Hey everyone! Just joined, and this is my first post.
I received a Flashforge Creator Pro for Christmas from my wife and kids. Very thoughtful of them to get me something so awesome! I’m doing my best to learn lots, but I have a problem that I just can’t seem to figure out.
I’m printing a FitBit holder from Thingiverse. I’m using ABS, 0.1mm layer height, build plate heated to 120c, extrusion at 250c. Using Hatchbox blue ABS. 3M blue tape on the bed.
The first few layers of the FitBit holder seem to fold in on themselves. Is this a bed adhesion problem? Or, what else could cause this?
250 is on the high end of the spectrum for abs, is that what hatchback recommends, I could only find their 1.75mm filament in my quick search which says: “Recommended Extrusion/Nozzle Temperature 210°C - 240°C” on their amazon page.
@Sean_Smith I thought 250 was on the high end, but, I read somewhere that someone had good results using that with Hatchbox filament. I’ll try to drop it down and see how that goes. Appreciate the comment!
@Mark_Rehorst I have some Kapton tape on order with Amazon as I type this. Flashforge included Kapton on the bed, and a roll of Blue with the box. The Kapton ripped easily and my newbie ways of getting pieces off didn’t help. I removed it and was using Blue for the last week. I think you’re right though, and I look forward to going back to Kapton. I’ll also cool my bed down a bit. I run Simplicity3D and it’s defaults for ABS are 110/230. Not knowing much, I went with that using the filament that Flashforge included, and it worked incredibly well. Now, though, time to play around it looks like. 3D printing is still more art than science, isn’t it?
It looks like bed adhesion is your problem. A couple of things to try:
a) Heated bed. Make sure you preheat the bed. On my printer, even though it says it’s up to temperature, the whole plate isn’t. Try turning the heater on for 15 minutes before you print. After I worked that out, the jobs stuck better.
b) You can also try abs juice when printing with ABS. Dissolve a small amount of abs in acetone. I usually do it until the acetone goes white and has a bit of thickness. Use a paint brush and put it under the area that you are going to print on.
c) Printing on a raft or using a brim. A brim is on the first later and adds what looks like more perimeters on that later, so if it does lift, it lifts from the outside and they will lift before your jobs lifts. A raft puts a couple of laters under the print job with the theory that if they lift, the print job wont.
The blue tape that came with it will just be painters tape which you can get from a hardware store. This is more for PLA. Even when printing with PLA, I’ve found a warmed heat bed (like 50c), the jobs seem to stick better.
I started printing on my printer with ABS. I printed a few things but after that decided I would only print with PLA.
I print ABS with 80C bed and ABS slurry. From the image it seems that you have adhesion, the first layer stays on the bed, but the next layers contract. I would play with the bed and extrusion temperatures (lowering them) and maybe you need an enclosing to keep the whole part about the same temperature.
Also try changing the cooling fan.
I have the creator Pro also, and it is really nice printer.
I’m using ABS filament with the following settings:
With the filament FlashForge sent me I’m using 230 and for the bed 115.
If you buy some filament from Fry’s I use 250 and 110 for bed (Frys sells the Shaxon filament).
If you want I created couple of videos on how to setup the software (using slic3r and replicator G) here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l3Gw6i7qz9I
Happy Printing
