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3D PRINTING – HEAT TOWER

To find out the proper temperature to use with a filament, i highly recommend you print a heat tower for each manufacturer, and color. To setup Simplify3d for this you will need to do the following

First download the heat tower
https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:2223651

Open up the Heat Tower Zip file and we are going to work with the heat tower with bridge for this test

Now open Simplify3D

Import the heat tower in the designated area

Navigate to the Processes area
Edit your Process
Go to the Temperature tab
Navigate to the Temperature Controller List
Select Primary Extruder
In the Per-Layer Temperature Setpoints box you will want to change the following
Layer 1 – Set the temperature to 240
As you add Setpoints, each subsequent layer will be +25 higher and -5 for Temperature. For Example
Layer 1 – Temperature 240
Layer 26 – Temperature 235
Layer 51 – Temperature 230
You will continue on until your last temperature is 190

You can then click OK to save the settings for this print

Slice the print

And send it to your Printer.

Once the print has completed, review which temperature had the best look and feel (no stringing, cleanest lines, etc)

This will now be the temperature you use for this Manufacture with this filament type, and this filament color. Yes each of those 3 things matter. If you change any of them, re-run this test to get the new baseline



ENDER 3 PRO – OVER EXTRUSION ISSUE FIX [SOLVED]

To fine tune your Ender 3 Pro you will need to measure the amount of filament that is passing through the machine using the following test, to ensure your settings are correct

First you going to want to disconnect your hotend from the extruder, and place these in an area where you can heat them up and they will not damage themselves or anything around them.

Next you’re going to want to go into the settings of your Ender 3 and click on preheat PLA. This will warm up the hot end and allow you to extrude for our test

Measure out 120mm from entry point on extruder to the spool, and mark it on the filament using a notch or a marker (I prefer a slight notch)

Open Octopi
Go to Terminal Tab
Enter in the following code
G1 E100 F100
Press Send
This will extrude 100mm of filament

Now measure the difference of what went in, verses what is left.
I extruded 101mm instead of 100mm, and have 19mm left before my notch

Back in Octopi
Terminal Tab
Enter in the following code
M503
Press Send

Search for M92 line and verify it says E93
This is what you will edit

To figure out the new value for E93 do the following
100/101*93=92.08
E93 should be E92.08

The values above translate to this
100 – Distance that should have been extruded
/ – divided by
101 – is the distance that was extruded
* – Multiplied by
93 – This is the E93 value we saw earlier

Back to Octopi Terminal Tab
Enter in the following
M92 E92.08
Press Send

Enter in the following
M500
Press Send

Your new settings are saved, and your extrusion will be accurate. Feel free to repeat the above steps to ensure your settings are correct and the extrusion works as expected

Simplify3D Opens and Immediately Closes [SOLVED]

Simple fix for this issue. Please note that this will remove your FFF files, so make sure you have them backed up prior

Navigate to
C:/Users/%USERNAME%/AppData/Local/Simplify3D/

Delete the folder named:
S3D-Software

Now you can launch Simplify3D and the issue is fixed

ENDER 3 PRO – OCTOPRINT – BED SIZE ISSUE [SOLVED]

When you send a print job to your Ender 3 Pro, using your Octopi, it starts to print, and the hotend does not recognize the correct size for the bed. The hotend is pushed off to the side, begins clicking, and the print is a mess.

Solution:
Make sure your Slicer has the correct bed size set in it
Make sure the OctoPi has the correct printer setup in it
Turn OFF your printer
Turn OFF your OctoPi
Disconnect the USB Cable in your Ender 3, from the OctoPi
Wait 30 seconds
Turn ON the printer
Turn ON the OctoPi
Wait 1 minute
Plug the USB cable back into the Ender 3
Login into your OctoPi
Click connect so the OctoPi works again with the Ender 3
Send the print job that failed before

And now it works!

Unable to connect to Octopi.local on Windows 10 [SOLVED]

So you can connect to from your Apple device (iPhone, Mac, iPad, etc) but you cannot connect to it from your Windows 10 computer.

This occurs because Microsoft doesn’t natively recognize .local extensions.

Solution:
Install iTunes onto your Windows 10 computer. This will add the bonjour service which will allow you to connect to octopi.local

After you install iTunes, visit http://octopi

You can now use your Windows 10 system with OctoPrint

ENDER 3 PRO – EXTRUDER CLICKING [SOLVED]

When you begin printing, your extruder starts to click, and continues to click for the first few minutes

This happens because the filament is unable to be pushed through the nozzle.

Solution:
1. Check the temperature of your nozzle and make sure it is hot enough to melt the filament. For PLA that would be 185C.

2. Level your bed. If your bed is too high the filament cannot extrude. By re-leveling the bed, and lowering it a notch, your issue should be resolved.

