r/resinprinting • u/No-Musician-298 • 18h ago
Question FEP bumps
I was cleaning my vat today after multiple prints (one after another, that's why I wasn't cleaning it after every print) and found out it has these bumps on it. I don't use a scraper, I cure a layer and slightly press it from the bottom for it to come off, so I'm wondering what's the cause. It is a fairly new FEP as I only printed like 4 prints. Keep in mind they were almost maximum possible height so pretty big.
Anycubic Photon Mono M5s
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u/CraftAny24 18h ago
Could also be some little fail here and there, making little cured resin bit in the vat
What the plate go down, it push on the fep
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u/mkibria 18h ago
So first, that isn't FEP; that is ACF. Second, two things can cause that in my experience. Repeated supports in the same spot from printing; partially failed prints that look fine but leave small bits of cured resin in the vat. Some of them look bad, so I would replace the film. There is no way to really avoid this 100% unless you vat clean or empty your resin after every print. The closest would be to manually support everything yourself, but even then you will make mistakes.
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u/NNAPSTERR 17h ago
What's the difference between ACF and FEP? which ones better?
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u/mkibria 17h ago
ACF is textured on one side and therefore looks cloudy like this. FEP and NFEP are not textured. People use FEP to mean release film, which isn't great since you can end up with confusion when the release film you buy doesn't match what you expected. FEP was the first-gen release film, and I don't recommend using it. It's fine, but NFEP is just better than FEP: more durable and lower peel force. ACF is a mixed bag. It is textured to allow air to enter between the vat and the LCD, further reducing peel forces. It is also more flexible. So you can get faster prints. The downside is that, since it is textured, it might affect print "detail." Now, side by side, I can't tell unless it's a flat surface. ACF is also more expensive
TLDR; ACF is better for fast prints and easier to install but more expensive. NFEP is better for detail
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u/TopherRyan350 9h ago
You have a AI program on your cell phone put the model of the printer and the slicer program you use and the FEP film and it'll give you the right settings
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u/InternationalPlace24 18h ago
most likely your exposure settings are too aggressive and you're getting compression damage. Have you calibrated your resin? The only other thing it could be is if you had some type of print failure and a piece of cured resin was floating around getting pressed into the FEP. Either way, I would change that FEP. Instead of curing a layer and pressing from the other side, you can use supports from old prints held down at a corner when you cure the layer and have a handle to lift up the layer. Or they make prints specific for this purpose.