Yesterday I printed models that took up a significant Y height. Hopper was about 1/2 full and when I started the print no warning was displayed about insufficient powder. When I came back the next morning a warning about possibly insufficient powder to complete print was displayed. The build chamber was still warn and the job I had printed was displayed in the pending queue instead of completed. I added powder to hopper and confirmed the warning screen. The job did not resume. I let the chamber cool for a couple of hours then moved it to the Sift where it stated that the chamber was still 61C. The next day I processed the prints and some were still warm to touch. All of the models were successfully printed.
Why wasn’t the print paused or errored?
Why was the chamber still be heated if the job was ‘finished’?
Why didn’t the pre-print checks determine there was insufficient powder in hopper?
That is odd. In my experience, the pre-print powder level check doesn’t always seem to get it right and has led to the “insufficient powder” warning. It has only occurred when printing a full build chamber with a mostly full hopper, but luckily someone was present to refill the hopper immediately and continue the job.
To prevent this from happening, we always keep the hopper completely full (unless we’re printing a very small job). If the hopper is almost full but does not have enough space for a full cartridge, we even go as far as leaving the cartridge open, and on the hopper (although I’m not sure this is recommended). Hopefully FL can explain how the warning system is intended to function, because I’ve also been wondering how this issue is handled.
The behavior you describe seems confusing, but it’s great the models all printed!
Yeah the powder level warnings could be a lot better. I try to keep my powder full to avoid them.