As the surface area is relatively small on the groves, what we see is the effect of heat transfer / disruption from the current layer on the layer previous, whereby the heat from the nozzle when applying layer 3 on top of layer 2, has distorted layer 2. When printing at lesser microns, you are putting more layers down. In the case of the coupling above, one of the main reasons that printing at 20 micron layer height produced a worse finish was mainly due to the small surfaces in the main section. There are so many other factors that affect the finished output, these include (but aren't limited to!) 3D printer set-up (build & configuration), accuracy, part geometry, part size and the type of material used. Why does lower layer height not always mean the best 3D printed result? Part B was printed at 60 microns and Part A at 20 microns. No, in fact it may surprise some, but Part C was 3D printed at 180 microns. So which part was printed at which layer height? Was Part C printed at 20 microns?
Which one visibly looks the best? Easy answer: Part C. Same part, printed on the same printer, same material, same settings except for one thing - the layer height: Take a look at the Coupling in the photo (part source: Thingiverse Thing 38678). lesser microns) then you should always get better results. So in theory, if you always print at a lower layer heights (i.e. The lower the micron, the higher the resolution.įDM 3D printers vary in their layer height capability, generally we see machines running from 10 microns to 300 microns layer heights. It is normally used to refer to the layer height, also known as print resolution or Z height. What is a micron? A micron is equal to one millionth of a metre. Right? Well our Technical Team have put it to the test to highlight what microns really mean in a real-world application. Printer A can do 20 microns whereas Printer B can only do 100 microns, so A must be a better printer! With plastic extrusion (FFF/FDM) desktop 3D printers, one of the most used, and perhaps, most mis-used terms acting as a means of comparing different machines is microns.
This post was originally written in 2016 and has since been refreshed and republished for accuracy purposes