1 Topic by george.pritt

  • george.pritt
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Topic: CTC 3D printer

I am in the UK. I purchased a CTC 3D printer last week. I have used it to print off some items I designed using sketchup with varying success. To do this I had to commit my PC to the task because if I did anything else on my pc the printer stopped, giving a message 'serial error'. I tried several times to print things but at some random point it would just stop with an error message 'serial error' with the display on the printer displaying gobbledygook. I tried with another pc I have as a standalone. It did a 4 hour print yesterday with no problem but when I started another print it failed with 'serial error' several times.  I would like to print from an SD card as this would free up my computers. This seems to need an x3g file. The printing I have done so far has been from gcode from my directly linked pc. The printer came with an sd card from which I got replicatorg to make gcode files from stl files from sketchup. I think I need makerware software to turn gcode into x3g. The sd card that came with the printer had makerware software on it but my pc won't download it. I went on the makerbot website and downloaded their latest software but it disappeared. I turned off my MacAfee virus checker and downloaded it again to no avail. I would like to know how to download the makerbot software to make x3g files bearing in mind my pc runs MacAfee.

2 Reply by carl_m1968

  • carl_m1968
  • carl_m1968
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Re: CTC 3D printer

george.pritt wrote:

I am in the UK. I purchased a CTC 3D printer last week. I have used it to print off some items I designed using sketchup with varying success. To do this I had to commit my PC to the task because if I did anything else on my pc the printer stopped, giving a message 'serial error'. I tried several times to print things but at some random point it would just stop with an error message 'serial error' with the display on the printer displaying gobbledygook. I tried with another pc I have as a standalone. It did a 4 hour print yesterday with no problem but when I started another print it failed with 'serial error' several times.  I would like to print from an SD card as this would free up my computers. This seems to need an x3g file. The printing I have done so far has been from gcode from my directly linked pc. The printer came with an sd card from which I got replicatorg to make gcode files from stl files from sketchup. I think I need makerware software to turn gcode into x3g. The sd card that came with the printer had makerware software on it but my pc won't download it. I went on the makerbot website and downloaded their latest software but it disappeared. I turned off my MacAfee virus checker and downloaded it again to no avail. I would like to know how to download the makerbot software to make x3g files bearing in mind my pc runs MacAfee.


Set your browser so it downloads the file to someplace like the desktop where it is easy to find. Or download it to another PC then put it on a thumb drive.. You could also buy Simplify3D as it works with these printers as well and well send or save the X3G file to the sdcard.

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.

3 Reply by george.pritt

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Re: CTC 3D printer

My pc is running windows 10 and would not download the makerware software. I went to my notebook which is running windows xp and it downloaded the makerware no problem. I'm still having problems with the printer crashing midway through a job and the printer display showing nonsense. I have told the supplier the machine is faulty so watch this space!

4 Reply by PeTe520

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Re: CTC 3D printer

my of is running windows10 and it downloaded makerware just fine... anyway try to download replicator G ... did you update the firmware ?

5 Reply by george.pritt

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Re: CTC 3D printer

Thank you carl and PeTe for your feedback. I had an anonymous reply from ctc via ebay asking me to explain my printer problem. I videod making a x3g file from a stl file then another video of the printer taking the x3g file and printing and the resultant problem and sent it to (hopefully) ctc. I have heard nothing back (5 days later). I contacted ebay via online chat asking if I could register the problem and their response was I had to start a returns procedure with them which means I have to return the printer before ebay will take any action. I don't want to return the printer, I just want the problem (which I think is software) sorted. I am going to look into PeTe's advice of updating the firmware. Watch this space!

6 Reply by george.pritt

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Re: CTC 3D printer

I have updated the firmware to the latest sailfish. The printer is working great -the display is showing rubbish. CTC have not yet replied to my problem.

7 Reply by george.pritt

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Re: CTC 3D printer

Until this morning I still had a problem with the display on my ctc printer showing garbled info and the printing dropping out randomly. Yesterday it dropped out after 2 hours of a 6 hour print! I upended the printer and checked out the main power supply and to cut a long story short found the metal casing of the power supply was not earthed, even though there was an earth wire attached. I have earthed the metal chassis of the power supply and it has cured my problem. Printing is fine and display is rock steady.