caylan
Posts: 10
Joined: Sun Nov 22, 2015 1:42 am

Perimeter Paths

These cylinder shapes have proved difficult for me to print on a Taz 6 with nGen Blue. It doesn't matter if I randomize the start points, so I lined them up here.
2016-06-15 at 9.13 AM.png
I've tried an exhaustive combination of temperatures, retraction, calibration, extrusion multipliers, coast, negative extra restart, and wiping. The "fix" has been to change Outline Direction from Inside-Out to Ouitside-In and disable Minimum travel for retraction.

I'm not particularly satisfied with this solution. The reason Inside-Out creates zits is because of gcode and tool path logic. Here is an exaggerated Inside-Out illustration.
2016-06-15 at 9.14 AM.png
The zits happen because slight imperfections (e.g. extra filament) in the adjacent interior perimeter bump out the final outside perimeter. When the inner perimeter finishes (2), regardless of retraction, the movement (3) deposits a small amount of filament. The next perimeter exaggerates the bump.

I see a few ways to fix this with additional (new) settings in my humble order of preference:

• Allow "Perimeter Width" in % - This would allow experimentation in printing thick walls.
• Make the perimeter loops continuous when possible (see below)
• Randomized start points for all perimeter loops (is a loop what I think it is?) so perimeters don't share a common start/end

Here is what a continuous perimeter loop could look like:
2016-06-15 at 9.15 AM.png
Here, the end of the inner perimeter loop (2) keeps extruding as it meets the start of itself (1), makes a left and then right turn (3) and is now printing the start of the outside perimeter (4). At the end of the outside perimeter (5) the slicer knows that there is an extra extrusion width and stops early to accommodate.

Thoughts?
dorsai3d
Posts: 237
Joined: Mon Jan 11, 2016 9:01 am

Re: Perimeter Paths

I'm not able to find it right now, but I could swear at some point I saw a Stratasys patent for that exact idea. I wonder how old it is?

EDIT: Found it! https://www.google.com/patents/US8349239 Patent is from 2009, so likely can't legally be done by anyone but Stratasys
franzel
Posts: 4
Joined: Thu Jun 16, 2016 1:21 am

Re: Perimeter Paths

Did you try 3.1. I suffer exactly from the same problem and feel that 3.1 has some improvements especially when disabling retraction at layer change.
When you share the STL of your object I will try myself.
caylan
Posts: 10
Joined: Sun Nov 22, 2015 1:42 am

Re: Perimeter Paths

dorsai3d wrote:I'm not able to find it right now, but I could swear at some point I saw a Stratasys patent for that exact idea. I wonder how old it is?

EDIT: Found it! https://www.google.com/patents/US8349239 Patent is from 2009, so likely can't legally be done by anyone but Stratasys
Wow, just wow. That's incredible.
caylan
Posts: 10
Joined: Sun Nov 22, 2015 1:42 am

Re: Perimeter Paths

franzel wrote:Did you try 3.1. I suffer exactly from the same problem and feel that 3.1 has some improvements especially when disabling retraction at layer change.
When you share the STL of your object I will try myself.
Yes, this is all with 3.1 (support for Taz 6). The STL is at https://cad.onshape.com/documents/b2ab7 ... 83b581a800
dorsai3d
Posts: 237
Joined: Mon Jan 11, 2016 9:01 am

Re: Perimeter Paths

caylan wrote:Wow, just wow. That's incredible.
Yep, turns out that's even one of the patents referenced in their lawsuit against Afinia. They've got tons of patents, one got dropped from the lawsuit because there was prior art for the patent that they filed. The prior art was an older patent of theirs for the same thing.

http://makezine.com/2014/08/05/stratasy ... st-afinia/
caylan
Posts: 10
Joined: Sun Nov 22, 2015 1:42 am

Re: Perimeter Paths

Another possible solution would be to setup a coast multiplier for internal or perimeter travel. That is, we could configure a certain amount of coast on internal perimeters to widen the gap and prevent the blob.
franzel
Posts: 4
Joined: Thu Jun 16, 2016 1:21 am

Re: Perimeter Paths

You are right, 3.1 doesn't bring improvements for this issue. I had another object where I had the impression 3.1 creates less seam.

As you, I tried virtually any combination of all settings. Your possible solution (outer first, disable mimum travel distance for retraction) doesn't make a difference for me.

Except the seam, my print quality is very good, I'm quite frustrated having no solution here. I tried other slicers as well, but result is worse or identical.

Our printers are quite different, I'm running a Kossel Mini with long bowden extruder, therefore I assume the seam is not related to the setup.

I'm sure an intelligent combination of coasting place and may be negative restart distance could solve the case without violating any patents. Until now both settings, even with large values doesn't make any difference for me. When increasing the values over a limit gaps become visible but the seam still doesn't hide!
franzel
Posts: 4
Joined: Thu Jun 16, 2016 1:21 am

Re: Perimeter Paths

I did a lot of testing and also made a print of the file starting this issue.
For me the problem are the retractions and the layer change. I minimized retractions to the absolutely necessary spots, however the placement can not be controlled. Some of them will always occur on outmost perimeter.

When printing a cylinder with no retraction, also seam will be visible, as soon retractions are needed to avoid stringing, an equaly visible defect will appear.
For me the solution would be to optimize the retractions to be almost invisible (tried all combinations of settings without any success), avoid retractions at outmost perimeter and optimize the Z change.
Outer perimeter with retraction
Outer perimeter with retraction
Outline perimeter no retraction
Outline perimeter no retraction
Just layer change without retraction
Just layer change without retraction
As you can see 99% of the object will be printed in perfect quality. A shame the last 1% can not be done as well.
Last edited by franzel on Fri Jun 17, 2016 11:38 am, edited 1 time in total.
caylan
Posts: 10
Joined: Sun Nov 22, 2015 1:42 am

Re: Perimeter Paths

Thank you for your testing, Franzel.

It would be nice if we could enter a "debug" mode in S3D to allow real-time modifications of the FFF that would regenerate new g-code for the next layer. See: viewtopic.php?f=8&t=5477.

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