SoliForum - 3D Printing Community — Is my tip plugged??

Re: Is my tip plugged??

null@example.com (AZERATE) — Sat, 31 Oct 2015 01:39:01 +0000

http://www.thingiverse.com/thing:393928
This is a super minimalist design. It will at least get you back up and running for a while. I ran 6 months on one.
http://www.thingiverse.com/thing:431363
This is a rock steady version. However, you would need 35mm(?) screws to reach the motor holes.

Sorry it took me several hours to reply. I saw your post earlier but was super busy.

Re: Is my tip plugged??

null@example.com (diyengineer) — Fri, 30 Oct 2015 20:01:10 +0000

Can someone direct me to the files I need to print before upgrading? Not sure which ones work best with the v6. Do I stay direct drive or go bowden??

Re: Is my tip plugged??

null@example.com (jagowilson) — Fri, 30 Oct 2015 16:38:20 +0000

Yep that whole barrel is pretty much the melt zone for the stock nozzle, so it gets pretty plugged up in there. I remember when I first got my machine and clogged it up, I enlarged the hole slightly and ran the M3 hex key they give you down it and pulled out a bunch of stuff (pretty sure my hex key is still covered in black plastic to this day). You'll like the E3D, because the melting zone is... much, much smaller.

Re: Is my tip plugged??

null@example.com (diyengineer) — Fri, 30 Oct 2015 16:19:27 +0000

Well, cranked it up to 230c, and ran about 50mm through it. Pulled what I could out and changed from black to red. Pretty amazing how much plastic is in that "chamber". Color changed helped a ton! Allows you to see dirty mixed color coming out. Used my dropper and ran about an ounce of acetone through it. Between shoving small 3-4 inch pieces of abs through it. You can feel the difference in force. Could barely get any through, and in the in, it was flowing real good by hand. Now by gear doesn't skip when extruding at all. Up and printing now well see how it goes. I need to re calibrate and print my e3d v6 upgrade!

Re: Is my tip plugged??

null@example.com (diyengineer) — Fri, 30 Oct 2015 14:26:57 +0000

200c abs extruder and 110c bed.

Re: Is my tip plugged??

null@example.com (widespreaddeadhead) — Thu, 29 Oct 2015 15:19:42 +0000

wardjr wrote:

Time to get serious about a few simple upgrades. The E3d Lite6 is only like $25-30 and that acrylic is garbage

Installed a e3dlite6 on my i3 a few months back and it works like a champ. PLA, ABS, and Bronzefill without issue. The only problem I ran into was after I installed the lite6 it made me want to get a V6 All Metal hotend.

Re: Is my tip plugged??

null@example.com (Morganism) — Thu, 29 Oct 2015 14:18:50 +0000

I don't know what temperature you usually run at. I would try cranking it up to about 230 or 240, let it get good and hot. Then manually push some filament through. After that, run 200-400mm through your extruder to clear it. You may be able to melt/burn whatever is in there out and get it flowing again. I have even seen people take a torch to the hotend to burn the debris out. (I don't recommend this, but it might need to be done)

At least something to try before going to the time, money, and trouble of replacing. If this cure kills the patient, you needed a new hot end anyway.

P.S.-I would be cautious putting acetone into my hotend. It might dissolve an ABS clog, but you don't know what the unintended consequences might be.

Re: Is my tip plugged??

null@example.com (wardjr) — Thu, 29 Oct 2015 14:17:53 +0000

Time to get serious about a few simple upgrades. The E3d Lite6 is only like $25-30 and that acrylic is garbage. My experience with the .35 stock nozzle is once it clogs it is never the same no matter the effort to clean.

Re: Is my tip plugged??

null@example.com (diyengineer) — Thu, 29 Oct 2015 12:07:24 +0000

I'll have to get a small eye dropper and some acetone on the way home. Will it melt the acrylic body? I'll try to drop some in from the top and see if that helps. Also, I think mine shipped with a .35mm tip when they first shipped, now I think they ship with a .4mm tip.

Re: Is my tip plugged??

null@example.com (diyengineer) — Thu, 29 Oct 2015 12:07:20 +0000

Re: Is my tip plugged??

null@example.com (wardjr) — Wed, 28 Oct 2015 14:12:59 +0000

Cleaning is different. For ABS you can soak it in Acetone or use heat. With the all metal hot ends that becomes as simple as cranking up the temp.
Either way it's good to see you around, it's been a while

Re: Is my tip plugged??

null@example.com (diyengineer) — Wed, 28 Oct 2015 09:08:39 +0000

AZERATE wrote:

That's a shame.
You have a clog for sure. May be debris, may be solid plastic. I can only assume you are printing PLA from the looks of the tape on your bed. I had good experience with PLA on the stock hotend....for a little while. Then it started jamming religiously.
With a PEEK hotend, you will have to take your hotend out, remove the barrel and heating block to apply heat. I've found a butane torch and pliers help beautifully with this. IF it is a PLA clog, this will get you up and running. But I strongly urge you to print a new extruder and possibly look into a new hotend like an E3D.

I still have never used pla, only abs. Cleaning any different?

Re: Is my tip plugged??

null@example.com (carl_m1968) — Wed, 28 Oct 2015 05:19:44 +0000

wardjr wrote:

diyengineer wrote:
A whole new print head assembly is $79 from solidoodle. I think it's time to upgrade. What's the best out there?
Get an E3d V6 a Hobb goblin and the MK5 mount from Filastruder you might get a .6 nozzle also it'll quickly become your favorite. Have I ever steered you wrong

Not to change the topic, but I have read on several sites that the nozzle size dictates your ability to do details and that the smallest detail you can print is the same size as your nozzle. So I guess if I had some very small raised letters would a .6 nozzle make it very hard to print them?

It even says this on that new stickied guide by S3D.

Your printer includes a nozzle with a fixed size that allows your to accurately reproduce very small features. For example, many printers include a nozzle with a 0.4mm diameter hole in the tip. While this works well for most parts, you may start to encounter issues when trying to print extremely thin features that are smaller than the nozzle diameter. For example, if you were trying to print a 0.2mm thick wall with a 0.4mm nozzle. The reason for this is that you cannot accurately produce a 0.2mm extrusion from a 0.4mm nozzle. The extrusion width should always be equal to or greater than the nozzle diameter. Because of this, when you click “Prepare to Print” in Simplify3D, you may notice that the software removes these small features from the preview. This is the software’s way of telling you that you cannot print these very tiny features using the current nozzle on your 3D printer. If you are frequently printing very small parts, this may be a recurring issue that you encounter. There are several options that will allow you to successfully print these small parts. We will example each one in the section below.

Re: Is my tip plugged??

null@example.com (wardjr) — Wed, 28 Oct 2015 04:56:10 +0000

diyengineer wrote:

A whole new print head assembly is $79 from solidoodle. I think it's time to upgrade. What's the best out there?

Get an E3d V6 a Hobb goblin and the MK5 mount from Filastruder you might get a .6 nozzle also it'll quickly become your favorite. Have I ever steered you wrong

Re: Is my tip plugged??

null@example.com (AZERATE) — Wed, 28 Oct 2015 01:38:11 +0000

That's a shame.
You have a clog for sure. May be debris, may be solid plastic. I can only assume you are printing PLA from the looks of the tape on your bed. I had good experience with PLA on the stock hotend....for a little while. Then it started jamming religiously.

With a PEEK hotend, you will have to take your hotend out, remove the barrel and heating block to apply heat. I've found a butane torch and pliers help beautifully with this. IF it is a PLA clog, this will get you up and running. But I strongly urge you to print a new extruder and possibly look into a new hotend like an E3D.