My Bambu PEI Texture plate is not holding up very well.
Only several prints with PETG and the surface coating is releasing in some areas.
No glue, clean with IPA after each use and cooled before part release.
Bad batch or is anybody else experiencing this?
You should never ever clean the textured plate with IPA.
Only with dish soap and warm water.
And before someone jumps in saying IPA is fine.
Yes, it depends on the IPA brand/type.
Just use dish soap and warm water and don’t worry about potential IPA cleaning issues.
Yep I agree.
Cleaned my first plate every print.
Lasted 100 hours of printing then not recognised by X1C.
New plate done 20 odd prints and not cleaned once, no glue.
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There aren’t any IPA brands/types. IPA is a chemical, and they are all the same. Its also a very simple alcohol and chemically stable and simple and as long as the purity of IPA is near 100%, there is no derivation.
But the PEI plate might be a different beast, some might not have troubles with IPA, others might. The high temp plate lost its adhesion for me after cleaning too often with IPA, but could easily be restored with a good soap wash. I didn’t use it on the textured PEI then.
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I’ve been cleaning my PEI Textured plate with 99.5 (Technical Grade) IPA, but not after every print. About 10 cleanings total so far. And no impact (so far).
The effect shown in the original post is clearly a manufacturing error. Time for a replacement.
@Jupp , you have any sources on “OMG never clean with IPA” ? I’m especially interested since, in my environment, cleaning with IPA is just far more convenient.
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There aren’t any IPA brands/types.
This is not true at all. There are cheap ones that just simply suck.
They are definetly not all the same.
Also IPA percentage makes a difference.
But maybe it’s specific to bambu’s textured plate only why some are having bad luck with IPA and some do not.
@Jupp , you have any sources on “OMG never clean with IPA” ? I’m especially interested since, in my environment, cleaning with IPA is just far more convenient.
https://www.reddit.com/r/BambuLab/comments/10m1gru/controversial_opinion_bambu_labs_does_not/
IMO, it’s just better to avoid IPA for the Bambu Textured Plate, just to be on the safe side.
There are differed brands selling IPA, but all technical grade IPA, aka 99,x% IPA is the same, the rest is just water pulled from the atmosphere.
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Some do leave a resedue, some do not.
Again, they are all definetly not the same.
But i am not trying to convince you, no big deal.
Well, at least we can agree that IPA on Bambu Lab plates should be avoided, for whatever reasons.
Well i only talked about the “textured plate” thought.
Dunno about the others 
Anyways, just for reference:
From Bambu Support:
Bambu Lab
2023-01-19 04:19:39
Hello Josh,
When you clean the plate, do you ONLY use warm water + mild soap?
Many people use alcohol, but this make the issue worse on the PEI sheet we noticed.
IPA is a solvent, not a soap, so it dissolves the oils that inhibit adhesion. When you do not wipe off all the IPA but let some dry, all you do is spread the oils over the entire surface area and it will suffer adhesion.
Its much worse for a textured PEI plate as its almost impossible to wipe it dry completely, but the basic principal is true for all surfaces. Basic, neutral dishsoap gets the oils away pretty good through.
But IPA should not damage the plate like in the picture I think.
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What about Windex to do a quick wipe for dust and occasional finger print removal?
Thanks for sharing your thoughts on this.
-Uman
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Had some old IPA that I used to clean glass with no issues. After cleaning either the Cold Plate or PEI plate with it, there was no adhesion.
I just got a new bottle of 3DJake branded IPA and it worked just fine on PEI.
However, dish soap works just fine, so I see no reason to use it if it doesn’t work for you.
My PEI sheet is still holding very well even after some rough handling, except in one corner everything seem to squish too much so it’s probably warped (or it’s the bed, I try not to think about it too much :-D)
Yes. PETG does this to unprotected textured PEI. 100% will happen if you do it long enough. It is unfortunate Bambu doesn’t make this clear.
On my older printers with a thick stick on PEI sheet I run bed @ 60c for PETG and I have avoided this issue so far.
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Which is a pitty. I just looked up in their store to see the compatibility matrix, and it clearly states for the textured PEI that no stick is required. Maybe they should at least update it to say its recommended like they do for other build plates.
I’m going to run an experiment. On my dual-sided textured PEI plate, I’m going to clean one side with nothing but technical grade IPA, and the other with nothing but distilled water with some dishwashing detergent in it. We’ll see how that goes!
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This will be interesting!
I print PETG frequently and use 99% IPA and paper towel every 3-4 prints without issues. For PETG removal, gotta wait for the bed to cool, otherwise it’s locked on there. I reserve one side of my sheet for PETG and the other for PLA so it’ll be interesting to see how they age.
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I agree, cool down is a must or it is a tug-o-war.
I print large diameter parts that have a large surface area in contact with build plate.
Cool down is always practiced and it still took a bite.
-Uman
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