v1.40
Welcome to printer software v1.40. In this release, we’ve included the following improvements to your print process:
- Improved default print plans for rigid resins on L1, M3, and M3 Max printers
- Modification to oxygen supply for M3 and M3 Max printers
- Better automatic part scaling to drive dimensional accuracy for EPU 45 Damping
- Snap multiple parts to the platform at once with Auto Snap (BETA)
- Improvements to the Print Plan Adjustments interface
- More accurate print time estimates for M3 and M3 Max printers
- Print preparation speed improvements
- Support for Flexcera™ Smile Ultra+ resins
- Easily rename printers on demand
- Miscellaneous bugfixes
- v1.40.0-1442.92 released to select printers on or after 08/17/2023
- v1.40.0-1442.97 released to select printers on or after 08/24/2023
- v1.40.0-1442.98 released to select printers on or after 09/06/2023
- v1.40.0-1442.100 released to select printers on or after 09/19/2023
- v1.40.0-1442.113 released to select printers on or after 10/11/2023
Carbon requires that customers update software regularly. With the exception of specified Version Lockable older version(s), Carbon does not support non-current software versions. If you require support but are running an unsupported software version, the first troubleshooting step is to move to a supported software version.
The following are supported printer software versions as of the publication of these release notes (August 2023):
- v1.40 (current version)
- v1.39 (supported until December 2023 OR until 2026 if your printer is enrolled in Version Lock)
Any feature marked as “BETA” in the user interface is considered by Carbon to be an Early-Access Technology. Early-Access Technologies may not be at the level of performance typical of a final product or feature offering, and such features may be altered or withdrawn by Carbon at any time and without warning.
The default print plans for printing rigid resins on L1, M3, and M3 Max printers have been improved to deliver significantly faster print times and improved print success. The new default print plans center around Carbon’s Force Feedback technology: print parameters such as pump height are now customized based on part geometry and are more responsive to resin viscosity.
Rigid prints on L1, M3, and M3 Max printers that use the default print plan are now 15-25% faster. Geometries with large cross-sections and suction cups now print more successfully.
Dental lab customers should note that these changes impact all dental resins, and can enable upwards of 33% higher throughput for M3 and M3 Max printers.
For non-dental applications, if you have struggled to achieve print time goals or successful prints for potential projects, consider re-printing after updating to v1.40, as the improved print plan may yield different outcomes.
Note that estimated print times (pre-print) may not reflect experienced print time improvements. Print time estimates are based on fleet-wide data about past prints, and may over- or under-estimate print times on the default print plan until an upcoming software release.
Additional notes:
- Projects that use custom print scripts or print plan modifications may or may not see improvements based on this change, depending on the extent and type of print plan adjustments that have been made
- Dental labs should note that the Small Unvented Cavities print profile will
- The default print plan is now faster than the Dynamic print profile in most situations. If you currently print any projects using the Dynamic print profile, Carbon recommends trying the default print plan, as you may be able to achieve faster print times
- For L1 printers, only general-purpose L1 printers used with Type C cassettes are impacted by this change. L1 printers configured for aligner manufacturers or L1 prints with other cassette types are not affected
- Better print results for suction cup geometries may not be experienced if a build contains a variety of geometries. If you are printing suction cup geometries, Carbon recommends printing with only a single suction cup design per build in the same orientation across the platform to allow the best conditions for suction cup detection
If you are unsure how this change will impact a specific project, or if you experience difficulties, please contact [email protected].
For M3 and M3 Max printers, Carbon has modified the method by which oxygen is supplied during printing. This change impacts all prints on M3 and M3 Max printers (all resins, all print plans). This modification is expected to increase the long-term reliability of printers’ oxygen systems.
