TAZ 6 with Dual Extruder v2



  • We recently purchased a Lulzbot TAZ 6 with an upgrade to their new Dual Extruder v2. After a few mis-steps with Cura, I discovered MatterControl. Initial testing seems good, except I've noticed a few things. Perhaps someone can shed some light?


    1) The starting gCode which performs the nozzle wipe does not seem to take into account the new dimensions of the head, starting too far forward on the Y axis and driving the 2nd nozzle off the cleaning strip and onto the front left corner's washer. I've compared Cura's starting gCode with MatterControl's and noticed a few little differences.

    Here is the wipe code from Cura:

    G1 X-17 Y100 F3000           ; move above wiper pad	
    G1 Z1                        ; push nozzle into wiper	
    G1 X-19 Y95 F1000            ; slow wipe	
    G1 X-17 Y90 F1000            ; slow wipe	
    G1 X-19 Y85 F1000            ; slow wipe	
    G1 X-17 Y90 F1000            ; slow wipe	
    G1 X-19 Y80 F1000            ; slow wipe	
    G1 X-17 Y95 F1000            ; slow wipe	
    G1 X-19 Y75 F2000            ; fast wipe	
    G1 X-17 Y85 F2000            ; fast wipe	
    G1 X-19 Y80 F2000            ; fast wipe	
    G1 X-17 Y70 F2000            ; fast wipe	
    G1 X-19 Y75 F2000            ; fast wipe	
    G1 X-17 Y95 F1000            ; slow wipe	
    G1 X-19 Y90 F1000            ; slow wipe	
    G1 X-17 Y85 F1000            ; slow wipe	
    G1 X-19 Y90 F1000            ; slow wipe	
    G1 X-17 Y80 F1000            ; slow wipe	
    G1 X-19 Y95 F1000            ; slow wipe	
    G1 X-17 Y75 F2000            ; fast wipe	
    G1 X-19 Y85 F2000            ; fast wipe	
    G1 X-17 Y80 F2000            ; fast wipe	
    G1 X-19 Y90 F2000            ; fast wipe	
    G1 X-17 Y85 F2000            ; fast wipe	
    G1 Z10                       ; raise extruder

    There's a few other things, like warming up both extruders, but I think this wipe code is the sticking point.

    2) When telling MatterControl that the TAZ 6 has 2 extruders, no adjustments appear to be made with regard to the position of the 2nd extruder in relation to the first. I did find the area to make that adjustment, but just have to confirm my measurements (I initially entered "5" in the Y offset, because the 2nd nozzle is in front of the first), forgetting that the software likely wants mm not cm. (I'll have to try "50" after this current print finishes) 😉

    3) The bed dimensions do not seem to be correct for the TAZ 6. The listed dimensions from AO say: Print Area: 280 mm x 280 mm x 250 mm (11.02 in x 11.02 in x 9.8 in), but MatterControl shows something else.

    4) Not specifically related to the TAZ, but there doesn't seem to be a PVA filament in the available filaments list. I chose to add a new filament and try to set it up, but it seems weird that filaments would include all sorts of printer settings, too. I'm wondering if I'm going too far. If I'm using nGen or ABS as my primary filament, and tell the printer to print support materials using head 2, and set head two to the specific temp I want in the settings/controls, will that suffice? Do I really need to go through and create a whole new filament?

    I'm going to poke around as best I can, but I'm learning under a deadline, so I don't have much time for trial and error on 8-hour print jobs.

    Any suggestions to help tweak MatterControl for this printer would be appreciated.

    Thanks,

    Dion



    1. Cura uses different start G-Code depending on whether you are using the single head or the dual head. MatterControl only has a profile for the single head right now. So for now you will just need to copy the start G-Code from Cura.
    2. Again, we have no profile for the dual head, so there are no offset settings built in.
    3. These values were probably originally copied from the TAZ 5 profile. I have corrected the TAZ 6 profile.
    4. You certainly do not need to include all the settings when creating a new material. If you look at any of the existing materials, you will see that most of them only include the temperatures and a couple other things like the density and cooling thresholds. It sounds like you might be getting confused because the editor allows you to adjust any settings you want. Here is a detailed description of how the quality and material settings work.

    I'd like to point out that you may be interested in our Printer Profile Bounty Program. If you create a profile for the dual head that works well, we would be interested in including it in MatterControl and we would give you a $15 MatterHackers store credit in return. Your profile must we well tested and in this case it should include material settings for PVA and any other filaments you think would be of interest to dual extrusion users.



  • Thanks for the reply. I took a chance a just copied the wipe code into MatterControl, replacing the relevant section. Seems to work just fine. I'd be more comfortable if the bed didn't shoot so far forward, as the first tip *just* touches the wipe pad, but I'll worry about tweaking that later.

    The Y axis for the 2nd extruder was "-50" (*minus* being the key), and seems to be working fine after a couple of test prints. It's weird thinking about how the numbers will be interpreted, but fortunately everyone seems to follow the same co-ordinates, so the dual extruder calibration steps for the TAZ 6 seemed to work just fine in MatterControl.

    I did see the Printer Profile Bounty. Not sure that I would have any *significant* tweaking to qualify, but I'll keep it in mind.

    As an aside, love the "Preheat" buttons!

    Thanks,

    Dion


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