Distance between nozzle and heatbed after leveling

dope76

first thank you for the help in this forum.
I bought an A5 and leveled the printer. 
the leveling worked and in step 5 (middle) fits a piece of paper.
But if I print now, the nozzle is so far away from the heatbed that I print in the air.
Is there still an attitude in which I can define this distance?
I've already read that you can set the z-offset in the firmware, but for a value always
update the whole firmware or is that the problem at all?
Please be lenient with me, I am an absolute newcomer


Thanks in advance for your assistance

Christian

Samuel Pinches

Hi Christian, firstly, welcome

I am assuming you are not using mesh bed levelling - just the normal levelling with the 5 points and the 4 corner screws.

So, you have levelled all 5 points and all 5 points are one sheet of paper away? Is this correct?

dope76

Hi,

Thanks for your quick reply!

that is correct.

but when I start printing, the nozzle is too far away from the heatbed. to the info: it is a
difference whether I the first layer with 0.3 or 0.1 prints (of the distance), 
but it is both times the same result.
The filament sticks to the nozzle and not on the heatbed.
When printing I get then 2 or 3 sheets of paper underneath

Christian

Samuel Pinches

Have you checked that the part you are printing is on the bed in the slicer? Sometimes when you load a part it may be floating above the bed? Maybe try another STL file?

Samuel Pinches

If that doesn’t work, can you please post your gcode file here? If you have problems attaching it let me know.

dope76

Hi,

sorry for the late reply. I have tried different stl files without success. I've already tried with remedies like hairspray without success. the filament does not stick to the surface. As an attachement, i send the calibration cube gcode with which i have printed.

Christian

Samuel Pinches

Here's 6 tips on bed adhesion to try: https://jgaurorawiki.com/a5/bed-adhesion

seafian

Hi Christian,
strange, with my rather new A5 it almost sticks too hard.
The filament sent with the printer worked very well, and it really popped off when the bed was cooling down.
The filament I'm using now sticks that much, that it needs to be removed with a little force from the cooled bed.

I assume, you are heating the bed for printing, do you?

First layer without the cooling fan?

If there is doubt, if the model to be printed is positioned correctly in Cura, you could activate printing support (from bed) to make sure the print starts directly at the bed.

Hope it helps
br
Andreas

dope76

Hi seafian,

thants the funny thing about it. In the beginning i had exactly the same effect. Every print has held super-strong on the heatbed.

I have no idea why, but I can do what I want, it does not work anymore.

I have leveled (I still do not know how to do it right, whether the paper has to be hard, easy to go, etc.).

I tried it with hair spray, glue stick, adhesive tape.

With 190 degrees and 210 degrees, with fan at the beginning and with fan 2/3/4/5 layer and the heatbed with 50 60 and 65 degrees.

I am currently despairing and have no idea what to do

Best Regards and thanks for your help

Christian

Samuel Pinches

Did you read tip #2 on my link?

dope76

yes, I have read and followed all tips. The only thing I have unfortunately done before is the heatbed with acetone to clean.

I hope that I did not break anything with it.

AETEK

Hi,

can you make a photo of the heated bed after the acetone treatment?

dope76

Hi,

I can not offer a photo until the weekend, but you can not see a difference (I at least ).

I am of the opinion that it is much smoother after the acetone than before, you only feel the difference.

Christian

AETEK

Hello,
Acetone dissolves plastics. The "Black Diamond" surface is made of a plastic and quite rough. So the molten filament adheres to the surface. You said the surface feels smooth now. That's an indication that it works worse. Take time for bed leveling. Preheat the bed to 50 ° C and the nozzle to 150 ° C. Metal expands when heated. In cold condition you can expect different results than when warm. To level, I take a sheet of paper (80 grams / square meter). The paper still has to move, but it should be a resistance when moving noticeable.
Maybe the Z limit switch is not fixed properly either. It could move. Please check if the screws of the Z limit switch and the bracket are tight. If you are sure that the leveling works correctly and the other sources of error are excluded, then your coating of the glass plate is broken. Of course you can also replace the entire heated bed with the glass top. This is unfortunately relatively expensive.

cheers
AETEK

Samuel Pinches

Hi Aetek, I'm not sure if they have changed the formulation, but the old formulation was a glass frit coating, which is typically an enamel or ceramic coating that is screen-printed on, and then baked. However, it was also susceptible to damage from Acetone, but ethanol and isopropyl alcohol were fine. I have hear reports of Ethanol damaging the bed coating, which makes me think that they may have sent out a different bed coating for some people - perhaps plastic as you have suggested. Without close up photos it is hard to say what is true.

