OK. This is even more helpful. Now that I know what your objective is, let me offer up some pointers that will save you a world of grief, not to mention filament.
This project you’ve selected is incredibly ambitious but as someone with a new printer, I recognize its appeal. Why can I say that? Because I went through exactly what you’re trying to do when I first got my P1 and printed my first riser solution. 3 spools later, I learned a lot and I can save you just one spool and some sanity, I will have done my good deed for the day.
Note: One thing I will mention. I was able to print a model like this without any change in filament. I did not make use of support filaments since I don’t have an AMS. So what I am suggesting here should also work with support filaments but these techniques may make it unnecessary and easier.
- I strongly urge you to not attempt to print the entire model the first time around. Aside for the hours wasted only to find out that your settings didn’t work well, it will waste a lot of filament. Instead, I suggest cutting the model into a section to experiment on using the cut tool.
- Here’s a couple of suggestions for this use-case.
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- Change the XY distance from the default of 0.35 to 1.35. This will give you a lot more room to remove the support structures.
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- Change the Top interface spacing to 2.5. Since the bottom of the model is not seen after print, using the default 0.5 is not needed to make the model look pretty and the larger gaps make removal a lot easier. It also makes scraping off the interface layer easier because you have fewer strands to remove, but this is personal preference, you may feel otherwise.
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- Experiment with increasing the top interface layers too. From 2 to 3. While this may only make a small difference I found it helped.
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- Raise the model higher on the plate. While this will use much more support filament, trust me in that it will make “snapping off” of the support far easier. You’ll see this in your test print. A 0.5mm support has to be scraped off, whereas a 30-50mm support can be more easily grabbed by your hand and “snapped off”. Try it both ways and you’ll see what I mean.
How to raise an model above the build plate.
Now if you haven’t done this before, you’ll know that if you try to raise a model off the build plate to give it greater height, it will only fall back down. So the way around this is to create an assembly using a small segment of scrap primitive 5x5x1mm and using that as the anchor, then select the other object and raise it using the move command. The slicer thinks it’s a larger model because of the assembly.
Next cut the model into the “test segment” in order to save filament using the (C)ut tool. Be sure to drag the scrap cube onto the part of the plate that will include the model segment being cut.
Then slice and you will now have a support that can be grabbed by your hand and “snapped off” much more easily than a thin 5mm high support.
By doing this practice, you will save a lot of time before you run your final model and it will allow you to learn how your filament combination is going to behave. Yes, it consumes a lot more filament for a single print but in the long run it saves a lot more than making mistakes over and over again by printing the whole model.