Inacurate scale on connecting pieces

Support & Troubleshooting Form 2
1

I have been having some issues with my Printer and scaling being off from individual parts of the same model. By that I mean, if I take a model and cut it up into pieces small enough to print… Print them… when they are done printing they are not matching each other.

This first happened when I printed my first cut up sculpture (an Elephant) but I didn’t think too much about it because I chalked it up to just an odd occurrence.

But then I printed a Big Heart, I only printed the first 2 pieces and realized the heart was going to be too big for our use, BUT I also noticed that the pieces weren’t matching very well. I didn’t think too much of it though since we decided to make the heart smaller so I thought maybe the next print would work out fine.

Well, the new smaller heart print had the same issue… in fact, the issue is worse. The pieces are off by about 4mm it seems… quite a huge difference and so they are not even close to matching.

I have included all the files in this fiasco. Please find the link below if you would like to check it out:
[https://www.dropbox.com/sh/exp3i3qdx4agkzr/AACFtGxyGDV-90ITJCzSmGb6a?dl=0]

I also wanted to add that I am using the WHITE resin White Resin Cartridge (GPWH04)

OBJ’s_From_3D_Program (folder)
These are the files straight from my 3D program (3dsmax) and once they are brought into preform they are scaled to .013 before printing as you can see in the other preform files.

Heart_Front_Bottom_Center_Scaled to .013.obj = The heart is cut into 12 sections this is the FRONT, BOTTOM, CENTER piece.
Heart_Front_Top_Center_Scaled to .013.obj = The heart is cut into 12 sections this is the FRONT, TOP, CENTER piece.
README.TXT = everything stated above

IMAGES (folder)
These are just images of the 2 parts I printed out to show how they don’t match.

PRINT READY (folder)
These are the preform files ready to print.

Heart_pieces Oriented to show they match.form = This is the print-ready files, however I oriented them just to make sure they were matching.
Heart_File used to Print.form = This is the actual file used to print the models, as you probably guessed I unhide each one individually before printing.

I will be calling support on Monday since I have the Premium service, but I would like to not waste all weekend if someone can help me out.

Thank you in advance for any help.

2

So to add some info… I originally printed them with my own orientation to avoid putting supports on certain areas. I am trying a reprint using the automatic method… and will see if anything is different.

One thing I noticed, is that yes the one object is bigger than the other… OR the other one is smaller… not sure what happened… BUT… the interesting thing is that neither of the objects seem WARPED or BENT in any way. Meaning part of me wonders if it was just an overall scale issue… however then I am reminded that the same thing happened before on 2 other prints so SOMETHING is off.

Either way, I lined both objects up in the preform program so I know they are identical and as mentioned am letting preform decide how to orient them.

3

When splitting things up that way, it helps if you design the edges so that they can connect together rather than having a clean edge that you’re trying to line up. It helps to have one piece have an edge that extends over the other piece.
It may actually be easier to put the outside face facing down, since it’s a featureless surface it will be very easy to sand smooth and with that side down then the supports will be easier and you don’t really have to put supports on the edges that connect.

4

4mm seems like an enormous amount of difference, so much that I would go straight to Formlabs as something is obviously wrong. I didn’t even look at your files as no matter how badly you could orient/cut/pring/assemble them you should not see such a big difference as the one you are describing here.

5

Update…Kind of…
So I have been in contact with Formlabs,… they are being very cool in helping me figure it out.

That aside, the outcome so far is that we cant get an accurate print using the WHITE resin. They also tried to print it using a different color resin, not sure what it was but was a Brown color… and that didnt work either. And by “didnt work” I mean the pieces didnt quite match up. the ends of the areas where it meets are angled down so its not a flush fit.

So the next thing they are trying is TOUGH resin. I will update as soon as I know more.

6

This topic was automatically closed 7 days after the last reply. New replies are no longer allowed.