Can't print anything with our MK2 w/o this happening...  

Re: Can't print anything with our MK2 w/o this happening...

Looks like it could be a couple things.

I suggest:
- Clean your plate with warm water and soap, then rinse it very well - use sponges or towels (paper or cloth). Let dry. Then follow up with IPA.
- Then check your Z-height. It looks like your Z is to high and its not squishing the 1st layer enough.

Re: Can't print anything with our MK2 w/o this happening...

Thanks much for the suggestions... I have cleaned and cleaned and can't get the bed much better than it is... Can still feel like there is some residue or PLA left on it in spots... I've used the glue stick a lot to help keep the print in place and could be a build up of glue, don't know... Here's a 1st level print at -0.665... Seems like it just misses to print in spots, and have seen that in real prints... I got frustrated and just went back to recalibrate XYZ from square one... When I put the paper on the bed, it catches on the 1st point and the directions say to turn the printer off right away if the nozzle catches the paper... Would love to figure out how to get our printer working again... Ideas???

Re: Can't print anything with our MK2 w/o this happening...

Check the non-driven hobbed gear pressure door, it might not be exerting enough pressure against the filament, allowing it to slip instead of feed consistently, i.e., tighten the two long screws that pass through the springs in the extruder housing.

Re: Can't print anything with our MK2 w/o this happening...

Thanks John, will take a look tonight...

Roger

Re: Can't print anything with our MK2 w/o this happening...

Make sure you're using the correct filament. It's a mistake I made - suddenly NOTHING stuck. Turned out I'd grabbed a spool of ABS by mistake. It did NOT like PLA temperatures.

Re: Can't print anything with our MK2 w/o this happening...

Make sure you're using the correct filament. It's a mistake I made - suddenly NOTHING stuck. Turned out I'd grabbed a spool of ABS by mistake. It did NOT like PLA temperatures.

I thought I was the only one who had done this. I feel better now! 🙂

Re: Can't print anything with our MK2 w/o this happening...

Thanks Dale... I am using the original silver PLA that came with the printer... I tightened the pressure door and the beer opener that came on the SD printed perfectly, and I mean perfectly!!! Then I tried to print my son's tomahawk he designed in STL and I sliced with PRUSA's slicer... I did not stick like before, so back to square one... We (my son and I) have not been able to design a piece, slice it, and have it print correctly... Guess we will keep after it and experiment!!! Just frustrating... Thanks for everyone's help!!!

Re: Can't print anything with our MK2 w/o this happening...

To completely remove old glue residue, soak the bed with windex and mop off with paper towels, then clean with IPA for printing PLA.

Once the bed is clean, only use glue as a release agent for TPU and Nylon, never as an adhesion aid. PLA just needs a bed cleaned with IPA. PETG needs a layer of windex as a separation agent.

If your prints are not sticking with those, then the usual reason is that live-z is not calibrated correctly (it can be difficult). Search for the 'life z my way' thread here on the forum. It uses 75 x 75mm square one layer thick to give an easier and more accurate calibration.

Re: Can't print anything with our MK2 w/o this happening...

It's because of the trash support generation from slic3r. I've complained about this already.

Making fast unanchored 180-degree turns on the first layer greatly, greatly increases the chance of this happening.

And it's doing this for NO GOOD REASON. The support is a THROWAWAY. You can make it any shape you want.

The first layer support base should have as few turns as possible to provide a solid support and anchor points for the sparse portions. After that layer, whatever it does it probably fine, but THE FIRST LAYER IS SPECIAL.

Otherwise you will need a ridiculous amount of squish or otherwise unnecessarily painful first layer tuning, again, effectively to make a THROWAWAY PART happy.

We're nearing the end of 2018 already. This is ridiculous.