Anycubic Photon and Mono X 3D DLP Printers

[Fen End Pit]

I just printed out this lever frame (4mm scale) on my Anycubic Photon, thought I'd share it here.

 

 

Once painted it looks pretty damn good. It took two goes to get the support structure right to stop the levers from bending.

 

 

Once hidden in the box you can hardly see it, but that is hardly the point.

 

David

[dpgibbons]

Great work. What resin/print settings/object orientation did you use please?

[MikeTrice]

David, that is brilliant.

[Fen End Pit]

26 minutes ago, dpgibbons said:

Great work. What resin/print settings/object orientation did you use please?

 

This was Anycubic's own brand grey resin, printed at .05mm layer height, 8 seconds per layer

 

 

I had to generate my own support for the levers in the CAD drawing because the the Anycubic software is frankly a bit inflexible.

 

David

[itsthegman]

18 hours ago, Fen End Pit said:

 

This was Anycubic's own brand grey resin, printed at .05mm layer height, 8 seconds per layer

 

 

I had to generate my own support for the levers in the CAD drawing because the the Anycubic software is frankly a bit inflexible.

 

David

I want one, there is no other word. Is there a file your willing to share that I can ask a friend to print?.

 

Yours hopefully.

 

G.

[MikeTrice]

There are a few earlier in the thread.

[Fen End Pit]

3 hours ago, itsthegman said:

I want one, there is no other word. Is there a file your willing to share that I can ask a friend to print?.

 

Yours hopefully.

 

G.

 

I've published the STL file on thingiverse 25 lever frame

 

Good luck printing (and probably more difficult removing the support)

 

David

[MikeTrice]

I am trying, unsuccessfully, to print a top plate for a 6 wheel rigid bogie. The problem is it keeps warping - a lot:

 

In an effort to stop the ends warping I have added sacrificial strengthers to hold them in place. They print fine but warp during curing:

 

 

 

My typical way of handling prints is to immediately remove them from their support material as soon as they have come out of the printer and been washed. Any warping in the past I can put down to uneven curing times under the UV light or failure to turn the prints when exposed to sunlight. Apart from this one component I have not suffered warping on any other mouldings including carriage sides (which are also quite thin) or complete bodies, so all rather baffling.

 

So I decided to try a slightly different approach and leave the print attached to the support material and gentle curing in daylight over a period of days, rotating occassionally. Although there is still some warpage it is nowhere near as marked as with the earlier mouldings:

 

Have not been brave enough to separate them yet. All very strange.

Edited May 9, 2019 by MikeTrice

[MikeTrice]

Interesting. Putting the prints in a sink and pouring boiling water on them you can see them physically relax so waiting to see how they cool down and behave longer term.

[Atso]

5 minutes ago, MikeTrice said:

Interesting. Putting the prints in a sink and pouring boiling water on them you can see them physically relax so waiting to see how they cool down and behave longer term.

 

Hi Mike,

 

My experience is that the prints will warp again once they have cooled - even if put them into a light box for an extended period of time and if you bend them to the correct shape in hot water (I've not tried boiling water though). However, I have found that once primed, the prints become much more stable. I think that the resin continues to react with UV and blocking the ability of UV light to hit the resin goes a long way to retaining the shape of the print.

[calvin Streeting]

is the resin thermo setting? 

[MikeTrice]

Not to my knowledge.

[Knuckles]

I have some bits warp once in a while, usually I run them under a hot tap and gently tease it where I want it a few times then run it under the cold tap straight away to set it.  Doing this 2 or 3 times usually solves it   Also increasing exposure time can help on a few items but as you know it tends to be a geometry issue thing as well.

[MikeTrice]

3 hours ago, Knuckles said:

I have some bits warp once in a while, usually I run them under a hot tap and gently tease it where I want it a few times then run it under the cold tap straight away to set it.  Doing this 2 or 3 times usually solves it   Also increasing exposure time can help on a few items but as you know it tends to be a geometry issue thing as well.

I have redesigned the parts to be of even thickness (which has thickened them up in the process) and they are much better. There is a very minor warp which I am sure can be teased out. As you say, this would imply the problem is geometry related.

[richard i]

Hot water and then allow to cool with weight on them holding them flat perhaps? 

