Functional 3D Printing

1045 readers

1 users here now

Welcome fellow prototypers! This communities' purpose is to help others and share functional 3D Printing related information. While other 3D Printing Communities are a good resource, sometimes too many help posts get buried under memes and fluff. This will remain technically focused and keep the fluff removed. Please help your fellow 3D Printer hobbyists as much as you can with their issues! and showcase your functional prints and how you use or created them.

founded 2 years ago

Remaining Filament Tracking (self.functionalprint)

submitted 1 year ago by Chocrates to c/[email protected]

5 comments fedilink hide all child comments

Is there a way I can track how much filament is left on a roll?
Either an add-on sensor I can build or software that will track how much is used vs how much is supposed to be on the roll?

Have a Prusa Mk4 and it's working ok so far but been having trouble with very long prints so trying to figure out if my rolls have enough left

you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments

[–] tonbo 2 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

There are octoprint plugins for that, but most people seem to weight the rolls. Substract the weight of an empty roll and divide by weight vs length. You have to measure those things first.

Edit: and runout sensor of course

[–] IMALlama 1 points 1 year ago

Assuming the filament on roll actually weighs its marketed mass (eg you get 1 kg of plastic on a 1 kg spool), you should only need to weigh the spool before you use it. That said, I bet there's variation in density amount colors for the same vendor/material and I suspect they measure by length.

I'm going to have to weigh my next spool and look for a method to track usage. My prints tend to be larger and I'm constantly worrying about running out of filament. Thankfully my prints are mostly functional, so I don't mind a random color change, but babysitting until the end of the spool is a pain.