As you can see I’m only getting a scarf seam on the outside of the ring, and a regular one on the inside (where it matters). What gives? How do I get it to do a scarf on both sides?
Printed on a P1P, 0.4 hardened nozzle, 0.12mm layer height. Sunlu PETG-High speed matte, freshly out of the dryer. Bambu studio 2.1.1.2.52.
The scarf feature is really good at “reducing” seams but it will not completely eliminate them as you just found out. It may help to understand that before scarf seams appeared in BS, the filament came to an abrupt stop. Now scarf joints - borrowed from carpentry - try to overlap the seams but there is still a beginning and end to the filament travel.
Here’s a Wiki on what a scarf joint looks like in carpentry where this idea germinated from: Scarf joint - Wikipedia
Here’s a video from a well respected YouTuber Teaching Tech. Unfortunately, he uses a bad term “Eliminate seams” which is simply inaccurate but the video explains it well.
Thank you for your reply. In the video he sadly only shows the inside cylinder with one filament and it’s impossible to see anything due to how shiny it is. So I have no reference for what it could look like.
I printed another one with Scarf seam type set to None. I.e. just a regular old seam.
For reference, the top one is with the scarf settings from the main post, and the bottom is the scarf seam turned off.
To me they look identical. Like scarf did not apply on the top one. It may be difficult to see with the forum’s aggressive image compression but the outside of the ring in my first picture has a fuzzy texture on the right side of the scarf joint. (It’s not the fuzzy skin setting though). The same defects are visible in the video. This defect is not present on the inside of the ring. I would expect the same defects even if the scarf seam was bad.
I don’t think it’s applying a scarf seam at all. Are there more settings hidden somewhere that may alter this?
Reading this again, it may be as simple as turning on Contour and hole. I’ve been thinking that the options are for how it makes the seam, not where it puts it. I’ll try it after my current print is complete.
This is the way. I was struggling with it myself then discovered the “…and hole” portion is what needed to be selected. Now you can only tell there are seams if you let the light reflect on it the right way.
Here’s a suggestion to try before implementing scarf seams that I almost forgot about. This is the first method I used before relying mostly on Scarf seams.
First, try out nearest and random seams to see which one produces a better result for your mode/filament combination.
Notice that these two variants in the global/Quality tab create a speckled affect. In the case of Random, depending on your filament, that could create undesirable zits or “pilling” on the surface.
Second, try modifying the seam gap. Here’s a way to do it without wasting too much time and filament. The goal is to try to create a sweet spot where the parameter creates the least gap. Once you have the minimal gap, then turn on scarf joints.
Create four or more cylinder primitives. Leave the gap on one of them alone to act as a control by which other others can be compared to.
In the Object/Quality menu, change the seam gap by some ±5% or 0.1mm gap. You’ll have to experiment. Chose a different upper and lower value for each experiment. Then slice and print. I suggest you mark the samples so you won’t lose track of what you did.
Here’s an example with an exaggerated value of 2mm. Obviously this won’t work but it illustrates what you’re looking for.
Before scarf joints, these were the only tools available so I’m a bit rusty and spoiled since using scarf joints came into the Orca slicer over a year ago. Bambu eventually copied it into Bambu Studio but it was one of many quality of life enhancements that continues to make Orca hands-down a much better slicer than BS. Of course it only works if you don’t upgrade the firmware because of Bambu Lab’s draconian move to block third parties who won’t play by their rules. So since then, I’ve never update by firmware because I don’t want to lose access to Orca.
I’ve seen this Seam gap setting when trying to convert the little bumps I get with random seam to pits, but it’s not present in Bambu Studio. Is that a Orca only feature?
That’s a good question and I simply don’t know the answer since I last updated Bambu Studio to 1.6 before I completely abandoned BS in favor of Orca. Orca was already 2 releases ahead of BS by the time 1.8 came out. Since then, Bambu artificially skipped over revisions in what I believe was to create a “perception” that they caught up to Orca. Truth is, they are still behind in many ways but there is one feature that are keeping out of BS so that they won’t have to share it, that’s skip model. There’s a reason it’s not in BS and only in Handy and that’s because if it was in BS, they’d be force to reveal it in open source BS. Sneaky, isn’t it?
Here is a trick.
Did you know that there is a search tool in the slicer that lets you find a feature and navigates to that tab? Just click on the magnifying glass and start typing in the search box.
Scroll down the list and click on the text and it will automatically bring you to that tab and scroll down to the feature you’re looking for. I have mild dyslexia and this is a life saver for me as I struggle when scrolling through lists of words, this helps me a lot even when I know what tab a feature is in. I find myself using it frequently especially since in a move to declutter Orca’s vast features, they had to move a lot of functions to a new tab called “Multimaterial” which since I don’t own an AMS, was the last place I would look for anything.
It might be worth deciding how much effort it is worth expending on getting the issue resolved with the machine or with a file.
If you are going to make 10,000 bearing races if that is what I am looking at, versus a single race.
A term I’ve heard is designing to manufacture or design to production which is about that aspect.
It is something I have to guard against in myself because if I’m not careful I’!! spend hours down that particular rabbit hole.
I’m making a mechanical water level reader for an old well. It uses a weighted float in the water which is connected to a spool of string. For any precision in the readings, the float needs to follow the water level perfectly as it rises and falls. If there’s any resistance in the spool, the float will lift out of the water slightly until the friction is overcome.
I’m using airsoft BBs inside. So far they seem perfect for custom (light load, low speed) 3D-printed bearings. Time will tell how they hold up, but they wont rust.
Looks like you figured out your settings. I have found that with PETG on my machine, I use about 10% for the scarf seam gap and it works well to hide the seam, I believe I’ve left the rest of the settings stock. I get an acceptably hidden seam with no bumps, nubs, or holes.
Have you considered using a sonic type level sensor instead of a float. Mechanical float devices and water are problematic given enough time.
Another option is a pressure sensor.
