Recently I’ve been having trouble leveling my bed on my Creality Ender 3 Pro. It’s not that it’s hard to level or anything, it’s that it won’t stay level for more than a day or two. I’ve been leveling it the same way as always with a piece of paper and I’ve been sure to disable steppers. So if anyone knows what I can do about this, please let me know.
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$\begingroup$ I have the same printer, run into the same issue. Have you tried using a small level? you can use it to calibrate levelness in the Y-axis (front to back) and X-axis (left to right) along with your paper approach (which helps calibrate the z-axis) $\endgroup$– Glenn FerrieJan 21, 2021 at 17:53
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2$\begingroup$ @GlennFerrie you level the bed to the earth, but you need to make it parallel to the print head movements! $\endgroup$– TrishJan 21, 2021 at 23:57
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$\begingroup$ @Trish Thanks!! $\endgroup$– Glenn FerrieJan 23, 2021 at 2:12
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$\begingroup$ you can get stronger springs that go around the screws that hold the buildplate; they help hold it in place better. I hardly ever have to "touchup" my CR10S after that particular upgrade. Oh, and make sure to pre-heat the plate before leveling (which makes it "fun"); hot metal will have a different tension/gap than cold, which could explain why it's inconsistent for you if you adjust it at different temps than you print at. $\endgroup$– dandavisJan 24, 2021 at 11:29
1 Answer
Generally, there is no best way, there are only the ways that work for you.
I use a feeler gauge, mounted on a detachable holder. I home to 0, lift the Z by 1 mm, and then level the bed to the same number on the screws and corners. Then I home back to Z=0 and perform an extrusion test, and if that is not satisfactory, use a different number for the leveling. The number on the plunger does not generally read 1 mm, as there is an offset between the 0 of the gauge and the printer.
When I don't level from 0 or am in a hurry, I usually only alter leveling by doing about 2-5° turns on all the screws to adjust the 0-height via the nuts, using the visual of the printed line as my aide. This only works because I have the experience how a good first layer should look like.
Another typical method that I stopped using once I had the feeler gauge is the paper, but I found it inconsistent.
Do not do these:
- Leveling the bed with a level does not lead to good prints - your print bed needs to be parallel to the movement of the printhead, not to the earth!