Need help! Printer not printing good circles

Question

Hello element14 community,

I have a da Vinci Mini from XYZprinting. It was a Christmas present but it would not print circles, so I sent it back. This is my second one and I have not had any issues with it for over a year. Now this one is also starting to have the same issue. Two opposite sides will be flat an the rest of the circle will be just fine! As if right now the issue is not severe, but it becoming exponentially noticeable. I've been using XYZprinting black PLA filament on the "good" preset. The bed is unheated and is covered with (old?) masking tape. The filament has been stored in the open, no where special. I have never added any grease or lubricant. The belt seems well tightened and I cannot spot any slipping. Where is my problem coming from?! I haven't been able to find any helpful sources on the internet, please help!

balearicdynamics · Accepted Answer

Hello Braedan! I am sorry to read about this issue and I am sorry on what I am answering you based on my experience. Before I started building my own 3D printers, most of them based on the Prusa design I explored the possibility to buy a more expensive but reliable commercial 3D printer. The choice was just because I need to use the printer and not play making and molding the printer itself. I bought a XYZ, not the mini but the bigger model. My luck was I bought it from Amazon! I used it for about a month, just the time to understand how the principle works and how the 3D printer produces parts; take in account that the bigger model has a hot bed that I always strongly suggest for a lot of reasons. Then... The surprise#1 , printer x-y motion started making wrong circles - become ellipses - but with a good measure also the square and cubes was not precise. After making a lot of specific tests, filming and logging every step and producing an incredible amount of media demonstrating that it was a problem of the printer I entered the next level gaining the surprise#2 : I have no idea if it is because I am in Spain but the XYZ technical support always answered me only one time a day, and by email only. In about a week - and time passes, imagine the feeling is things you need are continuously delayed and the time you planned to do a job is spent to understand why the printer does not work... In the meanwhile they suggested me a lot of silly potential issues like the x-axis belt tensioning, a wrong setting in the parameters here and there etc. etc. The final result was surprise#3 : they suggested me to send the printer back to them - covered by warranty - for a replacement in about one month.. I ignored this suggestion because, thank to Amazon, in three days I sent back the printer and bought a new one. And I won surprise#4 , I experienced the same identical issue - despite the newest firmware version - in about a month. My definitive solution was to send back the second XYZ printer, got back my money and bought a Prusa aluminium from Geetech that worked for a couple of years (some thousand of hours) with minimal and easy to apply repairing. Then I sold this printer to a friend that moved it from Spain to Italy, I bought a new one last year when I was living in the Netherlands, moved it here in Spain again in the mid of this year and bought a second one. And I am using the 3D printers as one of the most important parts of my prototyping jobs, as well as my CNC. Acquiring experience on the 3D printing technology I have discovered that IMHO the guys that created the XYZ printers made a couple of almost hidden but dramatically wrong project errors in their design; this factor, together with the very bad idea - always a personal opinion - of making a 3D printing software specific for their devices makes this product unfortunately not reliable. It is sad to discover that the same issues and problems I found on the device in 2015 it is again present, suggesting me that probably my idea of a project issue never solved maybe confirmed. You can read some more information on the suggestions and some tips I have experienced with time and usage of 3D printers in my post Review: 3D Printer Prusa Aluminium I3A Plus Enrico

rachaelp · Answer

Hi Breadan, To add to the great info balearicdynamics has already given, my guess would be, looking at that picture, one of the axis is becoming stiff and causing the stepper to miss steps. I suspect cheap linear bearings or linear shafts which start off ok but then start to get some play which then causes them to twist and bind as they move. I unfortunately had an experience with a bad 3D printer a few months back, all sorts of issues, badly running linear bearings on poor linear shafts was one of the many issues.... Best Regards, Rachael

Need help! Printer not printing good circles

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