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Calibrating with Prusa PC Blend Carbon Fiber  

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tjmitchem
(@tjmitchem)
Active Member
Calibrating with Prusa PC Blend Carbon Fiber

I'm trying to re-calibrate my Mini with PC Blend CF, since it looks like I'll need different settings than ASA to get it to stick.  Unfortunately, the printer is using a nozzle temp of 170, rather than the 285 that's recommended.  When I loaded the filament, I selected PC.  Nozzle is an Olsson Ruby.

Any hints as to what I'm doing wrong?

 

Posted : 06/07/2023 1:38 pm
Thejiral
(@thejiral)
Noble Member
RE:

Is that typo and did you mean 270°C or are you really talking about 170°C. PC Blend won't even properly melt at such low temps. 
What do your slicer filament settings say? There you have to set hotend temp to 285°C.

The problem with a Mini is that the stock tool head doesn't support such high temps. The officially supported max temp is 280°C. I don't know how well the Mini takes operating at those max temps but 280°C is still a feasible temp for regular PC Blend. 285°C would be better though, if possible. 

This post was modified 12 months ago 2 times by Thejiral

Mk3s MMU2s, Voron 0.1, Voron 2.4

Posted : 06/07/2023 1:44 pm
tjmitchem
(@tjmitchem)
Active Member
Topic starter answered:
RE:

170c is what the firmware is picking for calibration.  I'm not choosing it.

Also, the filament loading menu has a temp of 275c for "PC".  It doesn't even have an entry for "PC Blend CF".

 

EDIT: The max temp I can choose when adjusting a print is 290C

 

Posted by: @thejiral

Is that typo and did you mean 270°C or are you really talking about 170°C. PC Blend won't even properly melt at such low temps. 
What do your slicer filament settings say? There you have to set hotend temp to 285°C.

The problem with a Mini is that the stock tool head doesn't support such high temps. The officially supported max temp is 280°C. I don't know how well the Mini takes operating at those max temps but 280°C is still a feasible temp for regular PC Blend. 285°C would be better though, if possible. 

 

Posted : 06/07/2023 1:55 pm
Thejiral
(@thejiral)
Noble Member
RE: Calibrating with Prusa PC Blend Carbon Fiber

275°C is the lower end of the official recommendation for PC-Blend. For loading that is certainly suitable. For printing the viscosity of PC-Blend can be already quite high. I have seen that with printing at 280°C already but didn't want to go beyond on my Voron 0.1. 

I admit, I don't own a Mini (I know, wrong forum ;)) if you can set up to 290°C, a good value to try out would be 285°C. The official specs on the Prusa site only state 280°C though. The thing with the Mini is that the PTFE tube is getting closer to the heatblock than on an Mk3. That is why I am cautious at advising higher temps than Prusa does for longer operation. 

I am not sure what you mean by "calibrating". What are you exactly calibrating there? If it involves extruding anything it won't work at such low temperatures. If it is just about bed levelling etc it shouldn't be a big issue. 

Mk3s MMU2s, Voron 0.1, Voron 2.4

Posted : 06/07/2023 2:50 pm
fuchsr
(@fuchsr)
Famed Member
RE: Calibrating with Prusa PC Blend Carbon Fiber

For Live Z calibration, don't use the built-in method, it takes forever and is hard to interpret. Take a look at my calibration strips https://www.prusaprinters.org/prints/105404 which let you test 8 live z settings in one 5 minute print job. Just set the filament to PC-CF and you should be good to go.

Posted : 07/07/2023 9:05 pm
tjmitchem liked
tjmitchem
(@tjmitchem)
Active Member
Topic starter answered:
RE: Calibrating with Prusa PC Blend Carbon Fiber

That was worth the three coffees 🙂

Thank you very much!

 

Posted by: @fuchsr

For Live Z calibration, don't use the built-in method, it takes forever and is hard to interpret. Take a look at my calibration strips https://www.prusaprinters.org/prints/105404 which let you test 8 live z settings in one 5 minute print job. Just set the filament to PC-CF and you should be good to go.

 

Posted : 07/07/2023 9:57 pm
fuchsr
(@fuchsr)
Famed Member
RE: Calibrating with Prusa PC Blend Carbon Fiber

Thanks a bunch! I have no clue why Prusa keeps using this method, which even for the experienced user is not trivial to interpret. 

Posted : 07/07/2023 10:19 pm
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