ReplicatorG's support options

[Jason]

I am curious about the two options you can choose from for the "Use support material" dropdown. Exterior support is fairly obvious, but what does "Full support" entail? I guess that it is "Exterior support" + supporting structures within hollow models, but was wondering if someone could give me a more detailed definition. 

The "About Print-O-Matic" doc page (http://www.makerbot.com/docs/software/printomatic/) is very nice, but it completely skips over the options at top of the window! :P 

[Fastrack]

Exterior support is only on the outside "visible" part of the object.  Anything past the "visible perimeter" is "interior" or "Full Support"

So an object I made with tinkercad:  https://tinkercad.com/things/bMy319N45M0-daisy-powerline-15xt-bb-loader 

The inside of the bowl requires support so I picked "Full Support", the portion that supports the upper portion does not require any support as made those angles greater than 55 degrees.  The default in Skeinforge from MBI is 45 degrees (Raft Tab -> Support Minimum Angle).  I made a test object and saw no drooping with the plastic at 55 degrees so I changed that setting.

Another example would be if you had a mini bar stool with a person sitting on it.  If you selected Exterior support it would build support for the person's arms, but not the bottom of the seat.  You would have to select "Full Support" for it to build support material for the seat bottom.  Now if the machine could bridge the gap "open air or bridging", support may not be required.

In case your not aware if you want to print support material but not have a raft change the following on the Raft Tab to zero (0), you still select "Raft/Support" but will not get a raft:

Base Layers 1 (default value)

Interface layers 2 (default value)

Okay that was much longer then I had planned :)

Ben

[Jason]

Great answer, thank you!