AETEK

Hello,
So my pretty new A5 has a sensitive coating that is attacked by pure alcohol. Look here:

https://jgmakerforum.com/discussion/comment/779/#Comment_779

cheers
AETEK

Samuel Pinches

I have not got a plastic bed so I don't know how it performs... hopefully it is not another jgaurora disappointment.

I would suggest for cleaning plastic, to make up a solution of a little soap in water. Soap should be as cheap and pure as possible - pieces of unscented soap (don't want fragrance oils) block in water should be perfect. Then wipe bed with soapy water on a cloth. Then wipe with pure water, and then you can dry using heated bed.

If you are able to take some close up photos of the new bed @AETEK, I can post some warning about this on the wiki bed cleaning page?

AETEK

Hello,
I am not sure what the material is. Mine is attacked by pure alcohol. I've already tried it with window cleaner. Then nothing stuck at all. Fat and dust-free it seems only with Akohohl (if diluted) to work. Will your A5 print surface be light and dull when you clean it with alcohol?

cheers
AETEK

Samuel Pinches

Alcohol didn't seem to change it at all for me, and no residue is left on the cloth. When my nozzle scrapes on the bed, the hard coating embeds into the coating.

AETEK

Hello,
I am currently printing a case for my new display. I did the photos while the A5 prints (as best I can).

cheers

AETEK

Samuel Pinches

hmmm... that looks exactly like my bed surface

AETEK

If the material is based on ceramics, it would probably not be attacked by acetone. At the moment I have no need to try this on my "Black Diamond Surface".
I was already prepared to remove the surface with acetone when it stopped working. If this is actually ceramic material then it should last a long time and be very sturdy.
So far I have no visible problems with my dilute spirit-distilled water solution.
 

cheers
AETEK

dope76

Do I see this correctly, that the best thing would be to buy a new heatbed? If that would be the solution that is not a problem as I can not use the printer at all.

Samuel Pinches

Please try printing this money cat:
https://www.dropbox.com/s/wwt0378fzlauk2b/A5%20money_cat.gcode?dl=0

If you can record a video, maybe we can see what is going wrong.

dope76

Hi,

here are some pictures of the heatbed and movies from the beginning of the print. I hope you can see something. in the second video the print is amazingly good. Normally, the filament winds around the nozzle.

Samuel Pinches

I've written a guide to embedding videos here: https://jgmakerforum.com/discussion/212/how-to-embed-a-video

Samuel Pinches

From what I can see, your first layer speeds are too fast. Start with 10-12mm/s, and see how that goes.

Samuel Pinches

It is important to know: your first layer thickness will NOT fix a bed that is not levelled correctly. If you want to tweak your first layer height, you may want to try levelling your bed with a piece of paper, or try install the custom LCD firmware and custom mainboard firmware, so that you can use baby stepping to tweak your first layer height "live" during printing.

dope76

Hi,

I leveled like crazy. I've tried almost all tips from the internet without a tip had success (including your tips of course). I'm still trying a new heatbed. if that does not bring anything I give up.

Samuel Pinches

- levelled using paper till nozzle grips it a bit?
- cleaned bed with isopropyl alcohol and or ethanol?
- heated bed a 65C, preheated for 5 mins?
- slow first layer, 10mm/s, fan off
- tried more than 1 colour of filament?
- filament at 215C

dope76

Hi,

i tried all these points, unfortunately without success. I have tried adhesive tape now. that seems to work (at least for now). I think this is not a nice solution, because that should work without it, so I can at least print.