The following (rare) cases may benefit from additional support from Carbon:
- Printers located at high elevations (2,000 meters/6,500 feet or higher) may experience noticeable differences in printing. Specifically, dental labs at these altitudes may experience tighter die fit; contact [email protected] for guidance on a print profile that can counteract this effect
- A small increase in dimensional variation in the z-direction (+/- ~3.5 um) and/or overall wall thickness dimensions (+ ~15 um) might impact very sensitive prints; slower printing can counteract these effects
- Via Print Plan Adjustments, reducing motor speeds, adding delays, increasing pump heights, and/or reducing exposure compensation can be helpful
- Contact [email protected] if you do not have access to Print Plan Adjustments, and/or if you require guidance on how to adjust your print plan appropriately
M3 and M3 Max printers that are currently configured to use an external oxygen source may benefit from disconnecting that oxygen source. Carbon will contact impacted customers directly to discuss the proper workflow for this change. If you believe you may be impacted but have not been contacted, reach out to [email protected].
For select resins, Carbon automatically applies geometry-aware scaling factors to parts to counteract the effects of mass loss and drive dimensional accuracy in final parts. In v1.40, appropriate scaling factors are applied for EPU 45 Damping resin.
More information about automatic part scaling is available in the release notes for printer software v1.39.
In past software versions, Carbon has offered a “snap to platform” orientation command that allows the user to select a surface on a single part and immediately “snap” that surface snugly to the print platform.
The “snap” action is now available for multiple parts at one time by using the new Auto Snap feature to snap multiple selected parts to the platform surface in one action. The Auto Snap algorithm automatically detects the largest flat surface on each selected part and snaps it to the platform. This feature is particularly recommended for use with dental models.
Auto Snap is accessed via the Orientation interface, below the original Snap to Platform command, which is now labeled “Manual Snap.”
You can select multiple parts via Shift+click, or by using your mouse to drag a box around all intended parts (the latter is recommended to select all parts on the platform quickly).
If the operation is not successful for all selected parts, an error message will be displayed that allows you to identify which parts were not successfully snapped. Please ensure that you carefully review and remediate any failed parts before proceeding with your print.
Keep in mind that while aligning the largest flat surface of a part with the platform is useful in certain cases, it is not the optimal printing orientation for all geometries. Using Auto Snap may not result in an ideal orientation for printing your part – even if the algorithm succeeds. If you are not sure how best to orient your parts for successful printing, Carbon recommends using Auto Orientation for a more holistic analysis of part geometry and relevant suggestions.
The Auto Snap operation is not intended for use with latticed parts.
Auto Snap is offered as a Beta feature at this time.
The Print Plan Adjustments interface allows users to make changes to the print plan used to print a specific project. Print Plan Adjustments may be used to address print defects, enhance the chances of success on a first print of a challenging part, and/or optimize a production print for speed. In printer software v1.40, additions have been made to the Print Plan Adjustments interface to improve usability. The notes below provide an overview only; for definitions and guidelines on new parameters and graphs, log in to Carbon Academy and access the Print Plan Adjustments section of the Printer UI course xxx.
Print Plan Adjustments is an optional feature that is enabled for customers upon request. Reach out to [email protected] if you would like access to this tool.
While many parameters make sense to adjust on a slice-by-slice basis, certain parameters are more appropriately applied to an entire print. Previously, the only parameter available to set for an entire print was the Base Exposure Multiplier. With v1.40, additional parameters are available:
- Pump Up
- Minimum Force for Peak Detection ^
- Pump Height Buffer ^
- Maximum Pump Height ^
- Settle Up
- Post-Pump Delay Timeout ^
- Maximum Number of Timeout Slices ^
- Settle Down
- Pre-Exposure Delay Timeout
- Other
- Heater Setpoint ^^
^ M3, Max, and L1 printers only
^^ Requires heating-capable hardware
Printer software v1.40 adds control over the following parameters on a slice-by-slide level:
- Exposure
- Brightline Interior Exposure Time
- Brightline Exterior Exposure Time
- Brightline Border Thickness Pixels
- Brightline Outer Borders
- Other
- Slice Thickness
- Note that this parameter adjusts the thickness with which indicated slice groups are printed, but it does not impact the original slicing of the file. Slice images are created using the single slice thickness set during Print Preparation; then, this Slice Thickness Print Plan parameter can change how those images physically print (eg, thicker or thinner than the slices created during Print Preparation). This setting is complex and often requires changing other print plan parameters to be successful
New slice-level parameters listed above are available to a limited subset of users in v1.40 and will be available to all customers with Print Plan Adjustments enabled in a future release.
