Simplify3D User Forum

Hi everyone

Is there a way I can setup a print job with Simplify3D and my Replicator 2 to pause the printing at a specified place and prompt to change filament colour.
It is all a bit hit and miss doing it manually.

Thanks for your time

Merik

Hi there,

is nobody her to help? I would be interested in a solution.
Right now I go with different program parts, it's not really convenient.

Michael

Well i am in no way an expert but it seems to me to change filament mid print you need to be there ready to go anyway so i would think its best for the person to just pause the print, do the change and resume.

Firstly you need to be running sailfish firmware.

My guide can be found here: http://www.thingiverse.com/thing:61022

If you only want to pause at one location, lets say at 20mm then at the end of your Start GCode (under the scripts tab) you can add the following command line
If you want to pause at multiple location, there is also a way to script this using GPX. At the end of Start GCode (under the scripts tab) you will see a reference to
Move the body macro to a separate line, and place some pause macros in front of it. For example if you wanted to pause at 3mm and 6mm do the following:
Obviously you will need to remove these additions to slice other objects, but this is the way to do it.

Hi thanks for the response.

@jimc: Yes you need to be there.
I tried just pause but you get big blobs and you can't do anything with the control panel, that means pause doesn't work.

@whpthomas: I use Marlin.

I tried feeding the filament in after the other runs out but sometimes it doesn't feed thru and the print is gone.
What I would like to do is move of the print retract the old filament and extrude the new filament, move back to last position and start print.

Hope that makes it clear.

Michael

Hi, anybody else have any luck with this? I'd like to be able to pause a print at an arbitrary point and change filament. I'm thinking this might be possible using the macro buttons. Anyone have any clues? My apologies if this is answered somewhere else, I can't seem to find the answer anyplace.

whpthomas wrote:Firstly you need to be running sailfish firmware.

My guide can be found here: http://www.thingiverse.com/thing:61022

If you only want to pause at one location, lets say at 20mm then at the end of your Start GCode (under the scripts tab) you can add the following command line

Code: Select all

M322 Z20.0

If you want to pause at multiple location, there is also a way to script this using GPX. At the end of Start GCode (under the scripts tab) you will see a reference to

Code: Select all

M73 P1 ;@body (notify GPX body has started)

Move the body macro to a separate line, and place some pause macros in front of it. For example if you wanted to pause at 3mm and 6mm do the following:

Code: Select all

M73 P1
;@pause 3.0
;@pause 6.0
;@body (notify GPX body has started)

Obviously you will need to remove these additions to slice other objects, but this is the way to do it.

This is a very elegant solution. However I cannot get it to work with my Flashforge Creator Pro and Simplify3D. I have a recent model with the Mega2560 Mightyboard and Sailfish 7.7 from the factory. When I add the @pause Z.z commands as described above, the print simply stops at that Zpos. It does not pause or even retract, and there is no obvious way to restart it. So it seems that somehow the way that S3D is using GPX to translate gcode into x3g does not correctly interpret the macro call. Pause@Z implemented on the printer hardware buttons directly works fine, but I'd like to build it into my toolchains and can't figure out how. Thanks.