What does everyone have better experiences printing on… borosilicate glass bed or some type of textured print bed?
My main issue hasn’t really been the adhesion, but mainly warping with PLA. So perhaps its not the bed but my temperature settings. What are you all printing at for nozzle and bed temps for PLA?
I can post some pictures later of the warping. I am mainly having this issue on my Ender 3 V2. My MP3DP Repeat has been doing well on this.
I’m using the flexible bed that came with Ender 3, I find it easier to remove print. My PLA or PLA+ nozzle temp is 210C and bed temp is 60c. I get no warping at these temps, I originally printed at 190 and 50 with mixed results.
I used to use cheap picture frame glass. Borosilicate glass has better thermal resistance, particularly to more rapid temperature changes, but I’ve never had a thermal fracture from Dollar store picture frame glass.
Ove tried all kinds of things for adhesion. Hairspray, glue stick, even some specialty mixes for the job. With ABS, I found that a slurry of ABS and acetone worked about as well as anything, and better than most things.
Now I print on PEI, and find that it works pretty well. I no longer use ABS to print much at all, since I started working with PETg. The only thing that I miss about ABS is vapour smoothing (Putting the part in an enclosure with acetone on the bottom and letting the acetone vapour melt away the ridges on the print.)
The PEI coated spring steel plate works nicely, and because you can flex it, prints tend to come off fairly easily, though some adhere TOO well, and are difficult to remove. I like the smooth plates instead of the textured ones, but I have both, and both work fairly well, once they’ve been cleaned thoroughly.
I print on PEI. I print PLA. I was hesitant for a long time, because compared to the blue painters tape, it is much more expensive.
But it just never wears out. It can wear out. But practically speaking, it doesn’t.
In my experience, the biggest factor for warping is bed leveling. Having a consistent first layer will make it cool at an even pace and not warp as much. I also print with a brim if I am worried. It can help get a print to the finish line.
But I still have trouble with warping on some prints.
Here’s my experience- I’ve had good success with glass bed and hairspray for ABS, PLA, and PETG.
There’s a specific brand that has worked better for me- I’ll get a picture and upload that.
ABS- 100C bed temp. Pops off when cooled.
PETG- 54C bed temp. Pops off when cooled
PLA- 50C bed temp. Pops off or needs to be cooled a bit.
I’ve had this result on glass beds with my Lulzbots (Had AO100s and the Taz 5), my Qidi tech x1, my FlashForge creator pro, and on my Solidoodle workbench.
On the Workbench, I actually replaced the glass bed with a home depot 12x12 mirror tile and hold it on with swiss clips. Works great.
I’ve had success printing flexible filaments on an aluminum plate with Kapton on it. Have to wipe that down really well so there’s no residues before starting a print.
The buildtack surface worked OK for me on the Qidi and FlashForge, but tended to peel up and leave me grumpy. That caused me to yank the surface off and substitute borosilicate glass.
I have used PEI on TAZ family printers and that worked really well- but I’ve had several instances where ABS stuck so hard that I damaged the build plate trying to get it removed.
I’ve also used blue painters tape for PLA on unheated beds. Key there is a thick and slow first layer and getting a really good bed level and first layer nozzle height.
I’ve also had success printing ABS on top of a NinjaFlex raft (on top of Kapton tape, on top of an aluminum plate). Seems silly, but avoided curling on one really tough print that spanned a full bed on the FlashForge
I use a very watered down woodworking pva glue on 200x200 mirror tiles on one of my printers and the same mix on a 200x300 ali bed on my other regular printer. Spread the mix over the plate and let it dry. The adhesion is better on the mirror but is still ok on the ali. (I’m no chemist but PVA and PLA sound like they are nearly the same so my reasoning was they would likely stick together well 
)
I started out using borosilicate glass but I found that used to splinter some times leaving pits in the glass. I only use pla @ 210 max with a bed temp of 60 max. Eventually the mirror cracks, usually when trying to spatula the print off the bed before letting it cool enough, if you leave it to cool properly the print usually lets go by itself with a satisfying ‘pop’.
I print on blue painters tape with hairspray.
For pla and pla+ my temp is 215 for the nozzle and 60 for the bed.
I found breezes to be one major culprit in warped prints.
I have also learned that leveling your bed at temp makes a difference.
For Z offset I found slightly pinching a piece of paper and then subtract the thickness of the paper. And this at operating temps as well.
These are some things that helped eliminate warped prints. I hope it helps