Carbon recommends reviewing updated training materials on Carbon Academy before using these parameters, which are intended for highly skilled users. To access training, log in to Carbon Academy and access the Print Plan Adjustments section of the Printer UI course xxx.
Print plan graphs help you visualize how your printer will behave during a print. Printer software v1.40 includes new graphs to visualize important inputs to the print plan, including:
- Deepest Pixel Filled
- Deepest Pixel Cavity
- Minimum Distance from Peak ^
^ M3, Max, and L1 printers only
- Resolved a bug that prevented users from re-analyzing a print if the name of an uploaded print script had not changed (relevant if a user has changed the contents of a script without renaming it)
- Adjusted the way that Exposure Compensation and Exposure Time are displayed in print graphs to eliminate a potential source of confusion
- Resolved several minor bugs that impacted performance and/or user experience
To improve customers’ ability to accurately estimate the cost of projects and effectively plan production schedules, time estimates for M3 and M3 Max printers have been improved. While print time estimates for these machines can never be perfect due to the impact of using force feedback technology to adjust the print plan in real time in response to in situ print forces, quoted estimates are now more accurate.
Prints in rigid resins that use the default print plans are currently the most likely to experience differentials between predicted and actual print times due to accompanying changes to that print plan in v1.40 (described earlier in this document). We expect to improve these time estimates in a future release.
Various processes have been optimized so that key steps in print preparation are now faster:
- Project creation (processing time when setting up a new project) is now faster for all projects; impacts will be most noticeable when creating a project with one or more large, complex models
- Project edits (such as part transform operations or editing supports) are now faster
- The Gen2 slicer is now faster for all projects
Printer software now fully supports Flexcera™ Smile Ultra+ resins on M2 (including M2D), M3, and M3 Max printers. Note that there are two options in the resin drop-down menu; for best print results, please ensure that you select the resin consistent with the shade you are printing:
- Flexcera Smile Ultra+ Bleach
- Flexcera Smile Ultra+ (A1, A2, B1)
If you are printing crown & bridge applications, Carbon recommends using the following new print profile for best results: Flexcera Smile Ultra+ C&B. Other applications should be printed with the default print profile.
You can now easily rename printers in your fleet at will. Flexible printer names can help you organize your production floor in a logical, understandable manner.
To rename a printer, visit the Printer Dashboard (print.carbon3d.com)xxx and click on the three dots in the lower right-hand corner of a printer tile. Use the modal to input a new name for your printer.
Renaming functionality will appear on the Printer Dashboard for all printers in late August, and you will be able to set names for all printers at that time. However, the renaming will only be partially complete until v1.40 is installed on printers. Renaming a printer on the Dashboard will prompt the new name to display in some areas of the interface (areas that are governed by the Printer Dashboard itself), but other areas of the interface (such as the printer project list, print list, and queue management interface) will not reflect the update until v1.40 is installed.
Additional notes about using this feature:
- Renaming is only available to Admin users. Individuals with the User or Operator role type cannot rename printers
- Renaming a printer may take several minutes to propagate throughout the system
- Printer names must be unique within your organization; you cannot have two printers with the same name
- Printer names can contain 1-20 alphanumeric characters and select symbols: dash (-) and period (.). Spaces are allowed, but become dashes (-) when transcribed into a printer URL. Underscores are not allowed. Regardless of whether you have entered an upper- or lowercase character, the first character of a printer name will be automatically capitalized in some areas of display
- While the name you have chosen will be displayed wherever you see the printer name, Carbon will maintain a consistent record of the printer’s name at the time of manufacture, allowing for continuity in record-keeping. If you use print or printer data available via API endpoints or CSV exports, your chosen printer name will be reflected in the field labeled “printer alias.” “Printer name” will continue to reflect the printer’s name at manufacture
If your organization employs strict network settings that require specific whitelisting of allowed URLs, note that changing the name of a printer will require coordination with your IT team.
Every Carbon printer has its own URL, and changing the name of a printer will now alter this URL. For example, a printer named m9999 can be reached at m9999.customer.print.carbon3d.com. If you change the name of this printer to “New-Name,” the printer’s URL will now be new-name.customer.print.carbon3d.com, as long as your printer is not already operating with a custom domain.