Not ideal as best to solve how to avoid it in the first place , but until then might this work?

richard

[ianmaccormac]

Amazon have a lightning deal on for the next hour and a half, 15% off the price, so £322.15

Hope that makes peoples minds up if they are borderline.

Cheers

Ian in Blackpool

[monkeysarefun]

Anyone got the S model yet? Probably not worth replacing  a  standard Photon, especially given the Anti-Aliasing firmware upgrade for it  is about ready to go  but if I was in the market for my first I'd probably spend the little extra on the S, only downside seems to be its plastic body..

 

https://www.windowscentral.com/anycubic-photon-vs-anycubic-photon-s

Edited May 22, 2019 by monkeysarefun

[justin1985]

27 minutes ago, monkeysarefun said:

Anyone got the S model yet? Probably not worth replacing  a  standard Photon, especially given the Anti-Aliasing firmware upgrade for it  is about ready to go  but if I was in the market for my first I'd probably spend the little extra on the S, only downside seems to be its plastic body..

 

https://www.windowscentral.com/anycubic-photon-vs-anycubic-photon-s

 

The more knowledgeable people on the Photon users group on Facebook are very negative about the S. 

 

It sounds like the original Photon uses a third party circuit board with standard chipset that are found in many other brands of similar 3D printer (developed by the people who make Chitubox slicing software). This means there are plenty of firmware updates, and skilled members of the community are hacking their own firmwares to bring features from other manufacturers models that use the same chipset etc. They're working on a project they're calling BlackBoa to create an open source firmware for it.

 

The Photon S is an entirely in-house AnyCubic design, apparently including the circuit board. Even the file format for sliced files is different, and all of the little tools that have been developed to verify, patch, visualise etc the sliced files won't work with the S.

 

That might sound like a niche issue, but I think the main concern is that the standardised nature of the original Photon means generic spare parts are widely available, and should AnyCubic stop supporting it in the future, the community can continue to support it and develop new slicer software, new firmware, etc.

 

The original Photon has just had the anti-aliasing firmware released. This only appeared in reaction to the spectacularly negative reaction and threats of boycotts on owners groups when AnyCubic put out a badly worded press release saying that they wouldn't support any user who made any modifications to their original Photon. (People were starting to flash their firmware with a modified one from a rival machine that did already have anti-aliasing). This was just after the Photon S was released, and people saw it as a quick jettisoning of the old model and it's users. AnyCubic quickly rowed back and promised to update the firmware on the Photon, and just have.

 

I guess, if you're confident that you'll only ever use it straight from the box, the S does have a slight advantage of a more robust Z axis. If they had upgraded the screen from 2K to 4K or something, it would be a clear game changer. But they didn't.

 

From experience, I can tell you that once you start 3D printing, tinkering and chasing ever better prints becomes a hobby in itself! And in that respect, the community support etc of the original Photon makes it a much better bet for the medium term.

 

J

[Alan_LSWR]

Hi. First post! I've just done my first test prints with the AnyCubic Photon, printing mostly horizontally and vertically. The vertical prints were fine, here's an example of a column about 60mm high and 10mm square at the base:

 

 

I'm very pleased with this and it's production ready (I need 13 of them). I checked with a square and it's perfectly vertical (the photo is misleading).

 

However, most of the horizontally printed items were bent, including the same column.

 

My theory is that they bend when using the spatula to remove the items. I found I was stabbing at the end of the prints which then popped off the plate. However the printed items are still relatively soft and my guess is that the ends bent before the forces eventually caused the rest of the print to break free. These are cornices and are clearly bent. They are 7mmx4mm in cross section. These items suffered from a white deposit. I read this is due to washing too long in IPA.

 

 

Next time I will try slicing them off along the length. I surmise a metal spatula will get them off easier but that may scratch the plate.

 

This little lamp is about 5mmx10mm. It needs to be printed in another orientation to avoid the infill. Aim is to insert an LED.

 

 

Everything was printed with the default settings. I'm quite pleased with my first attempt but find the slicing software rather clunky and suspect I shall get frustrated using it. Designs were done in Fusion 360.

