Modeling for MMU2S
I bought the MMU2S and have the PRUSA i3 MK3S+ bought last year.
The printing is fine (just a couple of hunderd hours) but now I want to print multicolor and therefore need to make stl files that can do this.
I design with Blender thus I also want to make new models with Blender and NOT with Meshmixer!!
What I can't find are examples on how to make designs with multiple color so I can print it with the i3 MK3S+ in combination with the MMU2S.
What I'm looking for are tutorials on making models in Blender with multiple colors so I can learn to make them myself.
Does anyone know where I can find tutorials with Blender?
RE: Modeling for MMU2S
I assume there is no tutorial. But you will follow the same rules as in normal design for 3D printing:
- always apply position and scale
- no intersecting or overlapping faces and bodies
- only closed bodies
- pay attention to the normals
- clean topology is king
- the usual 3D-printing stuff: overhangs, thin walls, ...
The easiest way is to design your model as a single body and use the new MM-painting of PrusaSlicer 2.4 to separate the parts. PS automatically takes care of creating the necessary extrusions to optimize contact areas and print volume.
If you want to do it manually, you need to create different bodies for each colour and part with identical contact surfaces between those bodies. Most of the time the quick'n'dirty solution of using the difference boolean will work, but it ruins your topology and might generate other errors. You also want the contact area as large as possible. So, you usually extrude the smaller body along the XY plane into the bigger body. Then you clone that intersecting area to join it with the bigger body, delete some verts to bridge the outer mesh with the joined one and correct the normals.
You can export each part individually or grouped by colour. Grouping by colour will offer more convenience to the users because they will need to assign the extruders to just max. 5 parts.