Update: The yellow wire was the culprit. It had somehow grounded out to the printer frame and I replaced the wire. I have been up and running some decent prints since then.

carl_m1968 wrote:

swhit321 wrote:

Just looked on the website and they are out of stock on the 1.0 head. I did contact them, but I think it may be beneficial to start looking at other options. Is there any recommendations I have even thought about milling the standard carriage to take more common parts.

Look around the forum. Several are going for the E3D and a few are going for the PICO. All require making your own carriage or major mods to the existing.

"Major mods" is quite incorrect.. I put the e3d on my dav 1 with 2 small printed parts and no cutting necessary.....

Just curious, did you use your stock filament drive system and what Thingverse build do you use?

I was looking for something simple until I can build a airtripper or similar.

thecure, I will see how this plays out for a bit but will let you know if I need some pieces, I am thinking about going the Pico route.

edit: found the thermistor table and for my room temp 134.5k seems about right. I am starting to wonder about the heating element that I purchased and wondering if that is the problem. The nomex or teflon tube that sits around the wire is almost completely gone and I never had the heat on for more than a few seconds.

I am using the 40w 12v with both wires on one end. I only tried to heat it to 180 and the sheathing was melting within seconds.

How would I test the thermister? Ohms?

yes, disconnect it from the PCB on the side of the head. Then using a DMM measure resistance across the the two connectors on the wire/thermistor side. At room temp it should be in the ball park of 100K ohms. If it is much higher then the device is open. If it is lower then it is shorted. Also take one lead of the DMM and touch it to the brass body of the heat block. Take the other lead and measure resistance from the heat block to each thermistor lead. It should measure open. If it has a low resistance then your sleeves on the thermistor wires is bad and it is shorting to the heat block.

How would I test the thermistor? Ohms?

So I bought a new heating element and hooked everything back up. I decided to heat up the extruder and the reading never went up but i did notice smoke. Took it back apart and the heating element was burning its own sheathing. Is this a bad part or did I do something wrong? I think the thermister could be shot as I get the decoupling message also.

What type of heating element was it?

The common silver cartridge with two red wires on one end or the older still available resistor with a wire on each end?

If your thermistor is bad it could make the logic think the unit is always cold and that would make your heater run full blast till it melts down. There really should be some sort of backup for monitoring temps and shut the power down if it gets to a certain point. Sadly there is not, and it is the case with many printers out there.

browning54213 wrote:

carl_m1968 wrote:

Look around the forum. Several are going for the E3D and a few are going for the PICO. All require making your own carriage or major mods to the existing.

"Major mods" is quite incorrect.. I put the e3d on my dav 1 with 2 small printed parts and no cutting necessary.....

For somebody with technical experience and background, it may not be major. But for somebody who bought one of these thinking it would be plug and play out of the box and does not know their way around a tool box may find it a challenge. Not saying this is the case, but there may be some out there that only bought this to print and have little technical and mechanical skills.

You have to think of everyone and all possibilities that might be using one of these. Not everyone buys one knowing it is a hobby and requires work.

Im sure some may want better printing and even parts that are easier to get, but may not be comfortable taking their machine apart or printing and replacing parts with those printed.

My apologies you are right, mechanical engineer here so it seem stupid easy to me. But so did the complete swap....

carl_m1968 wrote:

swhit321 wrote:

Just looked on the website and they are out of stock on the 1.0 head. I did contact them, but I think it may be beneficial to start looking at other options. Is there any recommendations I have even thought about milling the standard carriage to take more common parts.

Look around the forum. Several are going for the E3D and a few are going for the PICO. All require making your own carriage or major mods to the existing.

"Major mods" is quite incorrect.. I put the e3d on my dav 1 with 2 small printed parts and no cutting necessary.....

For somebody with technical experience and background, it may not be major. But for somebody who bought one of these thinking it would be plug and play out of the box and does not know their way around a tool box may find it a challenge. Not saying this is the case, but there may be some out there that only bought this to print and have little technical and mechanical skills.

You have to think of everyone and all possibilities that might be using one of these. Not everyone buys one knowing it is a hobby and requires work.

Im sure some may want better printing and even parts that are easier to get, but may not be comfortable taking their machine apart or printing and replacing parts with those printed.

swhit321 wrote:

Just looked on the website and they are out of stock on the 1.0 head. I did contact them, but I think it may be beneficial to start looking at other options. Is there any recommendations I have even thought about milling the standard carriage to take more common parts.

Look around the forum. Several are going for the E3D and a few are going for the PICO. All require making your own carriage or major mods to the existing.

"Major mods" is quite incorrect.. I put the e3d on my dav 1 with 2 small printed parts and no cutting necessary.....

Just looked on the website and they are out of stock on the 1.0 head. I did contact them, but I think it may be beneficial to start looking at other options. Is there any recommendations I have even thought about milling the standard carriage to take more common parts.

Look around the forum. Several are going for the E3D and a few are going for the PICO. All require making your own carriage or major mods to the existing.