Build Plate Problems

[garethashenden]

I’ve been having a problem with my printer and I’m hoping someone can point me in the direction of fixing it. If I level the plate, the first print prints well. The second print won’t stick to the build plate. I try to be very careful when removing the plate from the printer and the parts from the plate, but something seems to be moving. I’ve tightened every bolt I can find without improvement, so I’m clearly missing something. This is frustrating and makes me not want to print things. Where should I look?

[Stephane]

How many bottom layers are you printing and at what time? Are you using a raft?  I've leveled the build plate only once since I got the machine in February, you should not need to level again.  However I do see comments on the web where the number of layers and the time for each layer is what usually causes the problems.

I suggest reading through this as well, much good information here! https://github.com/Photonsters/anycubic-photon-docs/blob/master/FAQ.md

[Chris333]

"Every bolt you can find" What about the internal bolts that you can't see?

Seriously I was having the same problem and I took the ball head apart to find loose screws inside. I don't think I've leveled my plate since then and it's been a while.

[AlwaysSolutions]

"Every bolt you can find" What about the internal bolts that you can't see?

Seriously I was having the same problem and I took the ball head apart to find loose screws inside. I don't think I've leveled my plate since then and it's been a while.

I really need to try this on my older Photon.  The new one I swear I've leveled it once and the thing has been bullet-proof for months.  The old one I get one or two prints out and then everything starts failing again.  Just need to get off my butt and tear that thing apart to see if that's my issue.

[Chris333]

Right around 0:50

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Check the 3 screws into the ball and then the 4 screws that hold the ball in place. Mine were loose.

[garethashenden]

Right around 0:50

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Check the 3 screws into the ball and then the 4 screws that hold the ball in place. Mine were loose.

I had tightened these and it didn’t fix the problem. I just too everything apart again, cleaned it up, and put it back together. I’ve releveled the plate and it’s running now, so we’ll see if it fixes anything.

[AlwaysSolutions]

Okay I've just taken mine apart and re-assembled.  Nothing was what I'd call loose, but I was able to get one click of a turn on 3 of the 4 screws around the ball. They were all pretty tight but maybe that extra tenth of a mm turn will do something?  Cleaning out my spare vat now so I can run some prints later.  Will take awhile to determine if this did the trick.  If nothing else the parts got a good cleanin!

[Chris333]

Can just speak to the problems I had. Was only getting one print out of each leveling and was getting pretty pissed about it. After one print I saws the plate was not straight and right before the print I had leveled it. Grabbed the plate and it wiggled. Tore it apart and found loose screws.

Haven't re-leveled since winter.

[wazzou]

Curious about all of this plate leveling.
I'd assume you've got to have a perfectly level platform where you use the printer as well, correct?

[C855B]

Curious about all of this plate leveling.
I'd assume you've got to have a perfectly level platform where you use the printer as well, correct?

I don't think it has to be super-precise. All the cabinet feet are adjustable and (in my view) the main need for the machine itself to be level-ish is for the resin in the vat. The leveling they're talking about is aligning the build platform relative to the imaging surface. They need to be as close to parallel in both X and Y as possible.

[Chris333]

My machine itself was nowhere near level for a long time. It only matters when the resin gets low.

[AlwaysSolutions]

Whelp - I can already tell my problem seems to be more than screws.  Had a failure right away - but I've isolated the problem to be associated with the rear 2/3rds of the LCD area. The test pattern lights up fine, but anything midway or in the back won't stick to the plate.  I get the remnants on my FEP so I know the LCD is imaging.  However, I saw a faint hairline crack in the back of my LCD so I figured maybe that was it?  Had a spare LCD laying around for that inevitable day where I'd have to replace one.  So I replaced the screen (that connector is weird) and gave it another shot.  Same da-gum problem!     So apparently I did a screen swap for no reason and now the mystery intensifies.  I will get this figured out as now I'm pretty fired up.  Having the one bullet-proof Photon makes me want that 2nd one to give me the same performance even more.

[Chris333]

It can be a little tricky to tell if the sheet of paper is tight front to back. I mean if you have the right resistance when you pull the paper out it could just be the front that is tight.

I was trying to hold my hand out like a spider to push all 4 corners down while I tightened the set screw.

Don't know what else to try.

If the whole pattern on the screen is lit up it should be fine. After that maybe check out the UV LEDs. I think there are only 4 LEDs, if one was out maybe that could cause uneven curing. If you do the light test can you see all 4 LED's through the pattern?

Some people say upgrading the LEDs will burn out the screen faster.

[AlwaysSolutions]

It can be a little tricky to tell if the sheet of paper is tight front to back. I mean if you have the right resistance when you pull the paper out it could just be the front that is tight.

I was trying to hold my hand out like a spider to push all 4 corners down while I tightened the set screw.

Don't know what else to try.

If the whole pattern on the screen is lit up it should be fine. After that maybe check out the UV LEDs. I think there are only 4 LEDs, if one was out maybe that could cause uneven curing. If you do the light test can you see all 4 LED's through the pattern?

Pretty much all of this... I stared down into the LED chamber and all four were lit so I checked my plate as a 2nd to last resort to see if it was flat.  The back right corner seems to be ever so slightly higher, maybe a 10th or 15th of a mm. I used a smaller strip of paper to test snugness of each corner and yep, that back right corner was not snug at all while all the rest were.  Sooo... I fiddled with the leveling, checking each corner individually much like an FDM setup until more or less things were as close to even as I could get.  Test printed and the problem areas succeeded.  I'll have to do a few more prints to see if it holds now.  It didn't give me as much problem when it was new but maybe I was lucking out on the leveling.  Or maybe I had the home position set so low it worked (but cracked my original panel?)  I may end up checking into that easy leveling adapter from Thingiverse to see if that would help keep this one consistent.  Stay tuned...

[Chris333]

I know some people sand the build plate to get the resin to stick. But I've also seen a few who said their plate wasn't flat and sanded to make it flat.

I've never sanded mine, but just something else to check with a straight edge.