sakati84 / 3dprintcolorizer Goto Github PK

I was thinking of how to make the quality better and I thought that it would help to turn on Infill before walls. Unfortunately, It turns out that you can't turn that on because the infill is using extruder 1 and the walls are not. If you turn the extruder settings for the infill to "not overridden" you are able to make this change. I don't know if this is possible but I was wondering if that setting would help and if there is a way that you could turn it on.

I have a CR-10 that I have converted to direct drive (Micro-Swiss). The instructions for this plugin said it needed a larger retraction, but with direct drive where retraction is set to around 1.5mm a larger retraction is likely to cause a jam.
Is there a workaround or modification that would work with a direct drive converted Ender or CR-10?
Thanks,
Al

I've been trying and wanting to use this, wiht my CR6 SE, as I haven't gotten my Ender 3 set up properly, though I have a EZABL I could potentially make amount to work with, but I haven't figured out how to make one to work with the stock CR6-SE

I understand that this project is defunct but I'm opening this issue because there is one big problem: it does not take supports into account. I do see that it handles support-interface blocks in gcode files, but not support blocks. This leads to all sorts of unexpected behavior, like moving draw and support lines to the end of the new gcode file.

I'm opening this ticket to see if anyone else is working on this issue. My first thought was to add ";TYPE:SUPPORT" to the support-interface/fill elif, but that has resulted in no draw lines being written to the final gcode file on any layer that has a support block so that the support section is skipped the same way infill is. I'm wrapping up a print with these settings and the plugin is more or less broken still; even though it's using the same settings for infill blocks it's not drawing anything until after the supports are done and when it does try to draw all of the draw lines are single points away from the print.

This is with cura 5.3. I'm going to try an identical print with 5.2 to see if there's some change in the way 5.3 writes gcode that would affect performance.

If anyone has any insight, this is the place for it.

Hi!
It would be great if you could chose the priority of the color, so that for example yellow paint doesn't get in touch with black paint if black was already painted.

I modified my GEEETECH A10M 3D Printer. removed one of the extruders repositioned the other one with double sized tape on the power supply. Need to reposition the fan. But after doing so much testing and not enough screws I hot glued everything together, leaving me with 4 colors total...

I've probably tried for a full day. But for the life of me I can not get the second layer to stick the Cura.
I've leveled the bed so many times.
I have normal prints working with Repetier and Easyprint Lite Release with the profiles provided by the Company that sells the printer.

So anyone know how to Either change the profile to another software or how to get Cura to work.

Cura says "The following script is active: PenColorizer" and I have all my offsets put into it. I manually made the profile based on what Cura profile files say (Cura kept crashing when trying to import it. If you know a fix for this problem too that would be nice). When choosing the model I put the 2 part 3DBenchy (So like the hull is one color and the rest is another). Assigning the hull to extruder 2 (To be black in this case) and rest to be white (Extruder 1). Also I checked to make sure that each part is from a different extruder which it was. But I noticed when putting the Gcode into a viewer it doesn't show it ever going up to grab the black sharpie. Trying another model it does the same thing even when running it never grabs the sharpie (Proving that the viewer is correct). How do I fix this?

I'm new to 3D printing so I apologize if I'm making a newbie mistake. I'm using the stock firmware on my Ender 3 v2. I've followed the instructions as closely as I could and I think I have everything setup correctly.

I did the Cura setup and sliced the multicolor parrot linked in the instructions after assigning the parts to the 4 extruders.

When I print I get the first layer or so down and the printing pauses for a few seconds without moving the head and then it continues to print. If I let it go this happens several more times. I've let it print a couple of millimeters but as it never attempted to pickup a marker I stopped it. I'm assuming that at those pauses it's supposed to go get the marker and then do the coloring.

I've setup OctoPrint and have attempted the same print from it and I get many error messages all something like "Not queuing T0, that tool doesn't exist according to the printer profile or was reported as invalid by the firmware. Make sure your printer profile is set up correctly." Sometimes its for T1 or T2 as well.

Should this work with the stock Creality firmware (1.0.2) or do I need to build and flash my own Marlin firmware?

Any other suggestions for getting this to work?

