Actually the blobby surface on the support side is due to extra exposure on the draining resin as the laser passes beyond the blockers. The smooth side is always the pdms side where the layer is compressed and the laser first hits the surface.
slightly cloudy pdms probably does not help and especially with lasers that have large flares.
Wonder if it is possible to develop a resin that uses a dye blocker instead of a pigment based blocker reducing the settling effect and chance of uneven grind of pigments.
Of course no flare on the laser would be nice too.
A resin that has lower viscosity and higher pigment should give better results. Unfortunately, for large prints, if there is no mixing going on, then the pigments will settle and that opens up a new set of problems.
Thatās an interesting hypothesis, but already disproved pretty well. @KevinHolmes demonstrated quite clearly the flaking side changes with the orientation of the laser (by rotating the laser).
That would make the test useless for what itās supposed to show. Namely that the flakes are due to repeated exposure of same volume of resin to the lower intensity, unwanted parts of the beam, that - over time - accumulate enough to cause curing or partial curing and end up as a flake hanging off the print.
Making the object helical would remove the repeated exposure of the same area to the flare from the equation, making the test useless.
Yea I agree that Kevinās testing with rotating the laser proved the flare was the source of the very bad side. But itās quite possible that always peeling in one direction has some negative effects too, good point. But probably not enough to warrant a hardware change though.
This thread has been very interesting so far. I hope a few more pics get posted from printers we havenāt seen yet. More printers will better represent typical.
Both of my jobs are on the brink if the busy season, so I wonāt be around my computer as much.
Note: I used the 3rd party resin so back side is bad, possibly from the combination of blockers and my flare. Fine detail did hold up though but the smaller holes are plugged where the support side is muddled. I also used an alternative cleaner to the IPA baths.
Next batch of resin I get will be the Formlabs so I can test again with that.
Itās bad because itās facing the platform and the laser is overshooting.
Itās not because of the pigment (i assume thatās what you mean by āblockersā) itās due to lack of pigment.
Ok so now I have the problem of not having a camera with a macro lensā¦
I am utterly amazed at how well this came out though. The brick w/holes is all skewed because the base didnāt attach, but I was more interested in the pillar test anyway. Not the best picture but you get the idea:
Also build-platform z-height step would need to change in relation to slider position as well, and it may not be a linear change, which ups the complexity a bit. But youāre right on about the āvariableā slider kind of control mechanism. Analog feeling, not with clunky steps in the slider, and where clicking anywhere in the slider path moves the slider there, not flipping surprisingly it to a preset spot
Actually, your idea was mostly already requested a plugin to this feature request:
