Simplify3D (S3D) settings for the Original Prusa i3 printers  

Re: Simplify3D print settings (August 30, 2016)

If you export out your FFF config and edit the file (in something like Notepad++), at the bottom will be the the material config, which usually won't have a lot in. If you add a parameter for retraction speed, then you have to add the same parameter for all materials. If you don't then it'll use what ever was last specified.
you go from something like
<autoConfigureMaterial name="PLA">
<globalExtruderTemperature>200</globalExtruderTemperature>
<globalBedTemperature>60</globalBedTemperature>
<globalExtrusionMultiplier>0.9</globalExtrusionMultiplier>
<fanSpeed>
<setpoint layer="1" speed="0"/>
<setpoint layer="2" speed="100"/>
</fanSpeed>
</autoConfigureMaterial>
to
<autoConfigureMaterial name="PLA">
<globalExtruderTemperature>200</globalExtruderTemperature>
<globalBedTemperature>60</globalBedTemperature>
<globalExtrusionMultiplier>0.9</globalExtrusionMultiplier>
<extruder name="Primary Extruder">
<toolheadNumber>0</toolheadNumber>
<diameter>0.4</diameter>
<autoWidth>1</autoWidth>
<width>0.48</width>
<extrusionMultiplier>0.9</extrusionMultiplier>
<useRetract>1</useRetract>
<retractionDistance>1</retractionDistance>
<extraRestartDistance>0</extraRestartDistance>
<retractionZLift>0</retractionZLift>
<retractionSpeed>1800</retractionSpeed>
<useCoasting>1</useCoasting>
<coastingDistance>0.2</coastingDistance>
<useWipe>1</useWipe>
<wipeDistance>2</wipeDistance>
</extruder>
<fanSpeed>
<setpoint layer="1" speed="0"/>
<setpoint layer="2" speed="100"/>
</fanSpeed>
</autoConfigureMaterial>

Can you share a copy of your FFF? My question is this extruder now only associated with the material and not the quality?

Re: Simplify3D print settings (August 30, 2016)

Comparing slic3r and simplify3d options I noticed something weird.

For PLA 0.05 travel speed on Slic3r is set to 200mm/s on S3D seems to be 4800mm/min which should be 80mm/s
Perimeters speed on Slic3r is 40 mm/s while on S3D is 60% of the default printing speed, or 2400/60*0.6 which is 24mm/s
Solid infill on Slic3r is 40mm/s on S3D 32mm/s

Wondering why so much difference between the two.

Re: Simplify3D print settings (August 30, 2016)

Can you share a copy of your FFF? My question is this extruder now only associated with the material and not the quality?

Yes those extruder settings would now be material specific. The FFF files are limited, you can't have some extruder settings under quality and some in material, it's all in one, or none in both. That just down to the way the XML file is structured.

I've attached my FFF file, with just two material profiles, I would suggest that you delete all but one, work on that one and then when you are ready to add more material, just click the green plus button to add a new one, then change your settings and update the profile.

I wrote down which settings I considered to be machine specific, which are material specific and which are quality specific. There were some overlaps on some settings (such as speed), but once I had them written down it was easy to put those in to one of the 3 categories - I can always change the setting manually if I think I need to.

Unless otherwise stated the settings below change on a material basis
--Extruder settings

And these are the quality settings
Layer Height
Infill Percentage
First Layer Height Percentage
First Layer Width Percentage
Top Solid Layers
Bottom Solid Layers
Perimeter Outlines
Outline Underspeed
Solid Infill Underspeed
Support Underspeed

This FFF is specific to my printer though, so check before printing anything. I'm using PrintBite instead of PEI so my bed temps are hotter and I've PID tuned both my extruder and bed temps. Your mileage may vary! ...and yes I do need to move my PID settings to be material specific...

Re: Simplify3D print settings (August 30, 2016)

After some playing around, so far I have been getting much better results with Verbatim Black PLA with the following settings

Temp
First layer ; 220
Rest : 210
Bed : 55C

Retraction
Retraction distance : 3mm
Restart Distance : -0.2mm
Wipe Nozzle : 3mm
Coast at end : Off (0.2mm coasting seemed to cause under extrusion)
Retraction speed : 30mm/s
Vertical Lift : 0.2mm

Other
Layer start : Closest at X = 0, Y = 0

Re: Simplify3D print settings (August 30, 2016)

I hope I am not hijacking this thread but as I am still new to all this I am chock full of questions. I have used a lot of the info here to make my own fff and it is working spectacularly (thanks all) My tops and sides of calibration cubes look awesome.

