Prevent support structure inside a hollow model

[Martin @tinu My Robox is a Blue Commercial Version Zurich, Switzerland]

Hi

I have a hollow model that needs external support. Unfortunately the intentional cavity inside the model, which can be printed without automatic support (manual lattice infill as shown by Angus from Makers Muse on Youtube), is also filled with support structure.

I tried to add manual external supports with the meshmixer support feature, but the results are unsatisfactory.

Is there a way in Automaker to only have external support, to the outside of the model but not inside? And even more advanced, kind of like, when the support starts from the build platform upwards then add, otherwise not.

Cheers,

Martin

• This topic was modified 1 week, 2 days ago by  Martin.

[click @click My Robox is a Green Kickstarter Limited Edition]

If there is an option for it - it would be somewhere in Cura. If that’s the case, then question would be how to pass those parameters from AM to Cura. If Cura doesn’t support it, then answer would be obvious - no.

[Martin @tinu My Robox is a Blue Commercial Version Zurich, Switzerland]

Hi

@click I tried to google, seems like Cura supports “Touching Buildplate” and “Everywhere”.

@pete, is that feature already there in Automaker to pass through to Cura and I missed it or is it something for the wishlist?

Cheers,

Martin

[Martin @tinu My Robox is a Blue Commercial Version Zurich, Switzerland]

I’ve done some research, and this is what I have found.

Normal Cura profiles are/have ini files:

• support = Touching buildplate or support = Everywhere

Automaker as a file named “slicermapping.dat” in “C:\Program Files\CEL\Common\PrintProfiles“:

• “supportEverywhere”:”generateSupportMaterial”, [Line 181]

Maybe this can be changed to something like “supportTouchingbuildplate”? My guess is that Automaker generates the ini file for Cura on the fly.

Cheers,

Martin

[Shaun @saiken I have several commercial Robox units BC, Canada]

 

I concur on the “Touching Build Plate” option. I’ve checked it out in Cura, and it looks appropriate for some situations. Put it on the pile, I suppose.

The devs should have “Quick Fix Fridays” where they knock out little bugs or features before the weekend.

[Martin @tinu My Robox is a Blue Commercial Version Zurich, Switzerland]

I’ve tried above change in slicermapping.dat, and it does the trick. I am printing the model now.

But now for whatever reason it seems to be always in Fine mode (based on the layer count I see; double as I was used when using Normal mode with unchanged slicermapping.dat). Have to do more tests.

Cheers,

Martin

 

 

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[Martin @tinu My Robox is a Blue Commercial Version Zurich, Switzerland]

Hm no, not worth tinkering with this setting. While it does what it should (supports only from build plate), AM always slices in Fine mode which in my case results in worse quality in double the time as Normal.

I played with the support angle setting, it still generates supports inside the model but it should be OK (continuous cavity to fill with epoxy).

This one can queue up in the feature request list I guess (like GCODE preview before print start :-))

Regards,

Martin

[click @click My Robox is a Green Kickstarter Limited Edition]

@tinu what do you mean by AM always slices in fine mode?

BTW I am glad you managed to find these - my initial (short) search yielded nothing. Thank for sharing it here! 🙂

[Martin @tinu My Robox is a Blue Commercial Version Zurich, Switzerland]

Hi @click

When I set “supportTouchingbuildplate”:”generateSupportMaterial” on Line 181 of the slicermapping.dat file, it seems to slice always with 0.1mm layer height regardless which printing profile is set. I usually use Normal, and in some cases I use a custom Profile that is a copy of Normal but with more bottom/top layers and shells.

In Normal mode (0.2mm layer height), the part I am trying to print has 446 layers. With the change above, it slices it into exactly 892 layers even when I set Normal mode as before. Therefore that must be 0.1mm layer height = Fine mode.

My guess is that the implementation of Touching Buildplate only support generation should be a quick thing (with or without UI changes so that it can be selected by a check box) as Cura obviously supports it and AM is reacting to this value, for the most part. But AM seems to do other stuff as well when changing this variable in its own slicer config file. Setting it to supportTouchingbuildplate was my own speculation anyway, we don’t have a clue how it is implemented in AM, which variable values are valid and how the AM slicer config is passed on to Cura.

It’s clear that my change is not supported by CEL but hey, it can’t break the machine at this point, worst case it doesn’t slice so I just tried. Maybe @pete or @chrisyt are willing to ask the SW engineer how the supportEverywhere variable is implemented/passed on to Cura and whether this can be changed (and how)?

(I didn’t find a search function for the forum to check if this question about Touching Buildplate Support has already been raised or answered)

Cheers,

Martin

[Chris White @chrisyt]

@tinu Nearly there… you need to change line 181 in slicermapping.dat to:

“supportEverywhere”:”0″

Hopefully that should do what you want - if there’s enough interest in this feature, we will add it as a parameter which can be adjusted from within AutoMaker using a custom profile i.e. it would be a checkbox on the ‘Support’ page of the profile library.

[Martin @tinu My Robox is a Blue Commercial Version Zurich, Switzerland]

Hey @chrisyt, thanks for the answer and clarification! I will try that asap.

Cheers,

Tinu

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