Before renaming any printers, confirm requirements with your IT team to ensure your access to the printer interface is not interrupted.
While the features described above are the most noticeable and impactful changes in this software release, there are a few more minor changes you might want to be aware of.
- Printers that use an ergonometric setting (a lower platform height at the end of prints to facilitate platform removal in repetitive production scenarios) will now move to that post-print position more quickly after a print is completed; contact [email protected] if you are interested in returning to a slower post-print movement speed
- Gen2 Autolayout (currently a Beta feature) has been improved to respond to reported failure cases (single large part; >100 small parts)
- The L1 B1 EPU Default print profile cannot be accidentally used with inappropriate hardware and/or resins: files not using an L1 printer, B1 cassette, and EPU resin will fail to analyze and will show an error
- Note: If you have prepared projects on older versions of software (v1.39 or earlier) using the L1 B1 EPU Default print profile, your print profile selection will not automatically carry forward after updating to v1.40; please re-select the print profile before your next print (if you do not take this action, “Unknown Profile” will be displayed as your print plan)
- When adjusting the scale factors applied to parts in the Print Prep UI (not the Correction Scale factor), clicking the up/down button adjusts values by .1 rather than .01; this should allow for faster adjustments
- Note that specific values can still be typed in if desired; additionally, the Correction Scale up/down controls continue to adjust in increments of .01
- The list of keyboard shortcuts in the Print Prep UI (click the “Keyboard Shortcuts” icon in the lower left-hand corner of the screen) has been reformatted and re-ordered for readability and usability
Did you know? Keyboard shortcuts can make navigating the Print Prep interface faster and easier. Review available shortcuts by clicking the icon in the lower left-hand corner of the screen.
The following issues have been resolved with this release.
- Cross-printer queueing works as expected for projects shared between Carbon customers as .carbon files
- The incidence of the display of red artifacts on build Traveler documents has been greatly reduced (note that red artifacts are a graphics issue only, and have never represented model or print errors)
- Patch outlines for textures (limited-release Early Access feature) display as intended
- Running a Manual or Auto Snap operation on a part to which supports have previously been added will properly clear all supports before snapping the part to the platform
- Build Traveler PDFs are generated more reliably
- Printers are more stable in situations with intermittent power connectivity
- The printer front screen no longer occasionally shows a slice from another project mid-print (rare; never affected printing)
- Checking the “Release Film” checkbox in the Print Prep UI properly restricts the available build area for L1 printers
Update for v1.40.0-1442.97
Resolved an issue that caused some parts to float above the print platform under the following circumstances:
- Multiple model files (with different geometries) are added to the print platform via the Print Preparation UI
- Multiple model files (with different geometries) are downloaded together from the Print Preparation UI as STLs
- The resulting STLs are re-uploaded together to the Print Preparation UI
Update for v1.40.0-1442.98
Resolved an issue that prevented use of the Gen2 slicing algorithm on encrypted projects.
Update for v1.40.0-1442.100
Resolved an issue that could create IP conflicts (and thus block access to the Printer Web UI) for some users.
Update for v1.40.0-1442.113
Resolved two issues:
- M3 printers are no longer susceptible to frequent air flow leak alerts
- Resolved a bug that could cause a print plan to be overwritten with another project if prints were analyzed/sliced at the same time (within ~500 milliseconds)
The “Pre-v1.37 DPR 10” resin version is not compatible with printer software v1.40. If you are unable to make the transition and would like to continue to use this resin version, you can opt in to our Version Lock program and remain on printer software v1.39 with full support. Contact [email protected] if you would like to consider continuing to print with this resin version.
While Carbon encourages customers to stay current with software updates to access the latest features and printing improvements, we recognize that some production applications have stringent validation rules, and may be better served by a stable software version. For this reason, Carbon offers a Version Lock program that allows customers to stay on a single, specified version of software for up to three years, with full support.
v1.39.0-1383.122 is available for Version Lock. If you are interested in placing your printer(s) on Version Lock, contact [email protected].
We love hearing from you about your workflow, your parts, and how we can improve. You can reach out to the Carbon Support Team at [email protected].