I followed all instructions and it does work BUT doesnt slice right. When i slice a multi color model in cura of coarse, it slices fine i can set any extruder i want and it slices the way it should but after i put the file on sd I saw the model was split up again in random places even tho I checked the slice in the sim and its fine. when i look at g-code its split up. why is this ? I see others on youtube using this mod and it works. It retrieves pen just fine , just does something to gcode wrong . Ive tried reinstalling cura 4.11.0 and same issue still.
any help please.......

I followed instructions and used the sample print. When I went to print it did not recognize the extruders. I use octoprint with my Ender 3 Pro. I have done several upgrades to the unit. I have the Creality 4.2.7 32bit board with direct drive extrusion. I have dual Z-axis. I have included some pictures Please help

I am seeing an offset in both the x and y axis, but mostly x. I did the calibration as described, is there something I am missing?

Ignore the bad print, I am working through clogging issues. I am running on anet a8 hardware, but with an E3Dv6 clone hotend and Bowden extruder as well as an SKRv1.4

In my configuration.h, I have

MANUAL_X_HOME_POS = -18.5
MANUAL_Y_HOME_POS = -3.74

When I use my calipers, this seems to be the offset of the pen. If I don't have these, then my prints are in the center of the bed and I lose print surface on the left and front.

If there is another way to reclaim this space and not affect the pens, then what do I need to modify in Cura? I am not afraid of changing my Marlin configuration. I have attached my configuration.h and configuration.adv.h files

After printing the first layer the extruder temperature suddenly drops to 0. it nevers moves up or anything. just keeps printing like nothinbgs happened but isnt moving extruder gear and sets the temperature to zero

Since the plugin paints the exterior 2 walls of every surface, a flat surface shared by two colorized objects will not adhere properly and the print will either be unstable or fall apart.

Expected behavior: 3 stacked colored cubes will have a continuous infill from the base to the top layer
Current behavior: the printer will print 3 discrete colored cubes stacked on top of each other, with infill broken by 4 colorized layers between each cube.

As with the last issue, I understand that this project is defunct, so I am opening this issue in the hopes that I or someone else can figure out an elegant solution and use this issue to link a relevant pull request.

My first thought is to make a look-ahead for "SKIN" blocks and compare T values, then exclude those blocks from painting in the same way FILL blocks are excluded, but this would cause problems when one sub-object's skin is partially above another's.

This should be doable on most gantry printers, as that's usually in the middle of the printer, but this will require calibration for the other side with a Y cord for both.

Hello I have a problem when in my first layer with the different exdurder my first layer sucks, the nozzle is too far away and changing the z offset won't help, also there is not enough filament in the first layer and its messy please help

M900 for linear advance on each tool. should be only one tool.
what I have in gcode:

...
M900 K0.130000 T3 ;added by LinearAdvanceSettingPlugin
M900 K0.130000 T0 ;added by LinearAdvanceSettingPlugin
M900 K0.130000 T2 ;added by LinearAdvanceSettingPlugin
M900 K0.130000 T1 ;added by LinearAdvanceSettingPlugin
M900 K0.130000 T4 ;added by LinearAdvanceSettingPlugin
...

should be:

...
M900 K0.130000 ;added by LinearAdvanceSettingPlugin
...

I know this may sound stupid but the tools that came with the Ender 3 don't fit in the screws and I can't get them out. Do I need to buy a better tool to unscrew them?

Edit: Sorry, I used the wrong screwdriver

when there's no marker an its extruding the retracts are longer then the detracts. may vary on the retraction during painting value. still trying to find exact cause...

Hi,
I wondered how complex it'll be to add support for the Prusa i3 MK3S printer, what needs to change apart from the head pen mount and the top mount? Will the calibration be able to handle the differences between the printers?
I may be able to do most/all of the work, but I want to get a better understanding of the needed effort.

My setup shown here:

I'm fairly sure I have put in the offsets for the pens/1st position correctly, but the movement to pick up a pen will go up to the correct height, but not move to the left in order to take the pen down from the rack, it only goes up, moves slightly to the right, then goes back down and colors. Then also the coloring is shifted down along the y-axis, but that could be due to the offset being wrong (although I'm pretty sure I put it in correctly). Videos here:

                                                           Pickup Wrong

https://user-images.githubusercontent.com/122464075/225982612-762c6129-2513-4768-b1c1-84049ed0a2ca.mp4
Offset Wrong
https://user-images.githubusercontent.com/122464075/225982812-58b0644e-b2c3-421e-8742-341f3bb65380.mp4

I'm using a Prusa Mini with mostly up to date firmware, and Cura 4.9.0. Could this be a non compatible firmware, or another firmware related issue or just me being stupid. I will continue trying to find if I did anything wrong, but help would be greatly appreciated!

