It’s ALLLLIIIIVEEEE.. and I’m scared

[Lemosteam]

Surprises me that the vats don’t come with Tupperware-like top and bottom covers, both for transport and for quickly switching resins. Bottom cover to protect the FEP from same.

Seems like a no-brainer.

@timwatson , I’ll be the judge of that. 

[RBrodzinsky]

John, congrats on the new printer. I’ve loved my Photon S, which I’ve had for almost a year now. And have never changed the FEP.

I’ve been considering getting a filament printer, as well.  Who knows

[SkipGear]

@Lemosteam - Another suggestion for you. Stop by Target and pick up one of these.....

https://www.target.com/p/16-cup-plastic-food-storage-container-made-by-design-8482/-/A-76201504

The build plate fits nicely inside this. I keep it filled about 3/4 of an inch deep with alcohol and use it to remove prints for their initial wash and also to wash the build plate afterward. The airtight seal on it keeps the smells contained when not in use. It is also just the right size that you can stand the build plate up long side up and hook the mount over the edge to let it drain.

[timwatson]

@Lemosteam also super important to know.


Every resin printer has slightly different UV led exposure compared to the same models across the line. So it’s very important to print an XP2 calibration and then the Ameralabs city. The first XP2 is really to get your times honed in (it’s a 10 min print). Before you print anything you’ll want to use a resin spreadsheet for known working combinations with YOUR machine. You can’t use a spreadsheet from another machine very effectively. You can use that if you want to average the times but you’ll want to do those 2 tests for every NEW resin you use. So when you change the resin do a new resin test. Use others working settings that have your same machine then adjust +.2 seconds or -.2 seconds to get your ideal for your setup. Every machine is different and that’s why the exposure settings you get will be slightly different than the next guy.

[SkipGear]

The R.E.R.F. is pretty much the same thing done in one print instead of two. It has positive and negative space tests, spheres, right angles, undercuts, bevels, etc. and it is already set up for the X to test 8 different exposure settings in one print.

I doubt that XP2 test would work on an X because of the exposure ramping that happens automatically on the base layers. When they finally make a firmware update that allows you to eliminate the ramp, then it may work.

[Stephane]

After printing a rerf test, make sure to filter your resin and clean the vat.  The lowest exposure parts of the rerf test will have parts that will not have adhered correctly and will now be floating in the vat.

[Chris333]

After printing a rerf test, make sure to filter your resin and clean the vat.  The lowest exposure parts of the rerf test will have parts that will not have adhered correctly and will now be floating in the vat.

True I found tiny letters floating around in mine.

[timwatson]

I doubt that XP2 test would work on an X because of the exposure ramping that happens automatically on the base layers. When they finally make a firmware update that allows you to eliminate the ramp, then it may work.

You can just slice the XP2 model and not use the pre-programmed version. In fact that's the BEST method because you then get an exact representation of how the machine will print.

By "exposure ramp" I am assuming you mean the elephants foot? The elephants foot exists in all resin printers that have a roughly 2x exposure time for base layers. There is some software made that will help diminish the elephants foot but it's all pretty much beta stuff. Even Chitubox will allow you to do bottom tolerance compensation to help eliminate it but it's brand new and very experimental.


[ Guests cannot view attachments ]

[Chris333]

I believe on the Mono X the base layers ramp down gradually instead of just cutting off from one base layer setting to the other regular layer settings.

[SkipGear]

@timwatson - The mono series printers ramp down the exposure from your base exposure to your standard exposure over 10 layers. There is no way around it at this time, it's in the firmware of the printer. As an example,  if you start at 30 seconds, once you have finished your preset number of base layers, it then ramps down the time to 27, then 24, then 21 sec, etc until you get to your standard layer time. (for me 1.5 seconds.)

[timwatson]

I believe on the Mono X the base layers ramp down gradually instead of just cutting off from one base layer setting to the other regular layer settings.

Yeh it's called Transition Layers and most newer machines have the ability to do the same.

They're specified here.
[ Guests cannot view attachments ]


The MONO has this at the firmware level??
So if you set the above to 0 it still transitions?

[timwatson]

@timwatson - The mono series printers ramp down the exposure from your base exposure to your standard exposure over 10 layers. There is no way around it at this time, it's in the firmware of the printer. As an example,  if you start at 30 seconds, once you have finished your preset number of base layers, it then ramps down the time to 27, then 24, then 21 sec, etc until you get to your standard layer time. (for me 1.5 seconds.)

Just reading up on this quickly, that's kind of lame. You should be able to change that. If you want i'd be happy to help you fix it. It is potentially a gcode setting.

[SkipGear]

Yes, there is no way to turn it off. That is why I have only 1 bottom layer in my settings. Doing that with the transition that is naturally there, I have never had a print fail at the base. You can turn it off in the slicer and it is still there in the print.

[SkipGear]

Really it doesn't bother me at this time because I haven't been printing anything directly on build plate. The last thing I did that with was traffic cones and barrels on my photon S.

If I get much deeper into these, I may look into learning Gcode to play a little bit more on the dark side.

[timwatson]

You can put this in a txt file and make the filename "backupMachine.gcode". Then place the SD card in the machine navigate to the file press play like you're going to print it and then you will have a backup of the gcode that runs your machine. Bare minimum if you ever have a firmware upgrade mess with your machine you can use this to return it to a working state you liked.


This is the contents of that file you create.
M8512 "backupFirmware.gcode"


Make sure there aren't any curly quotes.