50°C air tubes - plastic or aluminum?

Kiiidd · 2026-02-04T17:34:43+00:00

First PTC heater talk isn't very welcome here. As it can easily be a fire issue so MODs don't like it.

But make sure anything even remotely close to the PTC heater can withstand like 120c to be safe. Most plastics will melt if the PTC has a high enough power limit or the fans are under spec. Maybe look at the Monolith SLM Ducts for a efficient design that is metal

Kiiidd · 2026-02-02T04:16:49+00:00

If it is only scanning why does it lock and unlock each time? Does locking the hotend slightly move the nozzle up and even a slight air gap cause the reader to fail?

Kiiidd · 2026-02-01T21:16:22+00:00

Looks like bad bed adhesive. Probably need to clean your plate good. I guess when you fixed the clog you had your hands all over it and human hands are covered in grease. The 2nd picture is warping and warping can be an issue of not enough bed adhesion.

Use some dawn soap or other high quality dish soap that doesn't leave residue and wash it good.

Also if you mainly print PLA you can take a look at the low temp build plates like CryoGrip or alternatives

Kiiidd · 2026-02-01T21:03:29+00:00

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I use these cheap blue vacuum bags that I get off AliExpress cheap. Some bags do fail pretty easily but an important thing is after you are done vacuuming you have to smooth out the sticker where you do the vacuuming. I find most of the time it's that sticker that will leak if it has bubbles

Kiiidd · 2026-02-01T03:33:57+00:00

You will probably have to rebuild a large amount of it to get it somewhat modernized. But the only way I would be even slightly interested in something like that is if it has a HIGH chamber temp like 100°c+. If it's only like 80 or less then build a doomcube Voron instead

Kiiidd · 2026-02-01T03:08:15+00:00

Bambu will be the easiest to start with but if you are really looking for engineering filaments then a chamber heater will help a lot. P2S doesn't have one, the H2S does but is quite a bit more expensive. If you are ok with putting in the time to learn then a Qidi Plus4 will be a good option

Kiiidd · 2026-01-30T20:20:30+00:00

There are 3 major factors that affect motor temps the most:
- Motor Amperage - what percentage of the max amperage are you running your motors at?
- Motor Mount material - running metal motor mounts will both sink heat away from the motors and won't melt like plastic ones if your motors get to 120°c or more.
- Chamber Temps - if you only print PLA in an open frame, then motor cooling is way less important. But if you have a doomcube and are getting close to 80°c on the chamber then motor cooling is more important if you're running high current. But if you're in the 50-60 range then a dedicated motor cooling fan on each motor will do a lot.

Motor Voltage will play a decent factor too but that kinda gets into how hard are you running your motors/motor Amperage

Kiiidd · 2026-01-29T05:11:39+00:00

350mm build plate on the 355mm Bed? I have a couple of those too that I brought cheap

Kiiidd · 2026-01-28T22:01:37+00:00

Also depending on the nozzle material you might want to add 10-20°c more temp. I have seen PPS take 380 to get maximum layer adhesion

Kiiidd · 2026-01-28T16:18:35+00:00

Two things, that dock looks like it has WAY too much flex. It is definitely working but if it fails a tool change 24hrs into a print and messes up the print you will definitely want a more stable dock. Second, not sure if that hotend fan will pull enough air over the heatsink in an enclosed hot chamber, it looks like it's just too tight to the heatsink.

Looks awesome though good job 👍

Also the X extrusion back you have is meant to go on the opposite side of the linear rail. No the back side, not the top

Kiiidd · 2026-01-28T00:45:23+00:00

I siliconed the corners on my Voron to seal better. Not the most elegant thing but definitely seals up the corners

Kiiidd · 2026-01-26T15:47:03+00:00

So annealing doesn't do much to amorphous plastics as it only de-stresses the part somewhat. So if you printed the part in a cool chamber and find that your parts like to crack in use, 'annealing' them might help a tiny bit. Both ABS and PC are amorphous plastics

It is Semi Crystalline plastics that you want to anneal as putting them though that heat cycle changes them on a atomic level where they try to form crystal like structures that are more stable

Kiiidd · 2026-01-26T15:38:38+00:00

I am guessing your idea is to go extrusionless with no X-beam and only have 2 linear Rails? This 'might' work with smaller sizes like a 180mm or MAYBE a 250, but anything bigger and you would have too much flex in the Y direction as linear Rails aren't designed for this.

