I have an Ankermake M5 that I hadn’t used in a while and recently got back to printing some stuff. I had a few prints come out well but then turned my extruder into a giant glob of melted plastic on an overnight print. I ended up just replacing the whole extruder as there’s been some revisions and I figured it would be nice to upgrade, and replace the v-wheels and all that.
The new extruder initially had a ton of problems with stringing, but increasing retraction fixed it. The problem that I can’t seem to figure out is curved surfaces are now sort of wavy. It’s regular - turning into vertical peaks and valleys. I’m doing a print currently with the speed turned way down, but the issue persists.
Any ideas?
edit: After some trial and error, I figured out that it was a slicer issue. I was using the EufyMake slicer because that one can send jobs to the printer directly. When I resliced in Prussa, the issue disappeared.
You said it was a slicer issue, but I posit it was a sliver settings issue. If you like EufyMake just try going back to all default, or try and set everything carefully and manually.
Also try OrcaSlicer if it is compatible with your over the air printing capabilities, great slicer and user experience.
Holy shit, that looks like a perfectly miscalibrated resonance compensation (Input Shaping). Can you recalibrate that?
Alternatively perhaps the belts are too tight or too loose.
I checked belts, they’re good.
I’m wondering if there is enough of a weight difference between the old and new extruder to have fouled the configuration.
Yup, changing out your extruder, even if to an identical one, changes the weight just enough to cause this. Input Shaping is indeed what you want to look for, it’ll be different depending on the printer. Some you have to adjust config files, some you can actually do in the slicer now.
I’d give OrcaSlicer a shot, it has some built-in tuning mechanisms
I doubt this is it, but it kinda looks like what happens when your slicer has arc welder turned on, but your printer firmware does not. You get a bunch of unrecognized G2/G3 commands flying by in the console, and curves get weirdddddd looking
Do you have something stuck to one of the gear wheels or pulleys in your belt path?
No, checked that and the period of the undulations is speed dependent
Hmm. Well, then I have no choice but to concur with the others that this appears to be some manner of resonance issue. So much for being hipster about it.
Do you have the machine on a wobbly table? Are any of the armatures loose and able to move? The print head assembly is solid on its linear rails and doesn’t wobble if you grab it and move it around?