Disable Web Search in Windows 10 Search Bar

One of the worst features is the data leakage that comes out of your Windows 10 computer, every single time you search it for a local app. What I mean by this is when I click on my search bar, next to the start button…Say I search for Putty. It shows me Web results first, then my Putty app second. Now anyone monitoring a network can see the constant stream of requests coming out of a network and fingerprint the applications in use. HUUUUUGE issue in my opinion.

To disable this feature do the following

Click the Type here to search bar

Type Edit group policy

Navigate to Computer Configuration > Administrative Templates > Windows Components > Search

Double click the Allow Cloud Search policy and set to Disabled. Click Ok to save

Double click the Don’t search the web or allow web results in search policy and set to Disabled. Click Ok to save

Double click the Don’t search the web or allow web results in search over metered connections policy and set to Disabled. Click Ok to save

That is it. Your data leakage settings have been changed.

Writing OctoPrint to SD Card

Quick How-To using a Windows 10 Computer

Simply put, you need to download a third party application to write the OctoPi image to an SD Card. I suggest Etcher for this

Download Etcher from https://www.balena.io/etcher/
Install Etcher onto your Windows 10 computer
Download the OctoPrint image from https://octopi.octoprint.org/latest to your local hard drive on your Windows 10 computer
Unzip the OctoPrint image once the download finishes
Plug your SD Card into the Windows 10 Computer
Open balenaEtcher
Click Select Image
Select your OctoPrint***.img file
Your SD Card should be automatically found and selected by Etcher
Click Flash
The image will now be written to the SD Card
When the image has completed writing you will see the message Flash Complete!
You can now insert the OctoPrint SD Card into the Raspberry Pi and fire it up



Thanks for reading

Hardware that I use:
Raspberry Pi 4 (4gb)
https://amzn.to/3q551IO

SanDisk 32GB Ultra microSDHC UHS-I Memory Card with Adapter
https://amzn.to/2Vfvo0y

CanaKit 3.5A Raspberry Pi 4 Power Supply (USB-C)
https://amzn.to/3fNTYPu

CanaKit Raspberry Pi 4 Micro HDMI Cable – 6 Feet
https://amzn.to/33u5hr9

Western Digital 500GB WD_Black SN750 NVMe
https://amzn.to/3nZ5pH4

Plugable USB C to M.2 NVMe Tool-free Enclosure
https://amzn.to/3lflV3L

Installing Python on Windows 10 – for Makerbot Firmware Upgrades

This is a quick article on which Python version you will need to assist with manually uploading the Makerbot Firmware.

If you are trying to manually upload firmware for the Makerbot Replicator 2, and you try to use the most recent version of Python (version 3.8 at the time of this writing), it simply will not allow you to run the Makerbot firmware upload tool. If you see the following error when you run the tool, you will know what I mean:

C:\Users\%username%\Downloads\winBotTool_76_G\winBotTool_76_G>Traceback (most
recent call last):
  File “C:\Program
Files\WindowsApps\PythonSoftwareFoundation.Python.3.8_3.8.752.0_x64__qbz5n2kfra8p0\lib\runpy.py”,
line 193, in _run_module_as_main
    return _run_code(code, main_globals, None,
  File “C:\Program
Files\WindowsApps\PythonSoftwareFoundation.Python.3.8_3.8.752.0_x64__qbz5n2kfra8p0\lib\runpy.py”,
line 86, in _run_code
    exec(code, run_globals)
  File “bot_tool_v1\__main__.py”, line 2, in <module>
  File “<frozen importlib._bootstrap>”, line 991, in _find_and_load
  File “<frozen importlib._bootstrap>”, line 971, in _find_and_load_unlocked
  File “<frozen importlib._bootstrap>”, line 914, in _find_spec
  File “<frozen importlib._bootstrap_external>”, line 1342, in find_spec
  File “<frozen importlib._bootstrap_external>”, line 1316, in _get_spec
  File “<frozen importlib._bootstrap_external>”, line 1297, in
_legacy_get_spec
  File “<frozen importlib._bootstrap>”, line 414, in spec_from_loader
  File “<frozen importlib._bootstrap_external>”, line 649, in
spec_from_file_location
  File “<frozen zipimport>”, line 191, in get_filename
  File “<frozen zipimport>”, line 713, in _get_module_code
  File “<frozen zipimport>”, line 647, in _compile_source
  File “bot_tool_v1\bot_tool.py”, line 37
    yield (str(value[1]), str(value[0]))
                                       ^
TabError: inconsistent use of tabs and spaces in indentation

To fix this error above, simply remove Python 3.8 and install Python 2.7 from the following link:

https://www.python.org/ftp/python/2.7.17/python-2.7.17.amd64.msi