Hi everybody,
Could anyone provide an instruction manual (or link) on how to open the Form 2 and clean the optics? Unfortunately I’m starting to experience some loss of print quality. And I only have the Form 2 for a few months. The resin tank I’m using is not brand new but also not super old. Before swapping the tank I want to try and clean the inside mirrors.
Thanks much
Hey @mburger,
Thanks for letting us know and i’m sorry to hear you experience this in a short work period of the machine.
It could be the mirrors but before you went into this part I think it will be the best to try and clean the glass from the upper side before, sometimes its just dust on it.
Is the degradation your talking about is based on 1 type of resin that you are using on is it something that happened in several materials? can you mention the material and LT tank version as well?
Thanks,
Kobi
Hi Kobi,
Thanks for your reply. I appreciate it.
I print about 90% of my stuff in Grey V4 resin. I have not printed the same file in Grey and another resin to compare. I might try and do that with printing a file I’m not happy with in Clear. I’m using the regular (older version) resin tanks not the newer ones designed for longer use. The tank I’m using at the moment with the current Grey V4 cartridge should be about 60% into the recommended life span. So it should still be good for a little longer.
The degradation that I’m seeing with my latest prints (for the last 5 prints or so) is the following:
-all build-up lines are much stronger visible than before
-there are very thick lines going through the model where there have been no such lines before. They are hard to remove with sanding
-some parts (fine detail) that were there before are suddenly missing
I’m attaching a picture of a print that was almost flawless before (had no thick lines and no missing detail).
It does definitely concern me a lot at this point.
Thanks for your help
Hey,
So sorry for the very late response, got some issue with the forum user that have been fixed.
Its seems as degradation due to the tank, because the tank is became white as long as it been used, the laser beam is not passing with full force as before.
My suggestion is to try and print a small model with the details that is not there anymore on as less used area in the tank.
You can see the most used area printed in the web dashboard, there is a thermal signature of the tank.
Give it a try. For me, I succeed printing for about 2 litters for the regular tank before parts start to mess up. After passed to LT tank its all gone.
Have you tried to print with the clear by the way?
Hi there,
Thanks again for the reply.
What I did is I cleaned the Optical window as instructed by Formlabs. Had quite a bit of dust on it. At the same time I printed a small part in Clear. The Clear tank is almost brand new since I haven’t used it much. The part came out nice with all the detail. I guess that took care of it.
I have to change the Grey tank then. I printed about 1.5 L on that tank so far so I guess I thought it should have a little bit more life in it.
Thanks again for your comments
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