Despite nearly throwing the kitchen sink at it, I’m still getting some warping, though perhaps a bit less than last time.
I can tell because as the nozzle runs over the lifted areas, it emits a rubbing sound.
- This time I used Hilbert curves nearly everywhere: both as bottom layers and as infill.
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I temperature soaked the chamber prior to starting the print. Even during the print the chamber is still registering 48C (as you can see in the first picture).
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I applied vision miner to the build plate. So, just like the OP, it’s not a bed adhesion problem. Rather, the build plate itself is warping from the ASA shrinkage.
Not sure what else to try to fix on this.
- I could go with fewer bottom layers: two instead of four, at the risk of lowering the strength.
- I could go with 2 walls instead of 3, at the risk of lowering the strength.
- I could try lightning infill for the sparse infill instead of Hilbert curves.
- I could shrink the diameter, so that it’s further from the edges. I suspect this may have the greatest impact, as build plates are usually cooler near the edges. The trade-off is accepting a smaller build; or
- build it in pieces and glue it together; or,
- switch to some other filament that doesn’t warp as much; or,
- reduce the printable area in the slicer and clip either glass or thick garolite or maybe carbon fiber (?) on top of the heated bed. i.e. a build plate of some kind that’s thick enough that it’s pretty much guaranteed not to warp. Again, the trade-off is accepting a smaller diameter printed object.
- buy a bigger printer with a bigger build plate and a proper chamber heater. I was watching Clough42’s review of the Qidi i-fast 3, which has a large 6mm very flat aluminum heated bed with very good temperature uniformity and a chamber heater that goes all the way to 80C (even though the marketing materials only advertise it going up to 60C). On it he was able to print even large things in ABS without any warping at all, including one difficult print that had eluded him for the prior 7 years on all the other printers he had tried it on. Probably the next closest would be the Qidi 3 Max3, which also has a 6mm thick aluminum heat bed, but the heated chamber only goes to 60C (and allegedly Qidi recommends not heating it up above 50C, which is close to what I’m already getting with just the X1C). For comparison, from what I’ve read my X1C has a 3mm aluminum PCB for its heated bed.
The print is for an outdoor application, hence the choice of ASA for its temperature and UV resistance, as it will be in harsh direct sunlight. Of all these potential remedies, maybe the easiest would be glass fiber ABS (for reduced warpage) which I then paint with a UV resistant paint. Or, if someone could recommend some other material that would be suitable, I might try that instead. There are supposedly some “easy” ABS’s that print with less warpage even without glass fiber, but if I’m not mistaken the hdt is lower. Actually, I think I’ll try that next, as it is cheaper than glass fiber ABS. I don’t recall seeing any ASA’s advertised as specially modified for low warpage, but I might look for that as well.
Edit1: I just found this thread: Large ASA prints warping
so I’ll give it a read as well. It’s quite lengthy.
Edit2: Also, I did find some “zero warp” ASA filaments, such as: ASA Filament ApolloX™ - Natural 1.75mm – 3D Printer Supply Company
As expected, it comes at a price.