I queued up a simple rook test print on PreForm and the time estimate is 1h 58m
On the machine, I’m at layer 108 of 480 2 hours later and the screen says “41 min” remaining.
FormLabs 3L , current on firmware updates and using Grey Resin v4
Are these time estimates always off so wildly?
Hey @LePaul !
Thanks so much for taking the time to post! This is a super fair question that I’m happy to dig into a bit.
We’re always trying to improve those print estimates to get them as accurate as we possibly can via software and firmware updates taking in a huge number of variables including the viscosity of the resin, the geometry of the model, etc As you can see, these guesses aren’t always correct, but we are always looking to improve.
One thing that can definitely adjust that time pretty significantly(especially on a 3L) is starting the printer from cold, as the time taken to heat the printer up to proper temperatures is not factored into the print time estimate at this time, so in your specific case, that’s something to keep an eye on as well!
Apologies for any inconvenience caused by these estimates, but as you’ve been doing, keep all your stuff up date with updates and you should see those print time estimates get better over time.
Do you want to look at the form file and see the print settings?
Hey Paul,
I’d be happy to take a quick glance if you’d like, but I suspect what I mentioned above is a likely cause the discrepancy you’re seeing on this particular print.
Do you happen to know if the printer was already warm before you started the print, or if it needed to dispense any resin?
Hi,
I hadn’t thought about the warm up period. It did have resin in the tray already and utilizes the resin pump add-on.
What struck me as odd was the machine display sitting at 41 minutes for a long, long time and the inner circle movements not synching with the actually movements of the bed raising and lowering.
If it’s a fluke, that’s fine. But since we do prints for other members of the team here at work, it would be important to have an accurate print time that aligns with what PreForm is predicting.
Totally get it! Absolutely no harm in asking, and of course we want those estimates to largely be on the money, so if you do end up seeing consistent estimates that are wildly off(+25% or more off) definitely reach out to our support team so we can see if there’s something more specific to your printer going on,
Since your print was relatively short as far as 3L prints go, my guess is the extra time was the printer getting spun up, but as I said above, please let us know if it’s feeling less like a fluke next time.
I don’t think that’s likely.
I started a print at 930AM with a projected print time of 2hours.
It is 1:45pm now and it is displaying anywhere from 19-21 minutes left but the layer 139 / 538
When we do prints from other groups, we bill/charge based on the print time and amount of material used. It seems something is amiss, either with your printer or the PreForm software.
I’ve also noticed this, especially with small parts that have a decent number of layers (250+).
Is there a way to obtain the actual print time once the print job is finished? From what I see, the printer only displays the print time estimate once the job is finished, not the actual print time.
HI,
This continues to happen. I had another 2h 13m print job, as reported by both PreForm and the Form3L. I started this print at 2pm and is was still well under way, with 200 layers to go, at 5pm.
Something is not right. I’m also annoyed that the machine that ran for about 6 hours reports “2h 13m”, which is just a complete fabrication/lie.
FormLabs - you need to remedy this. Like most business and research users, we bill/charge our time out based on these estimates. If the print time isn’t correct, how do we know the material usage isn’t wrong as well?
I put in a support request since I’m not really getting much help here from FL.
Hey @LePaul,
Sorry to hear you’re continuing to see these issues, and apologies for the delayed response.
In this case, it’s probably best to make a ticket with our support team as you’ve done because they’ll be best equipped to dig into the specifics of what might be happening with your printer.
We definitely understand that issues like this have the potential to affect your bottom line, so hopefully the support team can get to the bottom of this quickly.
In general, if you’re looking for specific troubleshooting help for an issue you’re seeing, contacting our support team is the right thing to do because they’ll be able to help most efficiently, but that isn’t to say you shouldn’t post here as well. It’s good for us to get visibility into these issues, so thank you for taking the time.
I heard from Support last week and sent over the log files.
Today they suggested a factory reset since my printer seems to be pausing at each layer
Somehow the theory is my onboard storage is all filled up.
I have less than 100 hours on this machine.
Got it, appreciate the information! I hope that troubleshooting helps quickly.
