact support and request a new lead screw.  Provide explanation and images/video of the issue.  They should understand.

Watch Ian's awesome youtube video here http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JZGdMc2ebPo

I believe, you don't have to change the firmware, in repetier, you can go to settings->EEPROM Configuration or similar titled and change the values there.

Well I heard back from them and they want a video of the z rod in action. So im going to send that and see what happens

I think if the wobble is small enough, at .3mm layers the XY position of the rod might be close enough to the position it was at for Layer 1 by the time it has moved far enough to begin Layer 2.  With .1mm layers, there are two more layers in between those points, one of which might be at a more extreme deviation which was passed by in the .3mm print.

Or if it is inconsistent step length, the layer height might divide into it in such a way that it only hits the good steps and skips over the inconsistent ones.

So if the wobble is slight, .3mm may not provide enough resolution to show its full extent, at least not with every revolution.  I saw that with mine, I never noticed any banding until I printed something at .1mm, and even then

Well I'm having some problems getting some videos posted. But as soon as I am able to send them to SD support, Ill post them here also. Without the z nut fix in place you can clearly see some wobble in the rod. It moves from right to left back and forth. I can hear a knocking as I advance the bed too. I think the bed is shifting as far as it can over to the left then to the right and the bushings or what ever are slamming into the vertical rods.

Hey Jonathan thanks for posting this thread, because I am having the same problems (not as bad but it's close). I thought it was a firmware issue and was trying to resolve it that way. Turns out my motherboard is one of the bad ones and needs something extra to be updated, so I'm kinda stuck-like-chuck.

I'm wondering if that's the same issue with yours and the mobo is the actual problem. Have you tried updating the firmware?

I really don't understand how it could be the z-axis. I think the motors are over stepping and building entire layers wider than the last.

I would think if it's a wobble in the z the layers would look like:

----------------
  ----------------
----------------
  ----------------, and every layer would be equal but just not even, and not like:

-------------------
  ----------------
-------------------
  ----------------, where every layer is either building larger or getting squashed more by the extruder.

I think the effect on the first few layers are lessened due to the heated bed. The farther away it gets from the heat, the more pronounced the problem is.

I also thought it could be that the nozzle is loose and wobbly as it drags over the extruded plastic but I tightened the wooden plate and that also didn't help.

...or maybe it really is an issue that this guy brought up on my non-solution to z-axis wobble. (check the comments)
http://www.thingiverse.com/thing:36177 (BTW, thanks Ian for clearing up what I couldn't.)

Oh, yeah, she's bent.

Ship these off to SD HQ and let support see 'em.  Not quite as bad as my wobble, but it's not looking great either.