Is it worth trying to keep my Solidoodle 2 going? (Page 1 of 4)

I should also note that thanks to my job, I can mold and cast parts for this thing in vastly better materials than the 3d printed stock parts. Which I am considering for the crappy acrylic extruder plates.

If you always had to babysit it, don't bother. I have collection of so called "cheap Chinese crap" printer and I have no need to babysit  any of those once mod and calibrated. I would recommend Ender-3-CR10S with depend on how much money you want to spend on it.

If most stability issue comes from extruder/hotend, consider covert it to a laser engraver or pen plotter.

Most of the issues seemed to be from the extruder not feeding filament reliably. The toothed wheel that pushed the filament in would build up with ABS dust and constantly need to be cleaned.

Last time I used it I had to replace the thermistor. But that was when Solidoodle was still selling parts.

Other main issue was dealing with the default Pronterface, and its general awfulness. I would like to get it working with Repetier or Mattercontrol, but I think that will involve doing a firmware update?

Yeah I know that there will always be some fiddling to do, but my expectations aren't actually that high after my time with the Solidoodle 2. Just want something that I won't dred using. Which is why I haven't used it much in years.

I also don't care how perfect the prints come out as I have loads of options and skills for cleaning them up. I just don't want to have to spend 3 hours repairing a printer every time I want to use it. (Currently its like an old tractor my dad had, where he had to work on it for 3 hours to get it to run for 1 hour.)

I think my initial plan will be to see what I can do to improve it without throwing any money into it.

Also, thanks for the welcome back!

You do not need to buy another printer unless you want to. I have several Solidoodles and worked the kinks out of all of them cheaply (with a learning curve at some points).

If the toothed gear is dusting filament, it could be a couple reasons:
1) Your speed/temp/rectraction settings are off.
2) The hotend is clogged. This happened to me two months after owning a SD2 which got me hooked on modifying afterwards.
3) The tension spring is way too tight for your settings. After playing around with exotics especially, I’ve seen this happen on occasion.

You can grab a new extruder body from Printit Industries, but I highly recommend also ditching your PEEK hotend and grabbing an E3D of your choosing...the Lite6 is the cheapest and prints ABS and PLA with ease.

Are you printing ABs with an enclosure? Does your printer have a bed heater (early SD2s had the option of no bed heater)? Have you performed all necessary maintenance routines like lubricating and adjusting belts as needed?

I'm sure with enough upgrade and do everything correctly, any printer will eventually run reliably. I think SD2 may run smoothly and easy to use after replace the main board, add LCD-SD card reader, and upgrade hotend to E3D. Assuming you are confident you can do everything in the best quality (no offense, but you damaged the original hotend when cleaning it, and 2nd hotend seemed to be partially clogged.), the only issue to consider is whether it worth the time and effort and the money.

I would usually encourage people to worked the kinks out cheaply, especially when people are still "interested"/"confident"/"eager to learn". If you are frustrated and risking losing your interesting over the upcoming learning curve, buy a new printer. If you value the time and effort and the money you spend more than the experience, buy a new printer.   

Ender-3 kit cost under $200 and 1-2 hours of easy assembly for 230 mm X 230 mm X 250 mm build volume, which is lot bigger than SD2 150 mm X 150 mm X 150 mm. It is 360w 24V power supply, which means faster heating on both hotend and heated bed. It come with LCD-SD card reader so that you can run without tethering to a computer.

Major disadvantage over your SD2 is the enclosure, which does not seemed to be difficult for you given your expertise, but still take the overall cost into the consideration and make your own decision.

So an E3D Lite6 hot end, and a hobbgoblin to replace the tooth gear as initial mods. (As well as replacing the Acrylic jigsaw parts)

Does the E3D Lite6 hot end come with a nozzle already attached? All the pictures show one on there, just wanting to confirm if I need to get a .6 nozzle separately.

I put an E3Dv6 (.4mm) and HobbGoblin on my SD4.  I also bought a Calidum heated bed from PrintItIndustries.  That required flashing the firmware to accommodate the updates, so I enabled the gcode fan and EXP ports. 

Now it's the AK-47 of 3D printing.  It keeps churning out great prints, very little maintenance, don't have to constantly fiddle with it, and very rarely have a failed print of any kind.  With the upgraded components, I regularly print ABS, PETG, nylon, and POM.  I don't print woodfill with it, due to the nozzle size; I'm setting up a separate printer for that.

It's certainly been worth the time and expense of upgrades; ultimately you need to do what's right for you.

-Kevin

whats the hobgoblin?

Uh, this is not correct Tin.. with a standard thermistor, you can not go over 300C - on any hotend - it will damage the thermistor.

if you want to go higher, you would have to install a thermocouple (which is a little more complicated to install) along with the full metal hotend, be it the E3D v6 or whatever.

There are High temp  thermistors available . They are designed for the high temp high performance Mosquito hot end.
But is no reason one can not be used with the E3D.  These thermistors are rated to 450c

https://www.sliceengineering.com/shop/h … thermistor

Granted these are pricey compared to standard E3D thermistor Like 6.5 times the money. But none the less an option if one needs the performance.

You should download the latest version of Repetier-Host.  It comes with Slic3r, Slic3r Prusa Edition, and Cura Engine...all three produce good results, and you're certain to find one to your liking.  What was your previous version of R-H?

-Kevin