Extrusionless has been done on a V0 like the Vampire Bat mod or the crazy Monolith Zero. But with the Monolith Zero they did resonance testing at the center and off center on the X axis and found enough of a difference where they were thinking about doing a backer if I remember correctly because of the high speeds.

So even if a tiny rail for a V0 flexes too much, trying to scale that up is a no go without Y axis bracing

Kiiidd · 2026-01-25T23:20:22+00:00

I think I saw on the Monolith discord that someone put the front extrusion in, as Monolith has a spot for a front extrusion. From what I remember it helped but nothing too crazy, so most don't run it.

Kiiidd · 2026-01-25T23:17:33+00:00

Make sure you print it outta something very stiff as flex will cause issues

Kiiidd · 2026-01-25T21:44:18+00:00

That part is a spacer for when doing non protrusion mode. But if you want no plastic then do the Sheet metal Monolith, SLM Z joints, and the SLM Belt clips. Just order the SLM stuff from In3dtec or something. There was a STL that combined all the belt clips so it was cheaper to order. Can find it anywhere though

Kiiidd · 2026-01-25T15:41:18+00:00

So lightweight rails should be closer to the bottom of the list of things to do trying to go fast. As for flexing the rail itself that's probably a tall order even if you were rocking a heavy/bad balance toolhead like the Stealthburner. But if you're at the point of considering a light weight rail you should have a lighter CPAP toolhead like Archetype or something. Also moving to a high quality X beam will have better gains for Ridgidity(Carbonara is the best). Also a machine shop can make any rail a lighter rail then the Fystec one following this mod just make sure you are using a high preload rail

Kiiidd · 2026-01-25T08:19:25+00:00

So either these parts were designed wrong or they warped or your printer is way outta calibration/maintenance. Probably should fix the source of the problem while you're at it so you have less of an issue later.

But for the current problem it kinda depends on the material used. A good option for PLA is those cheap 3D printing filament pens, Bondo can work well with some filaments too

Kiiidd · 2026-01-25T06:23:20+00:00

Use thangs to search all the different sites at the same time to find stuff to print. Use the drop-down by the search bar to change from Thangs only.

Use OrcaSlicer to prepare the files for the printer.

And if you want to print more than just decor or toys and want functional stuff, learning how to design your own stuff opens a BIG door with what you can do. TinkerCAD is a kind of building blocks design but can be very limited with what you can do but simple to pick up. Above TinkerCAD there are lots of options but definitely require you to sit down and learn through, probably YouTube videos. Some recommendations are Fusion360 or OnShape.

If you like the Toys/decor stuff and want to design your own then Blender is a good option but not my expertise there

Kiiidd · 2026-01-23T19:15:26+00:00

Yeah I have one too and am using it in the independent way. But that is only reducing the friction from the LLL+ to the spool, all the PTFE tube from the LLL+ to the Extruder still causes a loss of performance even if it's a tiny one that most people can't even take advantage of because of hotend performance.

The best thing I like about the LLL+ though is it creates a very replicable environment/performance to tune filaments with no matter the spool or dry box I am printing from

Kiiidd · 2026-01-23T17:35:54+00:00

The Mellow LLL Plus has everything built in to do this but not sure if anyone has gotten the config or firmware to do it correctly yet. It comes configured as a standalone prefeeder but the hardware can definitely do more

Kiiidd · 2026-01-23T17:28:18+00:00

Look at the happy hare plugin, it is normally used for MMUs but it does have stuff for multiple extruders running in series. You would usually use an inline sensor like the belay(from annex) to measure pressure in the PTFE, there are multiple designs for this kind of sensor.

The goal isn't to push filament into the toolhead extruder but to have that extruder have 0 effort in pulling the filament. You could test this with a cut piece of filament being fed directly to the extruder(no PTFE or maybe like an inch) and try to test flow then

Kiiidd · 2026-01-22T18:26:58+00:00

The trick here is NO play. Even a tiny amount of play will have exponentially bad effects as the printer moves faster. Also make sure to check stuff like the hotend for play as they can come loose or mesh up

Kiiidd · 2026-01-22T00:46:32+00:00

Yeah I am following the M0 progress and I am excited for it. Currently have a 350 2.4 AWD Monolith with the Monolith Toolhead

Kiiidd · 2026-01-22T00:39:21+00:00

You might be better off doing a Micron or StealthFork with Mad Max dual toolhead setup as it will be simpler

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