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3D Systems, Inc.
41
MANUAL OPERATIONS
The
Manual Operations (Man Ops)
section of the Sinter application provides access to several components of the printer which need
to be controlled manually while operating the system .
Homing the Part Piston and Roller
It may be necessary to “home” (reset the reference limit position) the piston and the roller . This needs to be done before a print job is
begun and may need to be performed during maintenance procedures .
Before you can do either, these dependencies must be met:
•
SLS system start-up is complete and Sinter is running . Refer to the section,
“ProX 500 Start-Up Sequence” on page 33
.
•
The
Add Powder Layer
window is closed .
To Home the Part Piston
Before you can move the part piston to any position other than the home limit, the piston must be successfully homed . All the buttons
except for
Home Limit
are dimmed for a piston that needs to be homed .
1 . To home the piston, click the
Home Limit
button in the
Piston Control
window .
2 . After the piston is homed, click the
Start Position
button
To Home the Roller
•
To home the roller, click the
Home Limit
button in the
Roller Control
window .
Adding and Leveling Powder
Just before you run your print, use the
Add Powder
dialog box in
Man Ops
mode to add and level powder in the print chamber .
Adding powder creates a smooth powder bed on the floor of the print chamber.
To Add and Level Powder
Use the
Add Powder
button to manually add a layer of powder to the print bed . Before you can add a powder layer, all these
dependencies must be met:
•
The roller must be stopped at the left limit .
•
The piston must be homed and if empty, moved to the
Start
position .
•
The
Roller Control
and
Piston Control
dialog boxes must not be open .
When you click
Add Powder
, the
Add Powder Layer
dialog box appears:
To Use the Add Powder Layer Dialog Box
Change the settings for each parameter in the Add Powder Layer dialog box to the settings you want, then click the Add Layer button .
NOTE: Click the Stop button if you need to stop the roller while it is adding a layer . If you do this, you must move the
roller back to a limit before continuing . Click the Move To Limit button to move the roller back to a limit .
NOTE: Under some circumstances, the system may not correctly update the Move to Limit, Stop, or Add Layer
buttons; they may remain dim when they should be enabled . If a button you need to use is dim when it should be
enabled, close and reopen the Add Powder Layer dialog box to enable the button .