Alkmaar, Nederlands. March 2021. At the computer and in the garage.
So, now that the build plate is firmly locked in position, I'm ready to try some more prints. They should all work out fine because the problem was with the build plate not being secured properly. Yes?
I had by this time amassed a rather nice collection of STL files to choose from. The vast majority of them were free to download. That was to become a growing problem. You always have new STL files to acquire. At that point, the need has been satisfied. Actually printing the model isn't that important anymore unless you acquired the model for a specific purpose and not just because it looked nice.
For my next print, I got ambitious. A total of 6 items on the plate, 2 of which came pre-supported, the rest of them I used the auto-support option from within Chitubox. I saved the ctb file and plugged the USB stick into the printer. Loaded the resin into the vat, placed the cover over everything and nervously pressed the play button. The printing started.
Three hours later I was removing the prints from the build plate, removing the supports from the model prints and cleaning then curing the models. The Witcher medallion for my daughter came out well, as did the Chibi smuggler, a baby Yoda and a Witcher figure. However, a flying Mandalorian and the bounty hunter figure didn't fare too well even though the bounty hunter was pre-supported. Both figures were missing part of their leg. The auto-supports obviously weren't good enough on their own.
Chibi smuggler, a free figure that came pre-supported.
Henry Cavil as The Witcher, another free design that came out perfect.
With The Mandalorian season 2 out, who doesn't have a Baby Yoda?
A flying Mandalorian, minus part of his right foot.
The Bounty Hunter, hopping along on one leg.
Five days later and I was ready for another go. By now I'd subscribed to an excellent studio for monthly releases. These were all pre-supported and they had some really excellent models in 32mm and 75mm scales and each month at least 3 busts.
I had 8 items on the plate for the first run and 5 for the second. Yep, that's right, I did 2 print runs on that day. Pushing the envelope or what. I printed 5 items from my new Patreon subscription to Loot Studios. These were all pre-supported so nothing for me to do ... in theory. I had a Native Indian Zombie for Koen as a test, a Baby Yoda in the cot, a Mandalorian pose and a retry of the Bounty Hunter failure from the previous attempt.
The zombie was missing a leg, Baby Yoda in the cot was the base and a couple of supports. The rest was discovered clinging for dear life to the FEP in the resin vat. Everything else in that print run was perfect. After cleaning the prints I then removed the supports. That's when I broke the pistol of the Bounty Hunter figure. This was to become a recurring theme in the early days.
A lovely round table from Loot Studios for their tavern scene.
The Mysterious Stranger, who looks not unlike Strider in the Prancing Pony.
Yep, it's a zombie, but it's still supposed to have both legs.
Loot Studios version of a Witcher
A damned fine Mandalorian pose
He's got all of his legs, but the pistol is now some sort of game controller.
Once I'd removed the prints from the build plate and cleaned the resin vat, I set the printer up for the following attempt. A pre-supported Mando on his speeder bike, a figure that looks a lot like Galadriel and 3 witches. The witches all needed the supports adding. Imagine my amazement when all of the models from this run came out perfectly.
A most impressive model, complete with Baby Yoda in the saddlebag.
Galadriel look-alike from Loot Studios.
Witch #1.
Witch #2.
Witch #3.
So, the printer was active for 8 hours and I had more successes than failures. Another 4 printing sessions in the remainder of March saw me get some really amazing prints, but also suffer some horrible failures. The pre-supported stuff seemed to work most of the time without a problem. Anything I did the supports for myself was subject to worry and concern. But there was no real hard and fast rule. A print run of just pre-supported models only produced one good print. The others were failures. Investigating I once again discovered that the build plate was slightly loose, probably due to trying to scrape the models off the build plate. Once that was rectified, the main cause of a failure is inadequate supports.
Two days later I was ready to print again. This time with something more ambitious. A lovely figure of a witch sat on a pumpkin. It was a large model and would use a lot of resin so I decided to hollow it out. Setting the thickness to 3mm I left it to Chitubox to hollow the model. I was amazed when it came out fine, especially considering that I'd made a couple of classic mistakes in the hollowing out process. But more on that later. This was the longest print I'd done so far at well over 4 hours.
The hat of the witch didn't print well, the front part of the brim was missing. The rest looked fine. Since the hat was a separate item I could simply redo the supports and reprint at a later date.
A supportless chibi Death.
Witch on a pumpkin, with the failed hat.
Over the last two days of the month, I had 3 print runs for a total of 16 models, four of which were failures. Of the failures, one base fell off the supports, a tail of a dragon didn't print correctly (too thin at the bottom), an Obelix model lost a leg due to insufficient supports and skeleton only had the base, sword and skull printed.
The failed Indian zombie was successfully reprinted as was the hat for the witch.
Zombie Indian after assembly and priming.
The successes. All primed in grey with the Witch and Dragon in a zenithal highlight.
Monthly total items: 38 printed. 10 failures