Formlabs Website Store Support

FINALLY got the Form 2 Printing cleanly

Support & Troubleshooting Form 2
#1

I’ve been fighting this issue for a month and with input from Formlabs Tech and fellow users I didn’t get it fixed.

That’s until I was thinking about something that was said. First FL Tech sent a photo of the laser derogation and said that the laser beam was being deflected. Second a fellow user, Chris Pirvan said that the laser loosing power could scatter the beam. Interesting. I was thinking last night about DIRT in the LASER OPENING. So, today I took one of the Form 2’s apart and using a can of compress air. Kept it back a bit though. Made sure everything else was still clean and reassembled the printer and ran a job. Perfect Prints. Second job repeat, now running third job and expect the same.

Cleaned the second Form 2 the same way and will run a test print a bit later hoping that cured it’s problem as well.

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#2

Ah. When you clean the galvo mirrors, don’t forget the laser’s lens. If the galvo mirrors are hazy and need cleaning, that lens is, too. The one time I took my printer apart to clean the mirrors, I did all of them at once and also wrapped some pec pad around the end of a cuetip, dipped in IPA, and poked it in to the front of the laser to get that lens.

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#3

Static electricity most likely. Reason blowing it out with the compress air worked.

Told Formlabs Tech they need to add that to the cleaning instructions.

#4

Interesting ! I’m going to be taking my form 2 apart sometime in the next couple of weeks, prompted by formlabs very helpful tech support, and will be following their pdf. What you describe makes perfect sense.

Is it obvious where the laser is once it’s all in pieces ? Presumably is it a cm or two from the galvo Mirrors firing into one ? So its kind of obvious once there …? Access to the gal is themselves I gather is not that easy - is the end of the laser even more awkward to get to, or will luck be in my side at this stage …. ?

Have you got a picture you could post of it ?

Thanks!

#5

The laser may not be obvious, but you’ll find it if you look hard enough. It’s part of the “Galvo Block” that contains the mirrors. So once you see the Galvanometer mirrors, the position of the laser ought to be self-evident… You should be able to reach in to the opening to clean the lens on the front of the laser.

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