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Bed Topography with Pronterface  

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AndyInSwindon
(@andyinswindon)
Trusted Member
Bed Topography with Pronterface

Hi, I've been running my 2 x Mk3S's for just under a year now, and apart from a few spikes in bad luck, they are pretty reliable.  I have never checked my bed map, which was something I'd always taken a keen interest in on my old Ender3; with my Prusa's I've just never needed to.  However, this evening my curiosity got the best of me, and I gave it a try on Pronterface, and the results look horrific!  The print quality doesn't seem to be at all bad, but given the bed maps, there's definitely a lot of room for improvement.  I know that the Nyloc mod is a go-to for many, but as a general rule, I am just after a bit of an opinion on the attached bed maps.....

 

You can see that the variation on the first printer is 0.5, and on the other, 1.6.  On the second printer, when bed levelling at the start of a print, on a 9 point level, it always 'double taps' on points 8 and 9.

Again, trying to avoid the nyloc mod, am I being concerned about very little here?  My Ender 3, although a pain to level, was much more level than this.  Could it be the steel sheets warped a little too much?

 

Cheers for any helpful pointers in advance.

 

Posted : 06/04/2020 1:20 am
RH_Dreambox
(@rh_dreambox)
Prominent Member
RE: Bed Topography with Pronterface

Can your measurement really be right? With such a large variation over the bed, you should not be able to print anything at all.
Maybe you have the remnants of filament underneath the steel plate?
A much better tool is the Octoprint with the Prusa Leveling Guide plugin.

 

Bear MK3 with Bondtech extruder

Posted : 06/04/2020 7:33 am
AndyInSwindon
(@andyinswindon)
Trusted Member
Topic starter answered:
RE: Bed Topography with Pronterface

@rhdreambox

Hi, I've checked for remnants, and both steel sheet and print bed are clean and smooth.  I have Octopi setups on both machines, but have not had much success with running the levelling on them.  I'll give it a go, tbh I haven't spent a huge amount of time on it.  As you say, if the readings are correct, it should be struggling to print.  I used the figures from Pronterface and plugged them into the online visualiser.  It could be that the error lies here.

Posted : 06/04/2020 1:04 pm
AndyInSwindon
(@andyinswindon)
Trusted Member
Topic starter answered:
RE: Bed Topography with Pronterface

I've just tried again, with a 7x7 Mesh, and 5 probes per point, and the results were massively inconsistent, so I think it may be a pronterface thing.  If I get furloughed, it'll give me time to do the nyloc mod and try that.  I also have 2 MK3S's on order, so when they are built I can do a comparison with a new build.  Maybe when I threw one of these down the stairs and the other out of the window it affected the levelling. 

Posted : 06/04/2020 1:39 pm
RH_Dreambox
(@rh_dreambox)
Prominent Member
RE: Bed Topography with Pronterface

@apromain
You should never throw a Prusa printer down a flight of stairs! You can damage the stairs 🙂

Bear MK3 with Bondtech extruder

Posted : 06/04/2020 2:21 pm
AndyInSwindon
(@andyinswindon)
Trusted Member
Topic starter answered:
RE: Bed Topography with Pronterface

....and you should have seen the state of the window afterwards....maybe I should have opened it first! 😀

Posted : 06/04/2020 2:46 pm
AndyInSwindon
(@andyinswindon)
Trusted Member
Topic starter answered:
RE: Bed Topography with Pronterface

I think I must be the only one for whom the nyloc mod was the biggest, most pointless, unecessary waste of time.  Prior to trying it, the bed topography on pronterface looked horrendous (see above) but the printer worked a treat, but after trying it, getting my entire bed to within 0.1, rerunning the whole calibration wizard, I cannot get a single damned print out of it, no matter how I tweak the live z.  Going back to stock spacers, I  don't have time for mods that degrade my printers performance.

Posted : 07/04/2020 9:35 am
AndyInSwindon
(@andyinswindon)
Trusted Member
Topic starter answered:
RE: Bed Topography with Pronterface

Ok, here's a summary :-

1. Printer running absolutely fine

2. In a moment of boredom I decided to check my bed topography on Pronterface - it looked awful

3. Decided to do Nyloc mod, after which I couldn't get a single decent first layer, despite re-running calibration etc.

4. Decided life is too short and put original stock spacers on

5. Re-ran wizard, and once again first layer is fantastic.

The moral of this story is, if you don't have a problem with your printer, don't start trying to find one!

Posted : 07/04/2020 10:37 am
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