Maintaining the resin tank (Form 3/Form 3B)

Support & Troubleshooting Form 3/3+
1

I have just read through this support document and a couple of things strike me.

1/ There is no mention of filtering the resin. Is this now not recommended?

2/ The document implies that the printer should be run until the cartridge is empty and almost all the resin in the tray has been used. Then it suggests that and what resin is left should be discarded. If this is Formlabs recommendation how much resin will be left in the tray when the printer decides it can no longer continue printing. This would suggest that ā€˜hot swoppingā€™ cartridges, ie printing pieces that take more resin than what is available in the current cartridge and tray, is no longer recommended.

3/ When I was first told of the Form3 it was suggested that it would have the ability to print a mesh over the whole of the build window which would be able to capture any stray debris. has this idea now been abandoned or can we expect to see it enabled in the future?

1 Like
2

@billb Good questions:

  1. Filtering the resin is still recommended when needed, same as Form 2 - when you have a failed print or you see little cured particles in the resin. I think the confusion might be that this is recommended in the ā€œCleaning after a failed printā€ article, not in the ā€œMaintaining the tankā€ article that you linked (the two articles are linked to each other, but could perhaps be one longer article).
  2. Can you point to where in the article this was implied? Certainly this is not the case, we anticipate people using many cartridges of resin per tank, Iā€™d like to get the article fixed if this is confusing.
  3. You can expect to see this feature in the future, weā€™re actively working on it!
3

This is quite an interesting topic and I share the thoughts of billb, that the information of maintenance is confusing in the articles, plus: there is no video jet of how to thoroughly clean the V2 tank of the Form3. The videos show Form2, which is quite different in its construction and the cleaning of its tank - the Form3 is constructed with a delicate film and therefore it is recommended to use a plastic device to empty dry resin. I find it not clear, how the procedure is in general after:

  1. A successful print - what happens with the rest of the resin in the tank?
  2. Does it need to be hardened (as described in a video) or does it need to be stored liquidly, as described as well in a video?
  3. Does it need to be filtered back in to the cartridge - as described as well in a video?
    Kindly thanking you in advance for your feedback - stay healthy!