First things first, I have checked out this system and I am quite impressed by how simple it is!

However there is one flaw with it: Because of the way the sharpies hang from the back with the end cap you effectively remove a chunk of printing space in Z. So, what about changing the way sharpies are held?
Instead of hanging them from the end it'd be better to hang them from the front, similar to adding a front cap to the sharpie. This would not only allow you to reclaim a lot of space in Z, but it would also allow you to use different length sharpies.
It'd also mean you have a more secure way of holding the sharpie as it's own weight would be pushing it into the cap.

Depending on the mounting solution it might even be capable of mounting different types of markers while keeping the pen arm and the rack the same.

Has this been considered or tried before? What do you think some drawbacks with this system might be?

Great project! Just finished printing all the parts, installing, calibrating and doing a first test run on an Ender 3 v2. All seems to be working according to plan.

I would like to know if it is possible to use the system to just draw on paper without using the hotend nor the heated bed. I assume is possible by just using a single layer model, not using Extruder 1 and turning off hotend & bed temperatures and setting the fans off. I'm not really sure about the Z-Offset and maybe a Z-Hop when travelling?

I would like to hear from your thoughts about this.

Thanks again for this project!

Hi, when following the instructions I encountered a problem with getting the pen part, when i start using the prepare -> move command, the printer automatically starts homing the nozzle. there a way to get around this?

To save time later on in the print, when the holder goes up to put away a marker, it picks up the next one needed. It would need to start doing it at a higher layer, otherwise it would draw on the bed.

please make a version for anycubic printers

This way the markers can be grabbed, but you can still print at their full height. Should fix issues with some direct drives as well

I've noticed the script spends a lot of time painting over infill that wouldn't normally be seen and causes issues with layer adhesion (perhaps not letting the ink dry)

I'm trying to fix it by writing a wiki myself but you can't PR those, unfortunately. You can clone it on my fork with this link: https://github.com/Nathan22211/3DPrintColorizer.wiki.git

Mind you I'm not done and my formatting isn't the best. My writing style is also a lot different from whoever wrote the current wiki.

Skipping the move command results in the knocking the pens off the rack and not catching any pen at all.

Most likely it's because of missing space between the parameters in these lines:

G0 X62.0Z28.150000000000006 ;go under pen

Interestingly, this happens only via USB, e.g when printing via Octoprint or sending the command via e.g. Octoprint's terminal.
Printing the exact same gcode from SD-card works as intended.

Can simply bolt a frame to the bed extrusions and hang the same way as regular or, using springs or rubber bands, have x axis rail hit a lever bringing down the rack at which point the hotend carriage holds the pen then can move to the side a little bit and unslotting then pen. U probably already thought of this

I don't know if it's possible, but is porting this to PrusaSlicer viable? My Ender has really bad layer shifts with Cura. I'm not a developer so have no idea how difficult it would be, feel free to close this!
Many thanks

Hello,

I used defaut settings & curaprofile found into this github & a custom FFF printer profile for an Ender3.

I don't understand why Cura generated this amount of walls. One wall per extruder ?

Can you please help me ? I would like to reduce to 3 walls.

KR

I ran a test print to ensure all pens could be reached on a standard print, Pen #1 aligns perfectly, but there is more and more of a gap the farther down the rack the hotend goes. Pen #7 Doesn't align at all with the pen holder.

My steps/mm are calibrated and the size is correct, as there should be what seems like 40mm between the pen rack holes.

Could I suggest some sort of averaging system?

Take the first and last hole measurements and average them out to equal 7 equally separate holes?

I'm really grasping at straws here, it seems like I can't find this issue anywhere else.

Thank you in advance!

Would there be a way to only have the PenColorizer plugin generate gcode that colors the outer edges of the models?

I had an issue printing a dual extrusion Pikachu where because the sharpie colored in the whole tail layer the print separated.

Would it be possible to extend the plugin to support using the Sharpie as a release agent for support structures?

