I’m having underextrusion issues when printing color miniatures. This happens when there is a color change and a very small segment is printed, such as on the hands or face. There is also always an unevenness in the layers where the color is changed and I believe it is a related problem, but this also only happens with very small pieces, as for example in the photo of the larger cylinder it did not happen. I’m using PLA, layer height 0.08mm, miniatures height is 5cm. I also have a lot of problems with strings in miniatures even when using new filament. I modeled the miniatures myself. I’m using a A1
The problem it’s not the general sub extrusion, it’s just the color change, because when I print that same miniature in one color it only works correctly
For such miniatures, I highly recommend switching to a 0,2mm nozzle. You will be amazed about the details.
While this isn’t directly related to your problem, I wouldn’t be surprised if a smaller nozzle also improves things
Details on 0.2 are not exactly amazing, I presume you realise these figures are 25mm or so tall?
When you take into account all the factors, it’s probably easier to just get a cheap resin printer. Though I accept that I don’t know OP’s budget so this might not work.
Wargames groups, and almost certainly most events, generally won’t tolerate (as in, they will tell you you can’t put that on the table) FDM (even 0.2) for figures, though it’s acceptable for terrain and flat-sided vehicles. In RPG-land like Pathfinder/D&D you will be OK.
edit: Basically, a wargame EO (event organiser) will want to stream or post photos from the event and they can’t do that if there are FDM figures on the table. Some other players see the poor quality of FDM as “cheating” compared to how much cheaper they are than the ones they buy, and think its “ripping off” the game company. However it’s hard to complain about terrain and square-sided vehicles as the quallity can be OK on those, and they are too large to effectively resin print.
edit 2: This comes from personal experience trying to bring FDM-printed “tyranids” to a warhammer event.
[quote=“Eponymous, post:7, topic:160232”]
Details on 0.2 are not exactly amazing, I presume you realise these figures are 25mm or so tall?
[/quote].
50mm according to the OP.
And yet this is what Lord Kitten wants to do apparently. I hope you don’t argue whether results will look better with a 0,2mm nozzle than with a 0,4mm nozzle? when you are used to a 0.4mm nozzle, I find the difference amazing. No question, resin will look even better.
One setting increasing the stringyness might be z-hop. I don’t remember the video but one youtuber mentioned that it often causes more harm than good.
I’m not at home right now but I will have a look later if I find something in your profile that might cause trouble.
I didn’t find much in your profile that I would change. You have adjust a lot of settings, probably for a good reason.
Some things, you might consider:
You have disabled prime tower in favor of flush into infill. I think the nozzles don’t get properly primed because there is almost no infill in the models. I would re-enable it.
You have raised the default temperature from 220 to 230 °C. This could increase stringing. Do you need the raised temperature?
As written before, you could try disabling z-hop completely. It’s just something that I have heard that might be beneficial or it is completely useless
(edit:) oh, and long retraction could also cause problems.
You should worry about drying your filament before moving onto Z-hop and other extrusion issues.
The fuzziness of the miniature shows that your filament has quite a lot of moisture.
I agree, z-hop probably won’t be the solution. But the disabled prime tower could have quite an impact.
Honestly I have yet to experience problems with wet PLA. PETG is an entirely different story, but with PLA I had never problems. I also don’t dry it and the AMS dedicated for PLA has no dessicant.
Well possible though that it only shows in more demanding prints like the miniatures.
