btiefert / 3D-Printing

Mike's 3D Printing Information

Mike's 3D Printing Notebook

My notes, configurations, upgrades, and links for printing with my Anycubic Mega-S printer.

Firmware

Firmware has been upgraded to Marlin 1.1.9 with custom Anycubic adaptations by derhopp and davidramiro.

• Marlin 1.1.9 Anycubic GitHub Repo or Thingiverse page with identical info
• FAQ and calibration
• I am using the Marlin-AI3M-vx.x.x-TMC2208.hex variant.

Important: Marlin 1.1.9 sends 12V to part cooling fan instead of the original 9V. Part cooling fan speed should be set to 75% in slicer settings to compensate unless additional cooling is desired.

Marlin gcode reference

Printer Upgrades

• kuehmayer upgrade guide
• renba upgrade guide
• petrzmax upgrade guide

Things

My Thingiverse Page

• Things I've created or modified
• Things I've printed
• My Collections

Slicers

PrusaSlicer Config & Info

Cura Config & Info

Filament

Filament Experiences

Lessons learned

• Temperatures

  • 185ºC works well for most PLA.
  • 200ºC works well for PLA+. At 185ºC PLA+ has trouble adhering to previous layers.
  • 225ºC works best for PETG.

• Layer height

  • About 50% of nozzle diameter is ideal. Can go up to 75% of nozzle size, but layers may not adhere as well (less "squish" when laying down layers) and may separate.

• Corners

  • Right angles require the print head to come to a complete stop when turning. This can cause filament to ooze, creating a bulge in the corner. Options:
    • Design with slight fillets (rounded corners) so the print head doesn't need to stop.
    • Print perimeters more slowly so the change in speed at corners is less drastic.
    • Use high acceleration/jerk values (in firmware and/or slicer) to reduce the time the print head spends in the corner. However this can cause other artifacts, such as ringing / ghosting since it causes backlash in the print head carriage.

• Elephant Foot

  • The first layer tends to expand slightly more than other layers, leading to a slight bulge at the bottom of the print. Setting Elephant Foot Compensation to 0.1mm will shrink the first layer slightly to compensate for this.
  • PrusaSlicer 2.2 (alpha) handles Elephant Foot edge cases much better than 1.1.

• Extrusion Width

  • Slicers generally use a default extrusion width of 1.125 × nozzle diameter (i.e. 0.45mm for a 0.4 mm nozzle).
  • Wider extrusion (through squishing the filament) can provide better bed adhesion.
  • Slightly tweaking extrusion width can help eliminate thin gap-fill lines, e.g. when a wall is not an even multiple of nozzle width.

Designing in Fusion 360

TBD