Calibration Print Video and Layer Height Adjustments

I wanted to post a video of the printer making something, albeit something that still needs a lot of work.  Here is a video of my MendelMax 1.5 printing the 0.5mm-thin-wall.stl file from the calibration page of the RepRap.org Wiki, located here:  http://reprap.org/wiki/Calibration

After this print I remembered that I needed to try and tighten the timing belt on the X-axis.  I did that and printed another copy of the same object, and the results were "interesting".

On some of the passes around the print, when the extruder reversed and the printer moved up in the Z-axis, the PLA would not begin flowing out of the nozzle again until the printer had moved down the rest of that side of the print and started to move along the adjacent wall.  The last two walls that the printer formed looked very good, but something appeared to be going on with the extruder reverse setting or flow rate or something along those lines.

Next I decided to adjust some of the layer height settings, since that is what this particular .stl file is supposed to help you calibrate.  Slic3r was at 0.4mm layer height by default.  I tried 0.5mm and got a print with much more wavy walls.  Then I tried 0.3mm . . . wow!  I'm sure there are lots of other variables at play, but two of the four walls were almost perfect.  Brings a smile to my face . . . :)

So, for now, I choose a 0.3mm layer height.

On to more printing!!

D