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Made in us
Grim Dark Angels Interrogator-Chaplain






A Protoss colony world

Hi all, I recently acquired (from a friend) an Anycubic Photon S SLA printer, and after doing a few prints I noticed that there were a few small issues, namely some areas of the prints looked a bit "melted" and glossy compared to the rest, which looked perfectly crisp as one would expect. The melted areas were all in areas that faced the build plate while they were printing (the "bottom" of the parts). The parts were pre-supported, so I doubt if it was poor supports, and like I said the rest of the prints looked pretty good if not perfect. I'm wondering if it's a problem with my print settings; maybe I should increase exposure time or change layer thickness or maybe lift speed? Or is it some quirk of the particular resin I'm using (Anycubic Eco Resin, white color)? I'm very new to this, so I'd appreciate any advice you could give me. Thanks in advance!

My armies (re-counted and updated on 11/1/23, including modeled wargear options):
Dark Angels: ~15000 Astra Militarum: ~1200 | Adeptus Custodes: ~1900 | Imperial Knights: ~2000 | Sisters of Battle: ~3500 | Leagues of Votann: ~1200 | Tyranids: ~2600 | Stormcast Eternals: ~5000
Check out my P&M Blogs: ZergSmasher's P&M Blog | Imperial Knights blog | Board Games blog | Total models painted in 2023: 40 | Total models painted in 2024: 7 | Current main painting project: Dark Angels
 Mr_Rose wrote:
Who doesn’t love crazy mutant squawk-puppies? Eh? Nobody, that’s who.
 
   
Made in gb
Leader of the Sept







I wouldn’t be too quick to assume that presupposed models will print well. Were the supports still properly attached when the model came off the build plate? Ifthey aren’t They might not be performing well, and you should add a few more, or increase the support thickness.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
If you want to investigate your print settings, Albertorious recommended a very useful, quick test. I recorded my own investigation here:

https://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/120/783822.page#11150232

The test is linked from here as well. Hope its useful. I would also say that after I tweaked the print settings for quality, I had to up my support requirements. I had been massively overexposing before, and that led to super robust supports (but poor print finish).

This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2021/07/22 07:27:13


Please excuse any spelling errors. I use a tablet frequently and software keyboards are a pain!

Terranwing - w3;d1;l1
51st Dunedinw2;d0;l0
Cadre Coronal Afterglow w1;d0;l0 
   
Made in gb
Decrepit Dakkanaut




UK

A few thoughts

1) Areas which face the build plate will not look as good as those which face away from it. Far as I'm aware this is a limitation of the way the printers work because that side gets pushed down on the build plate all the time. That said it should be slight not vastly different nor half melted.

It's why, where possible, things like the face are often angled ot face away from the build plate as much as possible to preserve the most detail.

2) Presupports can be a problem, however in general when problem solving it can be hard with 3D printing since many fails can have lots of different sources and more than one might be present at the same time. So it can be hard to eliminate the key issue at times.

3) Angle of orientation could also be a factor even if the presupports are good it might just be a poor choice to orientate.



In general I'd approach problem solving in a process of eliminations

Start by printing something like the Amerlabs Town print - which is basically calibration

https://ameralabs.com/blog/town-calibration-part/

You just put it on the build plate and print. Then you can share lal 4 sides and the top with print groups who can help you read the results. It should allow you to ensure that your printer settings are correctly set for your specific printer, print environment and resin.



Doing settings first means you can be sure the printer is setup correctly; it means that then you can move on to considering if the presupports are poor; if the orientation is bad; if the FEP is in poor condition; if your Z Axis needs lubrication; if your printer environment is too cold/hot.

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Texas

Make sure you angle and drain your print good before rinsing, as sometimes when the build plate comes up any excess resin will just hang on the bottom and can create blobs if not cleaned really good, but a good rinse should take care of it.

If it is indeed part of the print itself, that should not really happen and I encourage you to learn and set your own supports as you will get much better print results. In my own experience, pre-supported files never seem to print well, as they are not tailor-made for your machine, resin, settings, etc.