Check out this video, which shows how you can use Sharpie as a release agent to enable printing over 100% density support structures with zero Z-gap, and still have the support structure break away from the part easily.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lcOcetpHhTU&ab_channel=ChristianGalles

I've tried it with PLA and ABS and it works amazingly well. The one major downside is either needing to apply the Sharpie manually, or being stuck using a non-zero Z-gap, since none of the open slicer engines support zero-thickness layers. Your system would be perfect for an application like this!

I need Help.
My Cr-10-V3 sets the Temperature at beginning to 150 and don't extrude. This behavior doesn't change in the whole print.
The Printer do the right movement.

This is the G-Code i'm using
CFFFP_pikachu_dual_details.txt

PenColorizer.py:48-54 The variable name does not match the description.

"FirstPenYPosition":
{
    "label": "First Pen Z Position",
    "description": "Z position for holding the first pen in the pen rack",
    "type": "float",
    "default_value": 238.0
},

I wanted to print the pen rack, but the first layer was only printed partwise and the next layers (until I canceled the print) the hotend scratched over the lower layers. Everything else I try to print works well. So I thought maybe anyone here could help me. Heres a picture of what was intended to be the pen rack (printed with an Ender-3) :

I notice that none of the .stl object code files for the 3D printed parts have any corresponding source code files anywhere on the repo. How are people even making contributions?

I thought this would be a nice addition. You know how you can change the colors of the materials you use in Cura and how you can assign each extruder a different color. Well I thought it would be a good idea to have a message at the beginning of the print that tells you where to put the sharpies then it says press button to continue. Once you press the button the printer heats up and starts the print.

The first layers will be laid fine but later on it will be pushing against the print and flexing the springs of my bed, and grind against the print.

crayola's has the advantage of being widely available as well as the possibility for dichromatic colors with a certain set

Hello,

in the past, I've seen a video where someone paused the print, added some edding on the supportmaterial and resumed the print. The result was an easier removeable supportstructure. In this case the lower adheasion was an advantage. Perhaps you can optimize this behaviour?
Unfortunately I do not have an Ender - so perhaps I will modify your pen-mount for my Anet-A8 in the future.

Thanks for your great work and sharing it!

Sorry - bad english ;-)

I use ArcWelder, which detects arcs made from a sequence of G0/G1 codes and converts the entire sequence to a single G2/G3 code. It makes highly-detailed STLs print faster and better, especially on 8-bit controllers.

I'm planning to adapt the project to the Sidewinder X1 v4, so I may code this myself if you don't beat me to it!

This is such a cool project. There are a couple of things that need to be included in the documentation to speed up the process of installing, tuning and getting started.

Testing routines
Firstly there needs to be a quicker way of testing without starting a print. I wonder if this can be a set of scripts that we load next to the PenColorizer.py
these scripts can do a few things

1. pick pen X, where X is one of the extruders. This test will allow us to see if the printer can pick the pen in the right direction or not and find out if any of them are misaligned
2. Draw a circle on X layer, here X is the layer height. This will have a checkbox called "assume pen loaded". This will allow us to see if z is properly calibrated for the printer. make a quick circle or some shape at a certain layer. With the checkbox we can combine a test of picking up a pen and testing the Z for coloring

Also if there were a few instructions on what kind of pen holder arm is needed. I just realized it is best to have the pen holder be much further out from print head. If not then it always hit the other pends when going up. I designed my own because I have a satsana fan shroud and at one point it seems like the pen was going to get stuck in the fans and ruin it. Most of the modders that use this will have custom fan shrouds with exposed fan so be careful.

apart from that it's a great project

Hi all having some issues with loading the plugin to cura.

Copied the py script to the plugin folder stated in the instruction and restarted Cura. still the plugin doesnt show up in the plugin list.
Tried cura 2.4, 4.9.0, 4.9.1 5.2 and 5.3

Is this script version specific or some other issue ?
What version is best used?

Hope somebody can point me in the right direction after printing all the parts haha. 👍

It would be nice not to have to worry about the heat making the markers dry out. A multi-colored less overkill version of https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c3LhK2SAusk&t=4s would be amazing. Also check out https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lcOcetpHhTU.

was doing some general testing with the colorizer and tuned in x y and z pen offset perfectly how ever the next prints x and y offsets changed by about .5 mm and would sometimes change back on the next print or go off by about another .5 mm, i did calibration correctly and didnt do any changes to slicing settings other than increase layer height to .2mm. Z offset never changed though.