I am having one heck of a time creating a smooth finish over the entire surface even after calibrations
I have sections of the print which are smooth (most of the ‘9’ and to the right of the ‘4’), and sections that are definitely not smooth. I understand why the star is not smooth, at least I knew that before I even printed.
Please see the attached photo.
I am using a Bambu A1, Dried 8 hours at 60C Creality PETG (~13-20% RH), Using 0.4 hotend with 0.08 layers, 0.16, and 0.20.
EDIT: The size of the print is 155mm x 55mm x 7mm, in case it matters.
Any advice would be appreciated. I’m only confused because some sections are clearly what I want, and most of it isn’t, but why the discrepancy.
Thank you.
that’s with Ironing, right ?
I tried ironing and it was worse. This is without ironing. I should have included that info.
I printed bmw gs logos (came very nice) with PETG HF (Jayo) at 230° flow ratio 0.93 (max volumetric speed 14) outer wall speed 60 and the rest lesser than 100.
I any case i would print your tag vertically. with tree supports supporting the overhang of the upper frame and those of the numbers. star probably doesn’t need supports and it will come very good imo
Thanks for the suggestion, I will try it vertically, maybe it will work out much better.
I will let you know the result.
Noticing a gradient of good to bad when comparing righthand to lefthand side of the print. It’s a shot in the dark, but it maybe suggests a bad bed pressure transducer on the left while probing the bed for bed leveling, thereby throwing off the bed leveling?
Try printing a “perfect first layer”. How does that look? Being a stupid simple base reference point, it often tells the tale as to what is going on. Find one on makerworld, or make your own in cad: just a big square at 0.2mm height that covers the entire printable area. If that looks fine, then try printing one with a 0.4mm height. 0.2mm layer height in both cases. The first will check your initial layer flow rate, and the second will the flow rate used in all subsequent layers.
If your number and star are separate objects, you can sometimes get them arranged just right so that the layer before the numbers prints like a solid top layer and then the next layer is the star and number,
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@NeverDie That is something I have never done, but easy enough to test out. Thanks for this advice, it will either be good or fail.
@dsteinman29 I wish it were that easy. These are all separate items in Fusion 360, the star is embedded deep into the frame, however rendered in Bambu Studio you do not have any sub-layer. I understand what you are saying, however I have no idea how to force the slicer to do this.
All the advice I’m receiving is very helpful from a learning perspective at a minimum. I do appreciate it and plan to learn. This is only a hobby for me, but I’m making emblems for my mud flaps and they must look good before I can paint them. Even if others will not notice any defects, I will notice them.
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The bed test using some spare PLA was flawless, well except a few thin areas around part of the parameter. Why can’t all prints look that smooth. I dried the PETG today for 10 hours and will try again tomorrow. It is very possible it was too much moisture in the filament. I do live in a rather humid area, near the Okefenokee Swamp.
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The original problem appears to have been the filament was not dry enough. The print works much better, however, since I did a print standing on it’s edge also, I loved the finer detail, so I swapped out to a 0.2 nozzle and it did generate a beautiful print laying flat (my original orientation), but there were missing lines/gaps periodically. It is visually noticeable however after I paint it, I don’t think it would be a problem. But I can’t leave it at that, I’m in the process of manual calibration which I hope will solve this issue as well.
Thanks everyone here and @MZip who reached out and provided me the valuable advice about drying the filament. Needless to say, I thought it was dry after 8 hours at 60C. Turns out it needed another 8 hours. I do live in a rather humid area which very likely contributed to it.
And I am very glad the print bed is flat. When I printed yesterday with the 0.2 nozzle, it did not scrape the bed. 