My Novella Collection is available on Amazon - Action/Fantasy/Sci-Fi - https://www.amazon.com/Three-Roads-Dreamt-Michael-Leonard/dp/1505716993/

 
   
Made in us
Deathwing Terminator with Assault Cannon






If you get something that looks like melted pile of goo, it means that the layers did not attach to the build volume (which necessarily includes the supports) properly while being continuously exposed.

As others have already noted, possible (and likely) culprits are:
1. bad FEP film causing excess adhesion
2. lifting speed is too high, causing breakage
3. failed supports/raft
4. bad resin (unlikely since rest of the prints came out ok)

I would follow suggestions above and make sure the machine is calibrated before exploring above potential causes of issue.

This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2021/07/22 16:54:25


 
   
Made in us
Grim Dark Angels Interrogator-Chaplain






A Protoss colony world

Flinty wrote:I wouldn’t be too quick to assume that presupposed models will print well. Were the supports still properly attached when the model came off the build plate? Ifthey aren’t They might not be performing well, and you should add a few more, or increase the support thickness.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
If you want to investigate your print settings, Albertorious recommended a very useful, quick test. I recorded my own investigation here:

https://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/120/783822.page#11150232

The test is linked from here as well. Hope its useful. I would also say that after I tweaked the print settings for quality, I had to up my support requirements. I had been massively overexposing before, and that led to super robust supports (but poor print finish).

All of the supports were still firmly attached to both the model and raft for each model I printed, so I don't think the supports themselves are the issue. As for that test in the other thread, my jaw hit the floor when I read an exposure time of 1.3 seconds. The instructions on my bottle of resin said 3-15 seconds exposure time, so I'm wondering if that test would even work for me.

Overread wrote:A few thoughts

1) Areas which face the build plate will not look as good as those which face away from it. Far as I'm aware this is a limitation of the way the printers work because that side gets pushed down on the build plate all the time. That said it should be slight not vastly different nor half melted.

It's why, where possible, things like the face are often angled ot face away from the build plate as much as possible to preserve the most detail.

2) Presupports can be a problem, however in general when problem solving it can be hard with 3D printing since many fails can have lots of different sources and more than one might be present at the same time. So it can be hard to eliminate the key issue at times.

3) Angle of orientation could also be a factor even if the presupports are good it might just be a poor choice to orientate.



In general I'd approach problem solving in a process of eliminations

Start by printing something like the Amerlabs Town print - which is basically calibration

https://ameralabs.com/blog/town-calibration-part/

You just put it on the build plate and print. Then you can share lal 4 sides and the top with print groups who can help you read the results. It should allow you to ensure that your printer settings are correctly set for your specific printer, print environment and resin.

Doing settings first means you can be sure the printer is setup correctly; it means that then you can move on to considering if the presupports are poor; if the orientation is bad; if the FEP is in poor condition; if your Z Axis needs lubrication; if your printer environment is too cold/hot.

1) That's what I heard from a couple of other sources; that the detail on the sides facing the build plate will just always be softer because the technology isn't perfect. My stuff doesn't look half-melted (in my OP I might have exaggerated a bit); mostly it's just soft detail and a glossy finish I'm seeing on the build plate side of the prints. 2) I like presupported stuff for now because then I don't have to fuss with the supports. At some point I know I'll have to learn to do them though. I'm not a fan of the AnyCubic slicer software's support system; it's confusing and seems more complicated than it needs to be. Maybe I need to find better software. 3) With presupported parts, I can't exactly change the orientation. But since some of the files I have include both supported and unsupported, maybe I could use them to learn to do my own supports and get better orientation. Also, maybe I'll just go and do the Ameralabs test thingy; might help me get the printer dialed in good.

MDSW wrote:Make sure you angle and drain your print good before rinsing, as sometimes when the build plate comes up any excess resin will just hang on the bottom and can create blobs if not cleaned really good, but a good rinse should take care of it.

If it is indeed part of the print itself, that should not really happen and I encourage you to learn and set your own supports as you will get much better print results. In my own experience, pre-supported files never seem to print well, as they are not tailor-made for your machine, resin, settings, etc.

