Filament Feed Struggle

<p>I’ve been struggling for two or three days now trying to get the filament to feed properly. The prints say it all, but the less obvious stuff speaks volumes. I mark my filament about ever 5mm and start extruding. You can very clearly see that it doesn’t feed, and when it does it has spots where it doesn’t feed. I’ve cleaned out the teeth on the feed gear. I’ve done my best to make sure everything is aligned. I’ve gone as far as using the 2nd hand filament feeder model listed in the stickied threads (mind you that thing doesn’t work at all, but thank god I pre-printed it). I don’t know what to do. Please help.</p>

<p>I had problems with my extruder, too. Grinds the filament after a few cm of proper extruding and then extrudes properly again. This would explain why your filament is fed not constantly.</p><p>The after-market filament feeder from thingiverse is working for me, but I had to replace the round PLA washer which sits between the bearing and the stepper motor surface with a M3 nut. Then tighten the M3 screw which is holding the bearing against the nut and tighten the other, longer M3 against the filament while extruding until the extruder begins clicking. Find the spot where the extruder does NEARLY klick and turn 1/4 counter-clockwise.</p><p> </p><p>Tightening the M3 screw holding the bearing against the nut is important in my opinion, because the other M3 screw applies force to somewhere else than the extruder gear (offset). This causes a momentum which makes the shorter M3 screw tilt. You can reduce the possible tilt angle by tightening it properly with the nut. (I hope this was written understandable :slight_smile: )</p>

<p>The problem is that I’ve only had this printer for about a month. I shouldn’t have to completely replace parts on the printer with second-hand\aftermarket parts to get it to run. It’s not old enough to need replacement parts already.</p>

<p>@Stefan_Muenchen do you have a photo? </p>

<p>Yesterday:</p><p> </p><p></p><p></p><p>http://private.addohm.us/images/cetus.mp4</p><p> </p><p>Today:</p><p>Still not right but much improved. The filament does not line up correctly with the nozzle. I can feed filament through the feeder section wihtout much resistance. Once the filament enters the nozzle, it gets very tight fast. I ended up drilling through the feeder section top and bottom holes and super gluing the feeder tubing and nozzle tubing (inside of the feeder tubing) in the top and bottom of the feeder section. What I think is happening is that there is just too much play for the filament to move around after some use, that it can just pop off to the side of the bearing that is supposed to be pressing it against the feeder gear. I’m also finding that the filament feeder section cannot be tightened down. I had left it loosely threaded. I feel like the feeder section really should have been made out of metal instead of half HDPE and half PLA - if they’re not going to make those models public, which would have been the solution to all my problems I think.</p><p></p>

<p>That print failed. Sort of expected. I’ve never successfully printed without rafts on this printer. Trying again with rafts.</p>

I had the same problem.

I tracked my issue down to the nozzle.

The <span style=“display: inline !important; float: none; background-color: transparent; color: #333333; font-family: Georgia,‘Times New Roman’,‘Bitstream Charter’,Times,serif; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 24px; orphans: 2; text-align: left; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px; word-wrap: break-word;”>bottom end of the </span>plastic feed sleeve partially melted inside the stainless steel portion of the nozzle. The PLA then <span style=“display: inline !important; float: none; background-color: transparent; color: #333333; cursor: text; font-family: Georgia,‘Times New Roman’,‘Bitstream Charter’,Times,serif; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: left; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px;”>partially </span><span style=“background-color: transparent; color: #333333; display: inline; float: none; font-family: Georgia,&quot; times new roman&quot;,&quot;bitstream charter&quot;,times,serif; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 24px; orphans: 2; text-align: left; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px; word-wrap: break-word;”>mixed and a</span>ttached to the sleeve plastic.

You should change the nozzle and see if the problem is fixed.

I did noticed the nozzle heater had a over temperature transient at warm up which could be a firmware bug and the actual source of the problem.

A reset and the heater temperature is behaving correctly again.

Peter

I had the same problem. In my case I could fix it with the right kind of filament. I did some research regarding the right kind and alas it worked. I hope you find a solution!