Ekocycle Issues

[NobleActual]

I have found that warping on 3D printers tends to be a combination of issues. Print size, speed/quality , infill, and shell settings will all affect your print quality, and any wrong combination of these will cause warping. First, throw down some blue painters tape on the build plate. It works wonders with PLA, keeping things from warping, while achieving a more consistent and repeatable "stickiness" level than hair spray, and without ruining or marking the build plate. While the ekocycle uses rPET, and I admit I have no experience with that, it should perform very similarly. Also, the bigger the print, the more likely it is to warp as the print will start to cool rapidly and often unevenly, causing warping around the corners. While it may seem contrary to what one would usually think, I have found it very effective to stick with the lower quality, and therefore faster, settings on larger prints, as the extruder will travel around faster leaving less time for the plastic to cool and warp before the next layer is deposited. I have never found a real reason to go over 20% infill with 3 or 4 shells at the maximum, and wouldn't recommend any more than that as prints will get incredibly slow and the chance of failure and warping grows exponentially. Finally, make sure your build plate is properly leveled. If it is not, all the settings in the world won't matter, your print will fail and warp every time. I usually level with a piece of paper, and when the extruder is just touching the paper and creating a little bit of friction, its good. Leveling is something that usually requires a certain amount of finesse, along with trial and error to get good at. Hopefully this will give you some ideas and get some great prints going!

[Ideal_Nerd]

Have the printer level the print bed and then adjust the z-gap. if it is not level then the edges of the bed will be lower and the first layer wont stick as well.

[hardcopi]

I am thinking it is the heat issue. Our workshop(especially where we put the 3d printer) tends to be on the cold side. Tomorrow we will try and move it someplace less cold and use the rafts idea.

We tried different glues and make sure the gap and level is good before we print. The temperature makes a lot of sense though because it is sitting next to a drafty door and well we are in Michigan.

[orangemoore]

Originally Posted by hardcopi

I am thinking it is the heat issue. Our workshop(especially where we put the 3d printer) tends to be on the cold side. Tomorrow we will try and move it someplace less cold and use the rafts idea.

We tried different glues and make sure the gap and level is good before we print. The temperature makes a lot of sense though because it is sitting next to a drafty door and well we are in Michigan.

If you can avoid letting the heat from the machine escape. 3d printers generate a good amount of heat by themselves and by keeping it in, it can also help.

[Taylor]

We've been fighting temperature issues as well. Here's the response I got from the Ekocycle support:

Originally Posted by EKOCYCLE Support

To resolve the Temperature Error, could I kindly ask you to do the following:

1. Please remove both cartridges without using the unload function and unplug the machine.

2. Wait about 10 seconds and plug it back in.

3. Now please go through the reload cartridge function for both (make sure the dongles are completely clicked in place) and rerun a print.

This will fix the issue.

[Larry Lewis]

Originally Posted by Taylor

We've been fighting temperature issues as well. Here's the response I got from the Ekocycle support:

We are having a temperature error as well.
Code: T14
Temp: 247C

We tried the suggestions you posted from Ekocycle support but it didn't resolve the issue.
Anybody have this issue and were able to resolve it?

[Larry Lewis]

Just called customer support and they said a key item is to make sure the dots on the print heads are lined up when they are installed. That did not resolve our issue but maybe that will work for others.
Also they said to try to swap the cartridges if that doesn't work. I will be trying that tomorrow.