Portabee 3D printer

[calida]

Hello everyone
I have built my portabee and she's great but whilst i've got better settings and smoother prints; i'm still not there yet - some little holes here and there and gaps.
Does anyone have any tips or advice? I'm drawing in Sketchup, slicing in Cura and then Pronterface.
Thanks
Calida

[FatFreddie]

Hi Calida,

Do you have any pictures of the problems?

What material are you printing?

Do you have a fan cooling the print after the first layer?

Mark

[calida]

I don't have any real problems just some holes and pits in the print; but not throughout just in places (mainly on organic shapes). I do have a cooling fan (although i've jst checked and it appears not to work)....could that be it??
Calida

[FatFreddie]

I don't have any real problems just some holes and pits in the print; but not throughout just in places (mainly on organic shapes). I do have a cooling fan (although i've jst checked and it appears not to work)....could that be it??
Calida

The cooling fan is needed for small parts - if they're not cooled, heat builds up in the part and it melts. The fan is normally off for the first layer and is then turned on for subsequent layers - this needs to be configured in your slicer program if you have a fan that can be controlled.

This (http://reprap.org/wiki/Print_Troubleshooting_Pictorial_Guide) is a good guide to print problems but doesn't have much on blobs or pitting :-( I'd guess it's your retract settings which are designed to stop plastic oozing out when moving the print head between printed areas but I'm afraid I don't have much experience with these settings (it's on my list of things to do).

Mark

[calida]

Well the problem seems to have gone ; the fan is working and smaller parts are just as solid as others. pretty good print quality except easy to break (compared to the prints from the Cubify at work) . Anyone know why this is?