 

 

Edited May 28, 2019 by Alan_LSWR
clarified column was vertical

[MikeTrice]

A couple of years ago I produced 3D models of a Greley Domed Roof end and carriage end. I really struggled with the roof end but recently had a brainwave and finally managed to complete the model. My Photon has been idle for a few weeks so was brought back online and the ends and domes printed:

 

I have some stepping occurring on the tip of the domed ends but this could be sorted with a little filler. At this point in time I have not upgraded my machine with the firmware to include antialiasing.

 

Having printed the items separately the obvious next step was to print them as a single entity and I am really pleased how they turned out:

 

The interior though is not so neat:

 

The ends were designed to match a MJT Aluminuium Roof and the fit is quite good:

 

As an experiment I also tried printing a section of roof but managed to break it separating it from the support. Surprisingly it has not warped so far but it does need to be thickened but I think I will stay with the Aluminium Roof.

[MikeTrice]

On 28/05/2019 at 22:26, Alan_LSWR said:

However, most of the horizontally printed items were bent, including the same column.

 

My theory is that they bend when using the spatula to remove the items. I found I was stabbing at the end of the prints which then popped off the plate. However the printed items are still relatively soft and my guess is that the ends bent before the forces eventually caused the rest of the print to break free. These are cornices and are clearly bent. They are 7mmx4mm in cross section. These items suffered from a white deposit. I read this is due to washing too long in IPA.

 

 

As you say the mouldings are slightly soft when removed from the build plate. I do find they sometimes flex during removal but seem to straighted themselves out soon afterwards. I use Methylated Spirits exclusively  which I find seems to work just as well. Most of my prints stay straight but I have experienced some that warp irrespective of how they are treated post printing. Warping can be caused by inequalities in the volumes of the printed items, or unequal post cure times. Normally I separate the prints from their support structure immediately before final curing but for items that warp it might be worth leaving them attached and post cure first. I have only ever used the plastic spatula that came with the machine to remove prints

 

As an aside I have just ordered my 4th litre of Anycubic resin and Amazon currently have it with £3 off until June 6th..

[Knuckles]

Didn't know there was a Photon AA upgrade, how do you apply it?  Unsure if I should currently in case I it up!

 

Coach bits look good.

 

I've been trying different resins and they mix well too so no issues there.

 

Black and grey current favourites.  Suitable colours and good for photographing before primer.

[MikeTrice]

3 hours ago, Knuckles said:

Didn't know there was a Photon AA upgrade, how do you apply it?  Unsure if I should currently in case I it up!

 

Coach bits look good.

 

I've been trying different resins and they mix well too so no issues there.

 

Black and grey current favourites.  Suitable colours and good for photographing before primer.

 

[Atso]

Those coach ends look really good Mike. The domed roof end is a bit of a pig to get right - my own method works but is time consuming. Regarding warping, I've recently found that my best results have come from leaving the prints on the supports and leaving for at least an hour in the UV light box. While it has not cured everything, most things seem to be more willing to retain their shape.

 

A couple of recent N gauge Photon prints from me.

 

 

The donor chassis for the N2 is from a Farish 4F along with one of the Shapeways Versatile Plastic 'pony' trucks I had made for the V1/V3. Unfortunately (but not unexpectedly), when used with a different donor chassis, the trailing wheels are far too far back. I'll knock up a new design and see how that works.

 

 

A GWR 43xx using most of the chassis bits from a Dapol Grange. I still have to print some replacement front and rear frame spacers to carry the cylinders and proving mounting points for the body...

 

I've not updated the firmware on my Photon yet either but I am keen to see if there is any real benefit to using Anti-Aliasing.

 

Edit: BTW I'm using 0.6mm diameter supports which are reduced to 0.5mm diameter at the head. I've found that this make the sanding of the supported area much less hassle.

Edited May 31, 2019 by Atso

[The Great Bear]

8 hours ago, Atso said:

 - my own method works but is time consuming. Regarding warping, I've recently found that my best results have come from leaving the prints on the supports and leaving for at least an hour in the UV light box. While it has not cured everything, most things seem to be more willing to retain their shape.

 

 

That's what I've found with my 4mm coach underframes, except that leaving the supports attached isn't practical so instead I print stiffening beams attached to the top of the underframe which I then cut off when cured, again an hour plus.