I shared a video of the problem, it’s hard to describe with words. Can you help me solve it?
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That doesn’t sound like the gear slipping to me, it sounds like the stepper motor trying, and failing, to step. My i3 clone would do this when:
- the extruder was too close to the bed (obviously not the case here)
- it was way too cold
- it was clogged
Assuming you’re preheated, remove the filament from your extruder, cut about 5 cm off, and give it another go. Note that you may need to unclog your nozzle with a cold pull, but on my i3 it tended to clog at the extruder gear.
Another thing that can cause this is if the extruder motor overheats. Is the cold end fan running? Is the motor hot to the touch?
I was able to remove the filament, and I cut some off and reinserted it, but the same thing happened.
Is your nozzle clogged? I would remove your nozzle and see if you can extrude cold. If you can, there’s a clog in your nozzle. If you can’t then there’s something upstream preventing filament from moving.
Take the nozzle out and see if you can feed the filament through then. That’ll tell you whether it’s a clogged nozzle (most likely) or stepper/bearing/driver issues (less likely).
I just checked youtube video about your extruder. I couldnt find how to change tension tho.
To inspect gear it should be possible to see it from above (around the spot where filament enters extruder). Maybe you can try to heat up to 210C and then disable stepper motors and push filament by hand (or using that wheel on front side of extruder). Or just remove filament and try extruding to see if motor is working normaly.
It could be that hotend is clogged or maybe your motor cable is lose (assuming it was working fine before). More likely a clog, and you should probably dissasemble extruder and clean, but you can also try cold pulls (google that, you heat up to lower temp and pull the filament with hand to remove if soemthing was stuck there).
What retraction distance you use? If retraction distance is too high and extruder fan not powerfull enough, hot filament can go too far in the cold part of extruder and then it can deform and cool down and gets stuck there. Motor can usually overcome that force and grind trough filament, but thats not your case, your motor cant rotate at all. Thats why I said maybe lose cable, but it could be that your motor curent is just set that low and I wouldnt touch it if it was working before. Another cause could be stepper driver overheating, but that usually happens while printing long print jobs, so not likely here I think.
It sounds like the gear is slipping are you using a single or dual gear extruder?
Dual is recommended imo. But some things you can look at are if the tension on the extruder gear is too high or low it can cause chatter or slippage. Also high friction on the spool can cause slippage so make sure the filament spool spins with little effort.
If none of this works look at the gear it’s possible it’s just warn out and not catching the filament.
How do I inspect the gear? Also, I only got this printer a few weeks ago, so it shouldn’t be worn out already?
Then I would do three things next
- check tension like the previous poster
- do you have the right temperature for the filament you are using 2a) are you using the filament you think you are using
- Is your nozzle clogged.
I am using 200deg, which is between the 180 and 210deg said on the spool. I am using this PLA filament . I don’t know what it means to check tension (sorry I am a noob), or how to check if my nozzle’s clogged. I was able to insert the needle that came with my printer into the nozzle halfway however.
Temperature: Bump your temperature up 10 degrees and see if it changes, if you have a thermometer check if your heating block to see if it is actually at the set temp.
Tension: here’s a good article about it
https://filament2print.com/gb/blog/141_3d-printing-extrusion-systems.html
Though looking at your video again, it looks like it’s gripping, but the wheel isn’t spinning. This is what’s leading me to something not allowing it to pass through the nozzle. If that wheel isn’t spinning, then it’s probably not an inability to grip but the stepper motor skipping because it can’t push the filament through the nozzle for some reason.
If your temps seem to be calibrated properly next step I would take is to remove your nozzle (while hot) and see if filament is able to be pushed through.
I looked through the article and I think I have a direct printer head. I tried changing the temperature even 20deg, and nothing changed. The wheel would spin properly when I tried it without filament. I unfortunately don’t have a thermometer. I will try and change the nozzle if I have to, but it looks like a complex procedure and I don’t want to mess anything up.
Changing the nozzle isn’t hard, you just have to be careful. All you have to do is heat up the hotend, hold the heater block with a wrench, and use another wrench to unscrew the nozzle (you might’ve gotten one with your printer for this). Holding the heater block is mostly just important imo so that the torque doesn’t misalign other parts in your hotend. Remember that if you’re facing down, then screwing directions are reversed. So you would unscrew the nozzle clockwise (righty loosey).
After you get the nozzle off, I would push some filament through the top to get your clog out. Then you can put the same nozzle back on. The main time you would need to replace it is if you’re consistently having issues even after that or you’ve been using it for a while (the hole gets worn through bigger over time). You can also look into doing a ‘cold pull’ to get out clogs.
Of course your extruder would still work fine if you didn’t have anything in it because it’s only jamming due to trying to push something through a clog :p You have 2 zones in a hotend: the cold end (radiator) and hot end (heater block). Sometimes a clog can happen because of heat creep, where a bit of hot melted filament gets retracted up into the cold zone and resolidifies there, blocking the passage.
I don’t know exactly how it works or your printer, but with my direct drive Artillery printer (Volcano style hotend) you just heat it up and then loosen the nozzle with a 7mm socket. When reassembling, screw the new nozzle in and tighten it while hot to make a good seal. You’re apprehensive about doing something new but nozzle changes are going to be a fairly regular thing for you in the future so you might as well learn the procedure now. Definitely Google around and look for guides/videos specifically for your printer or your style of hotend.
I apparently need hot gloves, I tried without them but burnt my finger and possibly graunched the spanner.
