1.10 Slicing in Bambu Studio
Module 1 · Part 3: Your print, step by step · Lesson 10 of 14 · about 6 min
Bambu Studio is installed on the wall computer in the printing room and on the workstations in the big room, with all the printers already set up.
The computers are shared. Each computer has one account that everyone uses. Nothing on them is private or safe, and that includes your files, the print history and the USB drives. Keep anything you care about somewhere of your own.
⛔ Hard rule. Never change or overwrite the installed default profiles.
You may change any setting for a single job, and you may save your own settings as a separate custom profile. If you save one, give it a clear name, such as your own name, so the next person can see it is yours and not an installed profile. Adding the filament brand and type to the name helps other members too.
Changing a setting doesn't change the installed profile by itself. Bambu Studio marks the profile as modified, and the change applies to the job you are slicing. The installed profile only changes if you save over it. So when Bambu Studio asks whether to save your changes, either discard them or save them as a new profile under your own name.
Only change a setting if you understand what it does. For your first prints, we recommend the installed profiles as they are. They work. The table below is for when you start adjusting.
Left: the name label Saint Phalle on the front of an X2D. Right: Bambu Studio's printer list, with Saint Phalle selected at the top
Bambu Studio's printer panel, with the printer, Sync info, plate type and project filaments marked with their step numbers
Step by step
Choose the printer, the one you are actually standing at. Each printer has a label with its name, and that is its name in Bambu Studio.
Sync with the printer, so the slicer knows which nozzle and filaments are loaded.
Import your model (
.stlor.3mf).Turn the model. How the part sits decides how much support it needs, which side gets rough, and which way the layers run. It costs nothing and often makes more difference than any setting (1.1 How a 3D printer works, and the words for it).
Choose the plate type that matches the plate in the printer. Getting this wrong is a classic mistake. The plate type sets the bed temperature, and a job sliced for the wrong plate can come loose halfway through.
Choose the filament: the slot your spool is in, with the right material.
Check the few settings below.
Slice. Check the estimated time, and compare the estimated filament weight with what is left on your spool.
Print.
The settings worth knowing
These are good starting points, not rules.
Setting | What it does | Good starting point |
|---|---|---|
Layer height | Detail versus speed | 0.2 mm |
Sparse infill | How dense the inside of the part is | 15–20 % for ordinary parts |
Wall loops | How many solid outlines each layer gets | 2–3 |
Top/bottom shells | How many solid layers close the part at top and bottom | 6 at 0.2 mm layer height* |
Supports | Temporary scaffolding under overhangs (1.1 How a 3D printer works, and the words for it) | Turn on if unsure; needed beyond about 45–50° from vertical |
* The installed profiles use fewer than this. Six is this course's suggestion, so that the shells match three wall loops. See below.
Walls and shells go together
Two sliced layers of a 30 mm cube: three wall loops around sparse infill at mid-height, and solid infill closing the top
A wall loop is one lap the nozzle makes around the edge of a layer, and each lap is about as wide as the nozzle: 0.4 mm. So the number of walls really sets a thickness. Two loops are about 0.8 mm, three about 1.2 mm, four about 1.6 mm. The walls carry most of a part's strength, much more than the infill. That is why adding walls usually strengthens a part more than adding infill.
Top and bottom shells work the same way, at the top and bottom instead of the sides. Each shell is one layer thick, so at 0.2 mm layers, six shells are about 1.2 mm.
So change them together. If you add walls for strength, add shells to match, so the part is equally solid in every direction. Three walls (1.2 mm) go with six shells (1.2 mm at 0.2 mm layers). With strong walls and a thin top, you get a part you can push your thumb through from above. More is not always better, though. Extra walls and shells cost plastic and time, and a decorative part doesn't need what a bracket needs.
Auto Bed Leveling set to Auto in both places. Top: Bambu Studio's send window. Bottom: the printer's Advanced Options before a print
✅ Hard rule. Leave Auto Bed Leveling on Auto, the default, and never switch it off. You can find the setting in Bambu Studio's print window and in the printer's advanced options. On Auto, the printer decides for itself when the plate needs probing. Switched off, the nozzle can scrape into the plate or print into the air.
Slicing on your own laptop
A USB drive in its slot under the touchscreen of the printer Saint Phalle
You can slice on your own laptop, at home or in the makerspace, and bring the file to the printer on a USB drive. Every printer has its own drive, and you may also use your own. Please don't connect your own computer to the printers over the network. Use a USB drive instead.
Save the sliced file in the top level of the drive, not in a folder, or the printer may not find it.
The printer's own drive: you may take it to your laptop elsewhere in the makerspace, but only long enough to copy your file onto it. Then put it straight back in its printer.
Your own drive: take the printer's drive out, put yours in and start your print. Once the print has started, take your drive out and put the printer's drive back, so it doesn't get lost. The printer copies the file to its own memory when the print starts, so taking your drive out doesn't stop the print.
Printer USB drives never leave the makerspace.
Nothing on the drive is safe. Nobody looks after what is on it, so your file may be gone next time. Keep your own copy somewhere else.