I've been draining the prints back into the resin vat before putting them in the washing/curing machine (I usually put the whole build plate with models attached into the wash bucket using the included rack). As for supports, the supports themselves seem to print just fine, it's just those lower areas that seem to get soft detail. I do need to learn to do my own supports (which will need me to overcome my fear of ending up with a failed print that will need to be scraped off of the FEP film...).

skchsan wrote:If you get something that looks like melted pile of goo, it means that the layers did not attach to the build volume (which necessarily includes the supports) properly while being continuously exposed.

As others have already noted, possible (and likely) culprits are:
1. bad FEP film causing excess adhesion
2. lifting speed is too high, causing breakage
3. failed supports/raft
4. bad resin (unlikely since rest of the prints came out ok)

I would follow suggestions above and make sure the machine is calibrated before exploring above potential causes of issue.

I'm not getting a melted pile of goo; what I get is some soft and glossy detail on the sides of the parts that face the build plate. Using the term melted was probably a poor choice of words on my part in my original post. I might need to check my FEP film; it looked okay when I first got the printer from my friend, but then I'll admit I don't necessarily know what to look for to tell if there's a problem with it. Lifting speed I'm not sure about; I didn't see anything obviously broken on any of my prints. And like I said earlier in this post, all of my supports and rafts turned out just fine.

Thank you very much for the advice and suggestions! I might soon share a few pics of stuff I've printed just to illustrate the issues I've had.

My armies (re-counted and updated on 11/1/23, including modeled wargear options):
Dark Angels: ~15000 Astra Militarum: ~1200 | Adeptus Custodes: ~1900 | Imperial Knights: ~2000 | Sisters of Battle: ~3500 | Leagues of Votann: ~1200 | Tyranids: ~2600 | Stormcast Eternals: ~5000
Check out my P&M Blogs: ZergSmasher's P&M Blog | Imperial Knights blog | Board Games blog | Total models painted in 2023: 40 | Total models painted in 2024: 7 | Current main painting project: Dark Angels
 Mr_Rose wrote:
Who doesn’t love crazy mutant squawk-puppies? Eh? Nobody, that’s who.
 
   
Made in gb
Leader of the Sept







Regarding exposure times, I have the Anycubic Mono, which is the generation after your S. the test will work, you just need to substitute in exposure times relevant to your machine. The S has been around a while, and you can find lists of recommended settings that are a good starting point.

Software wise I can recommend Lychee. It has a nice workflow, and good support adding capability both in terms of auto supports and how you do it manually. It can create slice files for my Mono directly without having to go back through the more basic Photon software. I imagine it will also support your S.


Please excuse any spelling errors. I use a tablet frequently and software keyboards are a pain!

Terranwing - w3;d1;l1
51st Dunedinw2;d0;l0
Cadre Coronal Afterglow w1;d0;l0 
   
Made in us
Deathwing Terminator with Assault Cannon






 ZergSmasher wrote:
skchsan wrote:If you get something that looks like melted pile of goo, it means that the layers did not attach to the build volume (which necessarily includes the supports) properly while being continuously exposed.

As others have already noted, possible (and likely) culprits are:
1. bad FEP film causing excess adhesion
2. lifting speed is too high, causing breakage
3. failed supports/raft
4. bad resin (unlikely since rest of the prints came out ok)

I would follow suggestions above and make sure the machine is calibrated before exploring above potential causes of issue.

I'm not getting a melted pile of goo; what I get is some soft and glossy detail on the sides of the parts that face the build plate. Using the term melted was probably a poor choice of words on my part in my original post. I might need to check my FEP film; it looked okay when I first got the printer from my friend, but then I'll admit I don't necessarily know what to look for to tell if there's a problem with it. Lifting speed I'm not sure about; I didn't see anything obviously broken on any of my prints. And like I said earlier in this post, all of my supports and rafts turned out just fine.
If the soft (undercured), glossy part is facing the build plate (i.e. more or less parallel to the build plate) then it's drainage issue. The resin is pooling on a crevice/surface without ample slope for the the resin to 'roll off' - that pool of resin is being indirectly cured over the course of the print, but it doesn't fully cure, resulting in 'soft/mushy' surface.

Also, don't touch that soft part with bare hands - that's uncured/undercured resin.

Solution is rotating the model so that you have better drainage plane.

This message was edited 5 times. Last update was at 2021/07/26 18:02:21


 
   
 
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