3DPrinting
3DPrinting is a place where makers of all skill levels and walks of life can learn about and discuss 3D printing and development of 3D printed parts and devices.
The r/functionalprint community is now located at: or !functionalprint@fedia.io
There are CAD communities available at: !cad@lemmy.world or !freecad@lemmy.ml
Rules
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No bigotry - including racism, sexism, ableism, homophobia, transphobia, or xenophobia. Code of Conduct.
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Be respectful, especially when disagreeing. Everyone should feel welcome here.
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No porn (NSFW prints are acceptable but must be marked NSFW)
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No Ads / Spamming / Guerrilla Marketing
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Do not create links to reddit
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If you see an issue please flag it
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No guns
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No injury gore posts
If you need an easy way to host pictures, https://catbox.moe/ may be an option. Be ethical about what you post and donate if you are able or use this a lot. It is just an individual hosting content, not a company. The image embedding syntax for Lemmy is 
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An STL file describes an object/shape. This needs to be translated into actual print instructions such as move to X/Y position, squirt plastic, move again, etc. This is what a slicer does: It "translates" from a shape to actual print instructions. I'm not sure, but I've always assumed that it's called slicing because it takes the 3D object and creates many vertical slices with print instructions.
I don't know about your printer specifically, but I guess it takes Gcode (which is what you get as output from a slicer) like most other printers? I suggest you grab PrusaSlicer as it's very flexible and supports a lot of different printer defaults. Load your STL in there, slice it, transfer the result to your printer, and you should in theory be good to go.
Tip: Start with something small.
I appreciate the help! Starting small, aye.
I've not seen the steps between STL and plastic model before so that's where I will be learning. I'm excited!
start out with a calibration print such as a benchy or XYZ cube using the default settings. if it looks wrong, Google the "symptoms" and go from there. modern printers take less fiddling than printers from 10 years ago so hopefully you won't need to do much.
That's what I'm hoping! I've got two friends that have printers and I'll get more tips from them.
nice!