When I print out a small model and I use a 4800mm speed setting, it goes faster. If I lower it to 3600 it goes slower and so on. This I understand. But if I change the settings to .1 layer height over say a .2 layer height, the difference in print time is HUGE and really pronounced if I change to .05. I also understand that, it extrudes less material, therefore it takes longer.

My question is...

If I select a model to print at 0.05, will the entire model, infill and all be printed at that layer height? Is that why the time is so much longer and if so, is there a way to print infill and everything not the outermost shell at a higher layer height to speed it up?

Re: Simplify3D print settings (August 30, 2016)

I hope I am not hijacking this thread but as I am still new to all this I am chock full of questions. I have used a lot of the info here to make my own fff and it is working spectacularly (thanks all) My tops and sides of calibration cubes look awesome.

When I print out a small model and I use a 4800mm speed setting, it goes faster. If I lower it to 3600 it goes slower and so on. This I understand. But if I change the settings to .1 layer height over say a .2 layer height, the difference in print time is HUGE and really pronounced if I change to .05. I also understand that, it extrudes less material, therefore it takes longer.

My question is...

If I select a model to print at 0.05, will the entire model, infill and all be printed at that layer height? Is that why the time is so much longer and if so, is there a way to print infill and everything not the outermost shell at a higher layer height to speed it up?

Yeah, unfortunately that's just the way FDM printing works. The layer height controls the height for the *entire layer* including infill. There is simply no other way to do it. I suppose in theory one could try to write a slicer that does thinner perimeters and and thicker infill layers by alternating layers and some other black magic, but I'm not sure the strength/quality would turn out the way one would want. An interesting idea nonetheless.

Re: Simplify3D print settings (August 30, 2016)

There is simply no other way to do it.

Unless you use KISS (PRO version only) to slice your model... It has a very nice option, "Stacked Layers" where sparse infill and support are extruded every N layers.

Peter

Re: Simplify3D print settings (August 30, 2016)

There is simply no other way to do it.

Unless you use KISS (PRO version only) to slice your model... It has a very nice option, "Stacked Layers" where sparse infill and support are extruded every N layers.

Peter

Well, it looks like someone already wrote the feature into a slicer! I also found "sparse infill" as an option in S3D which appears to do the same thing, although in S3D it's limited to 1.2x the layer height in order to prevent quality and strength problems, which is why in my opinion it's not a super great idea in many cases.

That said, I suppose that if a part will not be subject to any major stresses then perhaps it may be worth playing with.

Does anyone have any personal experience using sparse infill layers? Any observable difference in strength or quality?

Re: Simplify3D print settings (August 30, 2016)

I hope I am not hijacking this thread but as I am still new to all this I am chock full of questions. I have used a lot of the info here to make my own fff and it is working spectacularly (thanks all) My tops and sides of calibration cubes look awesome.

When I print out a small model and I use a 4800mm speed setting, it goes faster. If I lower it to 3600 it goes slower and so on. This I understand. But if I change the settings to .1 layer height over say a .2 layer height, the difference in print time is HUGE and really pronounced if I change to .05. I also understand that, it extrudes less material, therefore it takes longer.

My question is...

If I select a model to print at 0.05, will the entire model, infill and all be printed at that layer height? Is that why the time is so much longer and if so, is there a way to print infill and everything not the outermost shell at a higher layer height to speed it up?

Hi, Eric. Care to share your fff?
Mike.

Re: Simplify3D print settings (August 30, 2016)

@Omikron : You said ' in S3D it's limited to 1.2x the layer height'. I believe this is not correct. The recommended limit is that the infill width/height should be more than 1.2. This means that for an infill layer width of 0.4 and a layer height of 0.05 you can still print 1 infill layer for every 6 perimeter layers.

Re: Simplify3D print settings (August 30, 2016)

@Omikron : You said ' in S3D it's limited to 1.2x the layer height'. I believe this is not correct. The recommended limit is that the infill width/height should be more than 1.2. This means that for an infill layer width of 0.4 and a layer height of 0.05 you can still print 1 infill layer for every 6 perimeter layers.

My answer comes right from: https://www.simplify3d.com/support/faq/

Simplify3D allows you to print a fine perimeter layer height along with a thicker infill. You'll find 'Print Sparse Infill Every __ Layer(s)' in the 'Infill' tab. Use this setting to achieve a high quality exterior while saving time printing the infill.

