Been working with hobby grade printers off and on for 12 years and loving the new KE and the print quality and speed. Used Creality & Inland PLA & PLA+/Pro & PLA silk without any issues except for a 1 bad file I downloaded and 1 incorrect setting by me (tried without supports) on 2 prints…and I now have about 100 hours/30+ prints on the machine in the last month. And yes I clean the bed with soap/water & then alcohol, and it does the bed level for every print too.
However I just tried Elegoo Rapid PLA+ white and of the 6 prints (that were all playing card size items but a few filling the bed space) I’ve only had 1 flawless print. 4 had curling at a corner or two on at least one item for each print, and the last print failed to adhere to the bed on the first layer at several points.
All were processed on Orca/Creality KE multi-bed build with “stock” 0.24mm draft and Textured PEI Plate options. No other changes. And I’ve used this build for 70+ hours of my prints.
Is there some special setting that you’ve used for this specific filament? I am not sure if I need adjust bed or hot end temps, or some other adjustment? Thx.
EDIT - I did test things after all of this by ONLY removing this filament and putting on a Creality PLA+ and then an Inland PLA Pro and did Benchies without any issue, so it is the filament and/or settings for it and not a bed level or plate issue.
Flowrate calibration. Generally I use Sunlu brand and the default profile for Creality Print seems to work just fine. Tried Elegoo PLA and had to reduce the flowrate to 85/90% to get good results. Found this also when using Tecbears PETG.
Thanks. Wasn’t sure if flow was the problem or not…makes sense though. I’ve done speed and temp calibrations but when I see the 2 choices of Course Tune and Pass 2 I didn’t know what they represent. Ranges from 20 to -20 but didn’t know if that’s percentage or what? And then is Pass 2 the best guess from the range test observation and it spreads that out over 10% too so you can narrow down from there? Thx
Yes pretty much, coarse gets you somewhere close and fine refines it. ±1% I couldn’t see the difference in most realworld instances. ±10% makes a whole world of difference.
When I get the machine back together I’ll run those tests to see how it goes. Right after this situation I had other issues that may actually have been a contributing factor and I have the machine apart to get things tested and aligned and back together in a couple days. Things got dramatically worse over a couple prints starting with the Elegoo filament doing great, then curling corners, and then not sticking at all, and then finally a different filament failing catastrophically and balling up around the hotend and almost the printhead too in less than 10 minutes in to a print. Thank goodness for camera and app monitoring!! Anyway thanks…will update when I can.
Got it all back together and working better than ever. And no non-stick issues with a couple 3 hour prints with Inland Gray PLA Pro. Then did a couple small prints with the White Rapid PLA without issue so I ran the course flow test: only the “numbers” on -20 & +20 were not perfect however I couldn’t tell much difference in quality or had any plate print problems and the -15 to +15 looked almost perfect, so I didn’t get help from them. Therefore I decided to do a 2.5" by 4" lithophane 2.5mm thick (more or less) centered and it began curling all the way around less than half way thru and had to stop the print. There is something about this white Elegoo PLA that is not right unlike all of the other types I’ve used. Need to try more tests but not sure what those would be…Go ahead and lower Flow to 85%? Raise or lower bed temp for entire print or just after first layer(s) is complete? Partial enclosure in case room temp is down a bit too much? Thoughts? And thanks.
UPDATE but have basic question filament question because I think my problem is just a bad roll of new filament.
This was freshly opened about 3 weeks ago and when not being used it’s stored back in the bag with desiccant. However, after the first few small prints being successful I can’t get this roll of White Elegoo Rapi PLA to stop having curled corners. I’ve run all of the tests and some downloaded test prints, raised and lowered bed temps, adjusted flow down to 85 and up to 105, raised and lowered temp down to 215 and up to 225. And all manner of combinations of these and this junk will not maintain a solid bed stick, even with glue stick!
A one inch cube or a 4" plate, or a curved item that hits different parts of the bed all will have curls somewhere on the bed…and NO OTHER brand or type of PLA has done this and I have 150 horus on my KE.
I have a roll of lilac that is a pain to print with too. Only thing was gluestick and a big wide brim, but if you can’t get a brim to stick you’re on to a loser before you start.
Glue stick on other machines has been a must, but this KE has not needed any but I did try it too. I also forgot to mention about adding a brim - I’ve done a few rows (up to 5mm) of brim and tried mouse ears too without success.
I Guess I don’t care anymore to keep wasting time and machine life either so I think I’m gonna call it done and stick with Inland & Creality primarily from now on. Flashforge seems OK too, and going to test some Polymaker sparkle soon and I’ll put this on shelf and try with a different printer if I get another in the near future - otherwise it’ll get binned.
I have had similar issues with the Elegoo PETG Rapid. It’s very hard to prevent edge lifting. I have had no issues with other brands but I have not tried reducing flowrate as suggested. The PETG curls so badly it lifts from support. eSun-PETG-HS works perfectly for me every time but the Elegoo was VERY cheap.
I have been hesitant to try PETG after my recent debacle. I am also now aware that some brands or types of filament are simply not going to work as well as others. And other than possibly doing game miniatures that will require slower/normal speeds, I want to do fast stuff now that I can. I spent the first dozen years dealing with 10mm/s to 50mm/s printing that fast is king now. LOL. But I do want them not to fail so I am also testing and limiting my filament options going forward. I will keep in mind the eSun PETG-HS though!!! Thx