Discussion about 0.6mm Nozzle size, Arachne, Cura -> PrusaSlicer

[KaPH33n]

So people are talking about switching from 0.4 to 0.6 nozzle size. But I'll lose my fine detail?! Apparently there's some advanced slicer tech called Arachne that solves that, which existed first in Cura. Because Cura is open source it has been ported or transitioned into PrusaSlicer as well now? Thomas Sanladerer made a video about this.

Anyone have any personal experience with this? Anyone else ready to order a 0.6 or are you skeptical like me?

I would say that I am a hobbyist, but I am also starting my own 3D Printed Parts supply... so thinking commercially a speedier process is enticing. Theoretically I would trade off some detail for speed, but it sounds like the 0.6 nozzle with Arachne can print the same or better as 0.4?

 

[socalcade]

I've been using a 0.6 for over a year, without Arachne, and it's been more than fine for printing everything I've personally needed. After seeing Thomas's video in my feed last week, I did download the PrusaSlicer alpha (I have an Ender 5 Pro, switched from Cura to PrusaSlicer years ago and haven't looked back) to get Arachne, but I haven't printed anything with it yet.

 

[Zepherino]

I probably won't work with PrusaSlicer 2.5 until it hits release, but I imagine that .6mm nozzle will be fine for most applications in terms of making parts.

The video Tom made goes into pretty good detail in terms of why .6mm will suffice for most applications now that you can dynamically control extrusion width. Even before the Arachne engine allowed this, it was not uncommon to see people recommend .6 nozzles for general purpose printing (Prusa made a video on the benefits of .6 nozzles back in 2018

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XvSNQ7rVDio
).

The big thing about a larger nozzle size is that you increase your extrusion width and layer height limit, which will improve the strength and print speed of your part, as long as your hotend and part cooling can keep up. Increased extrusion width is a huge time saver because you can reduce the amount of perimeters vs .4mm while maintaining the same print thickness.

The only reason why I'll mainly stay on .4mm with my main printer is because I print 1/16th scale architectural models, and the larger nozzle will make a difference in terms of details for doors and windows, but that's a pretty niche issue where fine detail really matters. Maybe miniatures will also be an issue, but at that point, SLA makes more sense. When I have time (ha!) I'll play around with .6mm on my other printers, or fit it on one of the heads of a Prusa XL whenever that finally drops.