Author Topic: Print small parts with the cube 3d printer and increasing printbed adhesion  (Read 402 times)

Dan

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Just thought quickly share some experience with printing small parts on the Cube.  Part of this involves my "trick" from "Crap hack -Bulk Filament" in an earlier post.  The theory is, you want to prevent the cube from recognizing what I would call a minor filament flow fail.  Ill keep it in point form :

First off, prepare your cube file.  Make sure you use repetition - that is if you only need one small object, print 3 or 4 at the same time by importing copies of the same STL file.  The reason is the Cube is terrible at slowing itself down with small objects.  The unit goes too fast and doesn't always pause between layers.  This results in the printhead smearing off the previous layer and or melting the soft previous layer and distorting your print.  Printing multiples will extend the time the cube takes between each layer.

Then:

1) Set your print gap tighter (smaller) than what you normally would.  This would usually result in a Filament flow fail, -Ill explain more in the next step.
2) Start your print, then immediately press the stop button BUT do not confirm the stop.  This seems to prevent the printer from recognizing when the filament has stopped flowing properly. 

Basically setting the gap small really squashes the first layer to the platform.  Usually this results in a a FFF, but if you disable the checking of this (in step 2), small FF issues will not cause the print to fail.  Once the cube starts on layer 2 and 3, the filament should start to flow again providing the filament is not too hashed up.  Basically you want to set the print gap just right so the extruder motor misses "steps" sometimes, but not all the time while it is laying down the first layer.  This means that filament IS moving through the hotend, just not as freely as it would if the gap was set "perfectly".

It may take a few attempts to get the gap set right, but the result is worth it - Small parts, printed as perfectly as one could expect.

Dan

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