Has anyone else observed that bed adhesion in the X1/X1C is worse towards the outer edges of the print sheet?
I’ve consistently had issues with warping if I position the first layer of a print within 1 to 2cm of the edge of the plate. This is true across the smooth and textured PEI sheets. Extra glue on the smooth sheets can compensate. Also true across the two separate X1Cs I’m using.
Adhesion in the “sweet spot” middle of the plate, meanwhile, is consistently great.
I’m assuming the bed is just not heating as well or evenly out to the edges of the plate. Not a big deal, but it does reduce the practical build volume for reliable results. Anyone else observed this issue or found a better way to compensate?
Did you check if the bed is straight? On mine, the corners were 0.3-0.5 mm lower than the center, I guess this might also affect the tendency to warp, even if the bed leveling takes care of the nozzle height.
No, I used a much less sophisticated attempt and just placed a straight edge on the bed. The bend was pretty obvious and I after opening a support ticket Bambu Lab sent me a replacement.
Oh, wow! That looks like a lot more than 0.3 to 0.5mm! Happy to hear they replaced the part for you.
I’ll definitely give that a shot, though I suspect if my bed were off by that much, it would be causing bigger problems. And the fact that I have observed similar edge performance on two separate X1Cs makes me think it’s probably something about the X1s approach to heating the bed. Maybe I can validate with a thermal camera?
In any event, I’ll be curious if others observe similar issues with poor adhesion at the edges of the bed over time…
Funny thing was that the warped bed caused no issues during printing because the automatic bed leveling took good care of it. You just end up with parts which wobble around because they are not flat.
I checked the bed briefly with a thermal camera and it looked quite evenly warm. I can check again this evening if I remember…
I checked my other branded machines (Prusa, Creality, and others) all have a slight warp. Nothing is perfect. I started having adhesion issue with some off-branded PLA, a rainbow one, seem like many used it, though it was problematic for me. I researched and found some articles about enclosed printers and too much heat, though other articles stated they did see enclosure as a potential cause of lost adhesion. I tried cleaning, washing the plate, various temps, and slowing it down.
So what I did, following one Reddit post, was I removed the top cover. BAM, no issues. I am on 5th bulk print (10 of the same model on the plate). So the excessive heat build did play a part, it appears. even with the slight warp and printing pretty close to edges.
I do more PETG, so the enclosure is excellent for this, and I vent via a fan through an AC Infinity filter.
Run the bed at 60 instead 55. Use a Brim, but sometimes the Brim gets cut off when stretching the part. Go a little bit slower. I use PLA Generic SILK for regular PLA as it moves slower. Using all three I can usually get it 90 percent of the time even with a partial brim at the edges. Some people say no fans while printing, I disagree. Part fan and Aux fans should be on. Aux no more than 70 percent.
When running very large prints like that need to watched for the first 100 layers or so. Once after that, you are good to go…
I usually leave the lid on and door closed, even when printing PLA, mostly to 1) keep the chamber clean from any dust in the shop environment, and 2) to contain some of the noise. And most of the time, it doesn’t create issues for my PLA prints. But maybe I will experiment with opening the chamber for “edge” prints to see if that does improve performance/adhesion.
As a follow-up, I have found that opening the chamber with PLA prints DOES help reduce some of the adhesion problems at the edges!
So, if, like me, you have no problems with PLA prints most of the time with a closed chamber, try cracking the lid and door open if you have adhesion issues at the edges. Quality tip @JIANFOUR.
The instructions even advise to keep the door open with PLA. I crack mine and put a spacer under the lid with the AMS on top. I seal everything up with all other filaments.
Hard lesson with my Ender 5 and the enclosure that I got for it. Failed prints half way through due to inside temps getting too high. Once I opened the flap, my problems went away…after I spent $$$ on what I thought were bad parts, upgrades, and different filament, never mind the time invested. Then the reverse lesson with some PETG prints, gotta close the darn flap and keep the heat in.
I have a new P1S, hardly used. I try to print on different parts of the PEI plate to extend its life, but printing near the edges fails more often than not. That’s not very good for an expensive printer that does auto-levelling.
The design decision of these printers may have something to do with it. All three Z lead screws are powered with the same belt (on the bottom) therefore bed levelling is not really happening at all. What may be happening is the whole Z axis constantly moving up and down to compensate for where the print head is in XY… and indeed if you watch a print it seems like the plate is constantly vibrating in the Z direction… seems like a crazy way to do it… with lots of part wear and tear prone to lots of problems…
I was using ABS, and my part was small (25mm) and flat. I fixed the problem by adding a 5mm brim and joining it to the part by setting the Brim Object Gap to 0mm.
A brim is definitely a must for ABS, and I suspect reducing the space between it and the part helps with bed adhesion by keeping the part more strongly anchored.
The part which failed 3 times previously with no brim, was able to print successfully, in the same position on the edge of the plate, three times in a row,
And the fact that I have observed similar edge performance on two separate X1Cs makes me think it’s probably something about the X1s approach to heating the bed. Maybe I can validate with a thermal camera? 
prone to lots of problems…