Temperature settings
I have a questions about temperature settings. I was reading about the temperature settings for each material and saw that PLA should be at 215 for the nozzle and 50-60 for the bed. Most of the gcodes that were preinstalled on my SD card had them at 215 and 55. There were a few that had it at 210 and then a couple that had the nozzle temp at 0. I also noticed that some of the ABS ones (which I had to add to my SD card from the drivers download) were set to 0 instead of the 255 that they should be. Is this just that it was done incorrectly when the gcode was made? I ended up just using the "tune" menu in the LCD display to manually set the temps to the correct ones.
Now I noticed when I was importing some .stl files into slic3r that some of them have the first layer of PLA at 215 and then they change to 210. Should I change that to 215 for the entire thing? Is there a reason to change the temperature settings at different points in the print? Also, when you import into Slic3r, are the parameters already set by the .stl file or do I need to go through and manually change all of them? I am very new to this, so far I have only printed the bundled files but I would like the branch out and eventually print some of my own designs.
Thank you
ETA: im using a Mac if that makes a difference.
Re: Temperature settings
The STL files only contain the model geometry (as a triangle mesh). They don't contain any data regarding 3D printing. Your slicer will handle all that.
The exact temperatures you want to use depend on a few variables, from the exact material you are using (ie. what brand of PLA) to other things like print speed and room temperature. With the spools I use (Prusa PLA and Matterhackers PLA) I have settled on 215 for the first layer and 200 for the rest.
Generally speaking:
- You'll want a higher temperature for the first layer to improve adhesion. Since stringing / bridging are not an issue for the first layer usually you just go as high as it makes sense for the material here (hence 215 for PLA).
- For everything else, higher temperature means stronger adhesion between the layers, but more strings, and sagging in case of bridges or steep angles. So you'll want to experiment and find a good compromise depending on your use case etc. Note that other settings affect those things too so it's not that simple.
Since lower temperatures usually give out better quality prints, usually you will want to start with the lowest temperature recommended by the filament manufacturer, and go up from there if you notice issues (eg. not enough layer adhesion), usually by experimenting going up 5 degrees at a time.
- Gab
Re: Temperature settings
The gcodes on the card are for the filament that is shipped with the printer. Every filament has it's own properties like the optimal temperature and filament diameter.
To get better prints, you should test every roll, even if it is from the same color/manufacturer. The reason for this is that not all filaments are made equal and even the filament diameter will change from roll to roll. Lower quality filaments will even change diameter throughout the roll due to the lack of precision in the manufacturer's extruding process.
Better quality filament will have a tighter tolerance and will have less variance.
A slicer will build gcode that tells the printer to move the x/y axis and at the same time extrude filament. The amount of filament it has to extrude is dependant on the diameter of the filament.
I suggest you get a digital vernier caliper to test the diameter of the filament in a few places along the first meters of a new roll and put the average in the corresponding setting of the slicer. If you're using Slic3r, that is set in the filament tab, where you can also set the filament temperature for the initial layer and subsequent ones. You can save profiles for each roll, ex: "Prusa PLA Silver Filament 1.75mm".
So, go to thingiverse and print a calibration tower at the start of each roll to see what temperature works best.
Re: Temperature settings
Thank you both for your responses, this really helps