this post was submitted on 18 Jan 2025
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On multicolor printing, why does the prime tower have to be as high as the current layer? (lemmy.world)
submitted 2 days ago by Trail@lemmy.world to c/3dprinting@lemmy.world
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Recently bought an A1 mini with AMS, which has been generally great. I have been printing various things, but was thinking if the wasted filament during color changes could be further reduced.

I was wondering, if the color change happens on a high layer, why does the prime tower need to be built as high in order to flush when the color change happens? Is it not a good idea to have the prime tower not generated up until the color change is needed, and then start building it on the plate directly?

This would imply z axis movement whenever the color changes, but is it bad for some reason? It would take slightly more time, but the filament change already takes plenty of time so I assume it is not a factor of the already printed model cooling or so. Could it be something like we want to avoid unnecessary Z axis movements to avoid alignment mistakes maybe with the current layer, if the z movement is not considered precise enough?

Or it is just considered that the aavings of building a shorter tower any not that much comparatively? Anyone more knowledgeable has any thoughts?

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[–] Deckweiss@lemmy.world 8 points 2 days ago (2 children)

I usually just disable it. Didn't see any noticable differences with or without it.

The only case where I enabled it just in case was when printing with PETG and using PLA as supports.

As to why it has to be as high: I think the printer is not so smart. Depending on the tower and object position it might crash the X axis gantry into your print if it had to go down for the prime tower. (I assume that because there are lots of unnecessary safety margins like this when printing multiple objects one by one)

[–] SzethFriendOfNimi@lemmy.world 2 points 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago)

There’s also the retraction/wipe of filament. So if you can’t do it inside the print then the tower is used to give that surface to wipe off against.

Worst case then would be boogers/wisps

[–] Trail@lemmy.world 2 points 2 days ago

To be honest I haven't tried without it (didn't want to risk the rest of the filament if it would turn out poorly), but I reduce the size to 15mm/15mm or so, plus flushing into infill/supports, and has been ok so far.

I'll try without it sometime when I print for my kid and don't care as much :)