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Slicing and 3D printing

Use the built-in FDM slicer to turn a modeled part into printable layers and G-code. You can preview the layers in the viewport before sending the result to your printer. Slicing does not change your model.

Set up a printer

Open the slice panel by selecting Slice for 3D Printing in the F1 palette, or by opening the Slice tab in the Export panel. The Printer section works with its default settings:

  • Choose a model (Generic FDM, Bambu Lab X1C or Bambu Lab H2S). N3XD fills in the bed size, nozzle diameter and G-code flavor for that printer.
  • If needed, adjust the bed size or nozzle diameter. N3XD saves your changes automatically.

You do not need to choose a filament here; N3XD uses the material assigned to the part.

Choose the filament

The Filament row in the Setup section shows which material the part will print with. It uses the material assigned to the body. Click the row to open the Material panel and edit its temperatures, cooling and flow settings under Printing (see Materials). If you assign a different material, the slice uses it automatically.

The part may not have a printable material because none is assigned or because its material cannot be printed, such as metal for a part you plan to machine. In either case, the row becomes a dropdown. Choose what to print the part as; it defaults to generic PLA. N3XD saves this choice with the setup and leaves the part's assigned material unchanged.

A part with several bodies can use a different filament for each body. Assign different printable materials to the bodies in the Material panel, and N3XD uses them when slicing. If all bodies use the same material, the slice works as usual.

The printer swaps filament between bodies. With an AMS, these swaps happen automatically. Other printers pause with M600, so a tall part with two materials may require many pauses. After each swap, the nozzle still contains some of the previous filament, so N3XD purges it into a prime tower. This small block appears beside the part on the bed and in the layer preview; discard it after printing.

The preview colours each path by its filament, and the panel breaks the filament figures down per spool alongside the number of swaps.

Position the part on the bed

When you open the panel, the printer bed appears as a translucent plate. N3XD centers the part on the plate and rests it on its lowest point. To change the part's placement, move the bed:

  • Rotate / tilt the bed with the ring handles to lay the part down a different way, for example on its side to avoid supports. After a tilt the part re-settles onto its new lowest point.
  • Move the part across the plate with the in-plane arrows, or drag the centre sphere to slide it freely.
  • Rest face: click the field in Placement, then a flat face of the part; that face becomes the bottom. Reset returns to the automatic bottom-rest. The eye button shows or hides the bed and gizmo, hidden by default.

The part always rests flat on the plate because a floating gap cannot be printed. If the part is larger than the plate, the bed turns red and the panel shows a warning. N3XD saves the placement with the setup and uses it when you slice.

Slice a part

Select a part, then configure it in Setup:

  1. Choose a quality preset: Draft (0.28 mm), Standard (0.20 mm), High Quality (0.20 mm, Bambu) or Fine (0.12 mm). N3XD fills in the preset values below. For a Bambu printer, it selects the Bambu-tuned preset automatically; its values match BambuStudio's "0.20mm High Quality" profile for that machine and filament.
  2. Adjust the layer height, wall count, top and bottom layers, infill density and pattern (such as grid, gyroid or honeycomb), seam, skirt or brim. Each field shows the value N3XD will use.
  3. Choose a Wall type. The default, arachne, uses variable-width walls that follow the shape's medial axis, helping fill thin features and gaps. classic uses concentric perimeters; with Gap fill enabled, it adds a thin bead where a gap is too narrow for a full perimeter. The preview shows each wall at its actual bead width, including Arachne's width changes. Ironing is on by default and re-traces top surfaces with a fine, low-flow pass.
  4. Turn on Supports if the part has overhangs (grid or tree, with an overhang-angle threshold).
  5. Press Slice.

N3XD hides the part so you can see the layers clearly. The panel shows the layer count, estimated print time and filament use. Drag the layer scrubber to move through the print; the viewport colours each toolpath by its role (walls, skin, infill or supports). Select Clear Slice to reset the preview and show the part again.

Check how well the layers will bond

A printed part is weaker across its layers than along them. Each road has only a few seconds to weld to the layer below before it cools. Switch the preview from Roles to Bonding to see the predicted bond strength: blue means the weld is as strong as the material, while red means it is barely joined. The panel reports the average and lowest ratios, identifies the weakest layer (click it to jump there), and estimates how much void remains between the roads.

Grey roads are not scored. These include the first layer, which bonds to the bed; supports and other sacrificial paths; and roads printed on a different filament. In the last case, the weld depends on how the two materials interact rather than on either material alone.

The predicted bond improves when the interface stays hot for longer. For example, a hotter nozzle, slower layers or less part cooling can all improve the score. N3XD cannot score materials without melt-flow data, so the panel tells you when that data is missing instead of guessing.

Accuracy

This is a comparison tool, not a strength prediction. Compare one ratio with another; it does not represent a value in megapascals. PLA and PETG are calibrated against published tensile measurements of upright and flat prints, so comparisons between them use measured data. Those measurements show that PETG welds worse than PLA, contrary to a common claim. TPU is not calibrated because no published comparison was available. It uses PLA's constant, so its score is only a placeholder.

Both calibrations use small test coupons. Their layers print in seconds and weld about as well as possible. A large part may take a minute per layer, so its welds can be weaker than the ratio suggests. Use the preview to find risky layers and compare which settings improve the bond.

Slice a whole assembly

To print a whole assembly on one plate, open the Slice tab in the Export panel and select the cog on an assembly row. N3XD positions each part as it appears in the assembly and slices them together, preserving the modeled arrangement. If two parts overlap, the part modeled first takes priority.

Each part uses the filament from its assigned material, so the assembly can print with several materials. Use the Filament field to choose a stand-in for any part whose material is not printable. Because the assembly keeps its modeled layout, the bed-placement controls are hidden. The other settings work as usual, and the downloaded file uses the assembly's name.

The slice panel generates a preview. To download the file, open the Slice tab in the Export panel. It lists every part and provides shortcuts to its slice setup and download. Choose the format (.gcode or .gcode.3mf) from the dropdown above the list.

For a Bambu Lab printer, choose .gcode.3mf. This container uses the same structure as BambuStudio exports: it includes the plate G-code, checksum and plate metadata, so the printer can read it. Open the file in BambuStudio with File > Open to load it as a sliced plate and send it to the printer. You can also copy it to an SD card or USB stick and select it on the printer's touchscreen.

For the first print, use an external spool because AMS filament mapping is not available yet. N3XD renders the model preview tile from the home view when you download the file. A blank tile does not affect printing.

A direct Print button that sends over your LAN is planned. It needs the printer in LAN Developer Mode.