How to Print "Raftless" on the M200

With most materials and the correct settings, Z-Suite's rafts are easily removed, and we appreciate their great adhesion and leveling benefits. The raft is almost impossible to remove, however, from flexible TPU prints, so here is a procedure for creating prints with no raft attached. It doesn't eliminate the time and material used for printing the raft, but it does produce a raft-less part.

Requirements:

  1. You must use Z-Suite 1.4.1 or earlier. Later versions are not able to resume printing after pausing immediately after the raft is printed. Note that objects sliced in "Shell" mode in versions prior to 1.4.1 will not have a bottom surface; the feature to add a bottom was first implemented in 1.4.1.
  2. You can use firmware 1.x or you can use older versions, but the behavior is slightly different when resuming after a pause. 1.x jumps right back into printing immediately after selecting "Resume" on the control panel; older versions extrude some filament in order to prime the nozzle, and they prompt you to clean the nozzle and press the button again. The older versions (0.008 for example) will probably give a better bottom layer due to the nozzle priming step, but 1.0.2 works OK.


Slice your object as usual, using whatever settings you like. Often with TPU we like no infill for maximum transparency and flexibility, but in this example we did not select MESH or SHELL mode because the object requires infill.

slicing


After slicing, and before saving the z-code, set a pause at Layer 1, which will cause the printer to pause after finishing the raft. In later versions of Z-Suite this behavior was changed  so that pauses occur after the selected layer instead of before, but with 1.4.1 you should select Layer 1 by moving the slider all the way to the left, then pressing the right arrow key on your keyboard once to increment one layer.

pause


Launch the print normally; we recommend using the shim with PLA and TPU. When the raft has finished, the printer will pause and the extruder will move to the home position. While it's paused, scrape the raft from the perfboard and install a smooth bed surface 1.5mm thick on top of the perfboard. In the video we're using three 0.5mm sheets of some random plastic we had laying around the shop, clipped to the perfboard with binder clips. Since then we've been using polycarbonate with good results. Add some of your preferred adhesion promoting agent (glue stick is ours), wipe the nozzle, press "Resume" on the control panel, and away you go!






Model by "tjstroker" http://www.thingiverse.com/thing:230802

Here's a more recent "raftless" print in Sainsmart TPU done on a single sheet of 1.5mm polycarbonate:

IMG 0156 600


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