The 'Sparse Infill" value you enter is related to your 'Primary Layer Height' (layer tab). The perimeter will print at your 'Primary Layer Height', and then the software will multiply the primary height by __ (the number you enter) when printing your sparse infill layers. For example, if you have a primary layer height of 0.1500 mm and set the Sparse Infill value to 2, your infill will print at 0.3000 mm (0.1500 x 2).

For proper adhesion of layers, the software will not allow you to exceed a 1.2 ratio of width to thickness. If you exceed this ratio, Simplify3D will warn you. If you get the warning, try reducing the exterior layer height.

Additional examples:
0.1 mm fine exterior height - sparse infill can print every 2 or 3 layers
0.15mm fine exterior height - sparse infill can print every 2 layers
0.2 mm medium exterior height - sparse infill not suggested at medium or draft exterior levels

There is a similar Sparse Infill setting under 'Support' which works in the same way to create a sparse infill in your support structures.

Re: Simplify3D print settings (August 30, 2016)

I think my reply was deleted, but basically S3D support told me the only way to get per material settings was to edit the xml manually.

Re: Simplify3D print settings (August 30, 2016)

@Omikron : Just try it. With a layer height of 0.05 and a layer width of 0.4, you can have a sparse infill factor of 6 before Simplify3D complains about the width to heigth ratio of 1.2.

Re: Simplify3D print settings (August 30, 2016)

For proper adhesion of layers, the software will not allow you to exceed a 1.2 ratio of width to thickness. If you exceed this ratio, Simplify3D will warn you. If you get the warning, try reducing the exterior layer height.

The ratio mentioned here refers to extrusion width to exterior layer height - which makes sense, as generally maximum usable layer height is roughly 80% of nozzle width, without running into adhesion problems.

With standard 0.4 nozzle you are good till 0.35mm, so when printing for instance at 0.05mm perimeter layer height, the multiplier could be set to '7' to print infill every 7 layers, effectively at 0.35mm.

Re: Simplify3D print settings (August 30, 2016)

How do I generate support in S3D? When i pick the icon and generate automatic support nothing happens.
Should I enable Generate support material in support tab of the FFF settings to be able to add support?
Sorry I'm really new at this.

Update
Model was the problem. I Tried to print Zortrax superhero mask and it does not want to generate support on it

Re: Simplify3D print settings (August 30, 2016)

I just took the plunge after seeing the a YT video on the awesome support structures that S3D is able to generate (e.g. 10% for the support with a 75% layer on top), as that will allow me to save probably 50% of filament on some models with huge floating overhangs. Overall i'm very impressed by S3D, probably because so far the only slicer i've ever used (3 printers for >3 years) is CuraEngine with Octoprint 😀

While tweaking the profile, i found a that the price/kg for PLA is set to something 200€, maybe that can be fixed in the next release 😉

Re: Simplify3D print settings (August 30, 2016)

You can change the price/kg for the filament you are using in the "Other" tab on your printer profile in S3D.

Re: Simplify3D print settings (August 30, 2016)

Is anybody else seeing issue with retraction settings being too aggressive in the current version of the MK2 profile?

I have had multiple prints (with lots of retractions) fail a couple of hours into a print because no filament is extruded anymore and i caught it printing air. If i manually push down on the filament, it starts extruding again, so its not a clog (i think) but rather (thinking again) filament being ground up and therefore getting stuck - or something entirely different going on there.

I then went ahead and halved the retraction length to 0,4 and this time print finished fine.

Re: Simplify3D print settings (August 30, 2016)

Is anybody else seeing issue with retraction settings being too aggressive in the current version of the MK2 profile?

I have had multiple prints (with lots of retractions) fail a couple of hours into a print because no filament is extruded anymore and i caught it printing air. If i manually push down on the filament, it starts extruding again, so its not a clog (i think) but rather (thinking again) filament being ground up and therefore getting stuck - or something entirely different going on there.

I then went ahead and halved the retraction length to 0,4 and this time print finished fine.

It could be a partial clog, meaning it gets stuck enough that it can't be pushed back down by the extruder but not so stuck that you can't manually push it forward.

Re: Simplify3D print settings (August 30, 2016)

It could be a partial clog, meaning it gets stuck enough that it can't be pushed back down by the extruder but not so stuck that you can't manually push it forward.

True enough. I guess i go back to default settings and see if it happens again after some thorough nozzle cleaning.