Modular system with both FDM and extrusion of emulsifiable materials (a.k.a a paste or gel printer).

• Max Build Volume: 225 x 200 x 200mm

• Your first print

• Prepare the machine
• Level the bed
• General slicer info
• Start a print
• Tips
• Errors

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• Clean cylinders after each use! Not doing so will ruin them.
• While it is possible to print with food products, we do not recommend it, due to the difficulty of insuring sanitary conditions.
• Official Repetrel info page: http://hyrel3d.net/wiki/index.php/Repetrel
  • Check Prime & Unprime sections
• Head panel overrides (??)
  • Nozzle Ø: This should be set correctly (test to make sure it overrides the slic3r profile)
  • Layer Z in mm: this is not important, as it is overridden by G-code

• Plasticine
• Marzipan
• Bees wax

• Emo-25 - For emulsifiables at room temperature
• VOL-25 - For heated emulsifiables
• MK1-250 - for plastic filament
• Luer-tips - needles for the Emo-25 head

The first print was perfect. All consequent prints were bad. For the first layer, the nozzle moves too fast, tearing the printed line, and dragging it over the build plate. This is what under-extrusion looks like with Plasticine. Even after selecting a default profile this happens. There's G-code and the Head-control-settings. Trying to figure out what overrides what.

• Does the prime duration influence the print? (does the print fail because the head was badly primed?)
  • Slic3r profile has set a line-width of 1,65mm.
  • Head-control has a set a nozzle diameter of 1,5mm.
  • Priming ±10cm of material, then pressing start.
  • –> No influence (no better result than not priming extra long)
• Does the prime speed influence the print?
  • 500 (rpm?): first layer tears off build plate
  • 10000 (rpm?): first layer tears off build plate
  • –> No influence
• Does the head-control material flow rate influence the print?
  • Default value 1.0 (this is 100%): first layer tears off build plate.
  • 2.0: better, but first layer still tears off build plate.
  • 2.5: good first layer, but all consecutive layers were way too wide.
  • –> Yes, this has a definitive influence
• A thicker first layer height (Slic3r print profile)
  • Up till now all layer heights were the same. Maybe increasing the first layer could help with the adhesion.
  • regular layer height: 0.3mm
  • first layer height: 2.5mm
  • –> First layer failed. All consecutive layers failed too.
  • This was not a test of finding out influence. This is purely Slic3r-profile driven.
  • Do this test again, with a more subtle setting.
• Could it be temperature?
  • Environment temperature:The lab is very cold now, making the plasticine way less viscous. Try printing again when it's warmer
  • –> Yes, A room temperature of ±20°C makes plasticine print. It under extrudes when colder.
• Slower speed helps (no tearing), but lines are a little crumbly at 1.5w, 0.5z, 5f 0pct?
• Material Flow Rate Multiplier (in the Head-control section). Adjustments are sent to print head when pressing enter, or when clicking outside the number box (setting the cursor in another number box). This setting is thus live and overrides the Slic3r material flow parameter.
• Head Control - Nozzle size overrides the nozzle size set in Slic3r.

A successful print

• 16:40 afternoon (meaning, the heating has been on all day)
• 3D model: Formlab testcylinder 8x.stl
• Slic3r profile
  • Print: Formlab plasticine defaule 10
  • Printer: Unheated bed
  • Extr 2NoHeat, NoFan, NoBed
• Head-control
  • Nozzle Ø: 1.6mm
• A small amount of priming at 500
• Start Print
• I raised the bed with one 'click', but this might not have been necessary

Aha-moment: Extrusion width seems to only define line to line distance. It doesn't change the flow rate.

• 
  1st layer extrusion width of 3mm: good bed adhesion, perfect lines (Formlab plasticine defaule 10).
• 
  1st layer extrusion width of 6mm: good bed adhesion, perfect lines (Formlab plasticine defaule 10).
• –> So maybe the room and material temperature are more important than flowrate.

Future tests

• Do a visual test (video recording?) with lines on paper to see if the printer really moves 8mm/s. I have a feeling the printer moves faster than the first successful print.
  • 5mm/s or 8mm/s is not a problem when material is at room temperature (when the lab is not cold)
• Try printing again with a heated bed (20°
• Unrelated to this problem: I should try out more aggressive prime and unprime settings. (Definite influence).

• Printer sometimes doesn't wait until desired temperature is reached.
• After stopping the print (Kill function), reset Z-zero
• It seems that Repetrel doesn't do accelerations? Why is that?

• M756: S[layer thickness in mm] - for flow calculation
• M221: sets flow rate
• M104: print temperature
• Davo 01/10/2015
  • Reset: will reboot the 407 motion controller
  • Aux: will toggle a relay, which can be used to allow or deny power to an auxiliary item like an air filter or heater
  • Respond: was intended to be used to resume after a pause, but I don't know if it's enabled yet
• If you hear tics in a regular or random pattern, chances are you're printing with 'Spiral mode' selected. The tics are generated by the the Z-axis motor.