After several times of switching between laser and 3D printing and always experiencing the same “problems” after laser cutting wood I just wanted to give you a small piece of advice.
Always… really always… clean and lubricate Z-axis lead screw and linear rod after laser cutting wood.
If you do not you will see funky errors in your first layer which lead at least to lesser print quality if not even failed prints. The reason for this seems that the z axis not moving 100% smooth and 100% in the correct speed which leads to started lines “mid air”.
I forgot to take a picture of a failed print but here is one example how this manifests…. if you succeed with the first layer it’s usually no problem but the more travel moves you have in the first layer the more problematic it gets (as almost all line starts can/will look like this).
A simple z-axis clean solved it every time for me.
This is exactly why (IMO) a laser cutter should not be combined with a 3D printer. Laser cutting generates tons of microscopic particulate and sticky, gooey gasses that get distributed everywhere inside the laser cutter. Real laser cutters are designed to withstand this contamination so you don’t need to clean them all the time. For example, very few components are greased, because grease is a dirt magnet. But even laser cutters need to be cleaned regularly (my 40W CO2 needs cleaning every 30-40 hours of operating time). 3D printers with all their exposed bearings and leadscrews and rods are going to be needing much higher frequency cleaning. And besides the higher frequency of cleaning required, the contamination is going to build up in places you can’t reach to clean without completely disassembling the machine.
And it’s not just the mechanical components you have to worry about. The optics the printer uses are very sensitive to contamination and will also need frequent cleaning (just printing ABS is enough to haze them over).
A lot of laser cutting and a lot of 3D printing on the same machine are somewhat incompatible objectives. If you need a laser cutter, but don’t have the space for a laser cutter, the BBL option is your only choice so go for it but keep this cleaning problem in mind. But if you have the space for a real laser cutter, it is much better to buy a separate machine. In the long run, it’s likely to be a less expensive and less frustrating solution…
what does lasering have to do with bed adhesion? i certainly don’t clean the printer after every time i laser with it, and i have no issues with it, i only really clean after quite a few sessions
given that the plate is removed from the printer, those bed adhesion issues aren’t related to the lasering or the z axis in my experience
Hi @h3li0,
this only happens for me when laser cutting (eg wood) and usually I cut 2-4 plates in one run.
After that I always see this.
While cutting the smoke and particles produced during cutting stick to everything (you most noticeably see it on the windows)… so those particles also stick to the z-axis parts.
As for the problem on the first layer.. you always have to keep in mind that our printing head is stationary in the z-axis.. so for each travel the bed gets lowered at the start and raised back again at the end of the travel. It seems that because of the built up residue this takes slightly longer and because of the the start of each line has a change to simply not stick (as it is still too far aways from the bed …. see my screenshot).
When I had this the first time I tried many things but the only thing that solve it was cleaning and lubricating all z-axis parts. As this happened now several times after laser usage and always could be solve with this I thought I would share this experience. And yes - it has nothing to do with the build plate itself.
Ps: I never experienced it with engraving only.. only with wood cutting.
Maybe I do some before and after cleaning pictures when I laser cut next time to show this more in detail
yeah not sure what to tell you, the smoke driven residues after a few wood cuttings should not affect the screw travel in any way - at least in mine they don’t, but i do have the smoke purifier that i run on full power to extract the fumes during wood cutting, so maybe it does without it, but i’d find it strange, but if it works for you great, i don’t really have the patience to clean it everytime, i usually do clean-up once every 3 months
I use my 40W laser quite a lot and have never experienced this issue. I also use a ridiculously powerful smoke extractor to remove smoke and other by-products generated during laser cutting.
