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I have a monoprice printer, works great. .4mm nozzle. I bought a number of PLA solid colors and they all print reliably. I also bought 2 rolls of PLA translucent colors, and I have lots of trouble printing with them. What I eventually noticed was that when the translucent filaments extrude, they come out in a noticeably thinner stream.

Not sure why, I've tried increasing the hot end temperature and printing slower, but nothing seems to help. The effect seems to be that not enough filament comes out from the nozzle for the speed the head is printing at.

I use cura for the slicer, and I've tried changing the filament flow percentage and I've tried slowing down the print speed. Nothing seems to help, the nozzle ends up dragging the recently extruded filament around the bed until it all comes off.

Has anybody else seen this, where translucent filament extrudes thinner than solid colors? Any suggestions what to try to make it stick and print reliably?

Thanks.

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  • $\begingroup$ What temperatures are you printing at? Do you only have trouble with the first layer, or are you underextruding the entire print? $\endgroup$
    – Tom van der Zanden
    Commented Mar 26, 2016 at 7:48
  • $\begingroup$ Can you measure your standard filament and this new stuff with a Caliper? $\endgroup$
    – Eric Johnson
    Commented Mar 26, 2016 at 23:19
  • $\begingroup$ I've tried 195, 200 and 210, it comes out gooeyer at the higher temps but that doesn't make it come out in greater volume in any way. $\endgroup$
    – stu
    Commented Mar 27, 2016 at 0:17
  • $\begingroup$ The size of the new filament on the reel is the same 1.75, I'll measure the extruded size when my printer finishes its current job. I had measured it with a micrometer, that's how I proved to myself I wasn't seeing things, but I didn't write down the numbers. will do that when I get a chance. $\endgroup$
    – stu
    Commented Mar 27, 2016 at 0:19
  • $\begingroup$ Well I finally had a chance to extrude some of the translucent stuff and now it's coming out the same size as the full color filament, both are about 27/1000 of an inch in width. So I guess I'll see how the next print with it goes. $\endgroup$
    – stu
    Commented Mar 30, 2016 at 0:29

1 Answer 1

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In cura (if you are not in the quick print mode) you can dine the diameter of your filament. Setting the filament diameter to a smaller value will give you more plastic coming out of the nozzle. You can also set the flow percentage to more than 100%

You should also try to use a skirt. Some nozzles need some time until the flow is like it should be.

Another reason for this might be that the distance between bed and nozzle is too high. Try to level your bed so that the distance is less than before.

If all this doesn't work then it will at lest give you new ideas of where to look.

Best luck!

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  • $\begingroup$ I'll give your suggestions a try, thanks for the feedback. $\endgroup$
    – stu
    Commented Mar 26, 2016 at 21:26
  • $\begingroup$ so I had some more luck increating the flow percentage and shrinking the nozzle size. So far so good. Thanks. $\endgroup$
    – stu
    Commented Apr 5, 2016 at 0:42

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