[SOLVED] BUG REPORT: Shouldn't my raft include supports?

[yonkiman]

Printing the ole NCC-1701 and trying a vertical approach to save plastic. Want a raft and obviously have to have supports. But why doesn't Simplify put a raft under ALL my supports?

I think I know why, and it's a bug. There are 3 processes for three segments of this print:
Bottom: raft and supports, 20% infill
Middle (pylons to warp engines): supports, 100% fill
Top (above pylons), supports, 20% fill

Using the instructions from https://www.simplify3d.com/support/arti ... f-a-model/, I've been able to get the fill changes to work. But if you look at the base, you'll see the raft is just 3 circles (under the 2 warp engines and the secondary hull); it seems to have no idea that the saucer is there (I'm sure because the process's Advanced/Layer Modifications says to stop printing before the pylons). However the support generation does seem to know about the saucer and the pylons. Unfortunately the supports start getting printed at the raft height, and there is no raft under the saucer/pylon area.

I've tried telling it to generate a raft on all three process, and also just the bottom process. Same results.

So I'd say that's a bug.

To try to work around it, I've made the raft diameters enormous (even larger than the skirt shown in the attached photos), but there are 2 problems that doesn't solve:
- The biggest is that the support disappears for about 10% of the saucer under two parts of the saucer.
- The second is that the support structure "changes" where the processes change (above and below the pylons), making the support a lot less stable.

Would (obviously) love to see these bugs addressed soon!

[yonkiman]

Just wanted to close this out. S3D support quickly got back to me and suggested several changes which basically did the trick (though I still believe some of them should be addressed in a future S3D revision). Here's what they suggested (they also helpfully sent me a factory file with these changes):

I'd suggest using smaller support pillars to fill those areas where support is missing. Changing the overall pillar resolution to 1mm will automatically fill them for you.

For the raft expansion, you can increase the offset from the base by adjusting the offset in the Additions tab ["Raft Offset From Part"]. 20mm works to get all of the support o the raft as well. (Make sure to have this change applied to the bottom process as raft changes only take effect on the process that is against the build plate.

For the missing layer of supports. It looks like an issue with the layer height not matching up with the model's geometry as nicely as it could. You can make a layer height adjustment [Primary Layer Height] of .0001 and it should eliminate any gaps.

[JohnOCFII]

Just wanted to close this out. S3D support quickly got back to me and suggested several changes which basically did the trick (though I still believe some of them should be addressed in a future S3D revision).

Cool. I'm glad they were able to help.