I decided to play with small layers, so I printed the Hyrule Crest (http://www.thingiverse.com/thing:24714) at .05mm layer height. It turned out pretty well for a first attempt, too.
I learned two things, though - Increasing flow rate to 103% after the first layer makes it work better, and 4 solid top layers isn’t enough (I’ll give 8 a try next time).
Unfortunately, Repetier crashed on me just as it finished, and I didn’t check on the print until it had been done for 30 minutes, so the full-temperature hot end was parked on the last bit of the print for probably half an hour resulting in that nasty melted bit on the bottom. Still, not bad.
I’ve continued printing at .05mm and picked up some interesting experience with warping, shrinking, and temperatures.
Turns out the lowest possible bed temp where you get adhesion is better, or you’ll get funny corner warping (93c is the lowest I can go and still be comfortable), higher speed is better (the slower you go the worse the strange inward contraction is on the bottom cm or so of the print - it’s seriously like a 20% contraction), and printing a full height skirt 1mm away from the print along with a 4mm brim seems to fix the remaining corner warping issues.
…the finished prints are fantastic, though. They don’t even look printed except for the telltale infill patterns on the top. They look more like matte finished injection molded pieces.
