I've submitted a small fix to the Cura devs that stops the small line segments being created when you have curved walls lying immediately adjacent to each other and the overlap compensation is enabled. It should fix the project discussed above but doesn't really tackle the underlying problems that the overlap compensation has. Fixes are currently taking many months to get merged into Cura (assuming it is accepted) so don't expect the official releases to have this anytime soon. The next development version that I release will have this fix in it. See https://www.dropbox.com/sh/s43vqzmi4d2bqe2/AAADdYdSu9iwcKa0Knqgurm4a?dl=0

This is a very common problem. Even when using absolute extrusion, low extruder resolution (steps/mm) causes serious quality issues. Using 2.85mm filament makes it even worse. People expect to be able to print tiny thin lines using weeny layer heights and wonder why the result is all lumpy or even missing completely.

Actually, RRF/DWC could report when G1 lines are asking for such small extrusions that the quality will be affected. It would be quite nice if the GUI displayed a red symbol when that situation is detected.

Perhaps it is better to implement fan look ahead in the firmware, I don't know. In the meantime, if you use Cura, install one of my builds and there is a setting (Cooling Fan Lag) that controls fan look ahead for feature specific fan speed changes (bridging, skin over support, etc.). You can find my builds at https://www.dropbox.com/sh/s43vqzmi4d2bqe2/AAADdYdSu9iwcKa0Knqgurm4a?dl=0 and they can be installed alongside the UM releases. Please read the README.md at the above location if you wish to give it a go.

Thanks for the gcode, in Cura, set Minimum Wall Flow to something like 20 or 30. That should help.

In case you are interested, you can find armhf builds of my Cura development releases that will run on Buster at https://www.dropbox.com/sh/s43vqzmi4d2bqe2/AAADdYdSu9iwcKa0Knqgurm4a?dl=0

As you would expect, performance isn't stellar but it is actually usable. All the normal functionality is there apart from the fact that the layer display is using compatibility mode due to the legacy OpenGL support available on the Pi 4.

Hi, here's my 2p worth… I have used slic3r, S3D and Cura.

I am currently using Cura more than anything else. I like the fact that it has zillions of settings and even more, as a programmer, I like the fact that it is possible to wade into the source and fix bugs, add features, etc. With my single extruder Kossel XL, I am getting some really nice prints using Cura. Although the Cura devs are focused on the Ultimaker machines, they do encourage contributions from the community that enhance the software for other printers. I think for the price (free), it's really very good.

Before I moved to Cura, I used S3D and it does produce some really nice looking prints but I find the way it is configured just doesn't suite me. It also has some annoying problems which the S3D devs seem unwilling to fix.

I haven't used slic3r for a while but I started with that and it worked well at the time. I do remember it being rather slow to process complex models.

@ricky_grade10 said in Retraction Tuning Guide:

@phaedrux said in Retraction Tuning Guide:

printer settings plugin

I Installed the plugin but Im not sure what to do beyond that with cura. Whats next with the plugin?

Type "firmware" into the setting search box and it should show you the setting which you can then set to true.

I mentioned this in another thread but that didn't elicit any response so here we go again. I recently upgraded from 2.0.0-RC7 to 2.0.0 and notice that the button to print another is no longer shown when the job completes. I am using a recent Chrome release. Here's a typical screen shot after a job has completed.

BTW, I recently discovered that although the Duet is happy with just having the M82 in the start code to select absolute extrusion mode, it's also a good idea to also have G92 E0 to reset the length extruded so far to zero. This is because some non-Duet printers (e.g. Marlin based machines) seem to fail to zero that when a print is started and so the extruder gets very confused on the second print of the day!

@phaedrux said in Retraction Tuning Guide:

@burtoogle seems so. I don't tend to use the betas. Experimental features is as far as I'm willing to go. But glad it will become widely available. Though I still think firmware retraction belongs in the main settings.

Thanks for the heads up.

FYI Cura 3.4 has been released today.

@Samuel235 said in Pressure Advance seems to not be working.:

@burtoogle - I do have combing enabled, but its set to 10. Your branch of Cura freezes up when its idle for about an hour or so, I have to keep reopening it up when I get back to testing a new set of slicer dependant settings. Not a problem, just thought I would let you know

What OS and HW are you running Cura on? I haven't had any other reports of my builds freezing.

That crap in the last image is most likely to be caused by un-retracted travel. If you are using combing, you really need to set the max comb distance with no retract setting to something like 10, 20, etc.

@SnakeSP said in Pressure Advance Calibration:

@Phaedrux
Does not work for me
Cura 4.4.1, settings as you've specified - seam is generated in one of the corners no matter what coordinates i set.
Can you share a gcode of the cube (20x20x20) with a single perimeter with a seam in the center of one of the sides so i can modify it for my printer, please?

See https://forum.duet3d.com/post/124481

Re getting the z-seam in the middle of a flat face using Cura. Well, it can't be done using the UM releases but my Cura builds do now provide that capability. Setting the z-seam to user-defined and seam corner preference to none will enable this feature. You can find my releases at https://www.dropbox.com/sh/s43vqzmi4d2bqe2/AAADdYdSu9iwcKa0Knqgurm4a?dl=0. Please read the README.md file there for more info.

Here's an example, you can see the travel moves associated with the z-seam to the left of the middle of the flat area at the botttom of the image.

I don't know what slicer you use but Cura allows you to specify which print fan to use on a per-extruder basis so it is trivial to change the fan from 0 to 1. If you are interested its done on the extruder tab of the printer settings dialog.

@Phaedrux said in Gyroid Infill Requested Speed != Actual:

Gyroid is old news apparently. All the cool kids are rocking Schwarz P now.

https://community.ultimaker.com/topic/30456-new-infill-patterns-in-experimental-cura-builds/

Schwarz P is very slow to print because it consists of disconnected loops. Schwarz D is more like gyroid in that it is made from wavy lines. I implemented them because someone wants to do some comparative testing of TPMS infills.

@jens55 said in Some infill not reaching walls ?:

Must be ... Got it downloaded, installed and it started up ok. It even flipped to the second printer without crashing ... wooohoooo
I will try running a print on it tomorrow.
Thanks!

Unfortunately, it does crash when I loaded your .3mf file that you provided on the Cura forum. I have a workaround for that crash so I can make a new build that will load that project OK. I will do that now and put it on Dropbox.

@Rob said in Requested speed displayed is slower than specified in Cura:

[0_1575506420114_RollerReprapcura4.zip](Uploading 100%)

There's no link to an uploaded file. Anyway, it sounds as if you have solved the issue so don't worry.

Please post some sample gcode that exhibits this behaviour, thanks.

@bot said in [feature request] Air pressure advance:

I think this could be useful, in some situations.

Another useful lookahead feature that goes hand in hand with this would be temperature change. If a tool has a temperature change (say, from standby to print temp) coming up, the printer could use the model of the heater to pre-heat the tool so that it reaches its temp at approximately the exact moment the tool is needed.

Cura has done exactly that for some years now. Don't all slicer's do that anyway?