Slipping Extruder

like Mr_tim says might be a partial clog...does the filament drop straight down when extruding into midair or curl? if it curls it is clogged and you will have to correct the clog before you can get any good prints.

One other thing to note... once the extruder has skipped and stripped the filament you NEED to clean the plastic dust off of the drive wheel on the extruder motor or it will continue to slip and cause problems.

Usually you can poke a guitar 'E' wire into the nozzle when it is hot to clean out small clogs *be careful it is HOT* otherwise you man need to pull the nozzle off... there are plenty of threads on here that describe clearing clogs I would reccomend reading through a bunch of these before going ahead with this procedure just so you are aware of the many issues that can crop up and their remedies.

Ok....

Well that did not last long... Got 58 layers into 600 before it crimped up the
filament and air printed on me....

I found the thread I was looking for earlier on Extruder calibration and tried to follow
the video from the wiki... after following the steps, I determined that I actually extruded
126mm for a 100 command... but then I am lost.  I see him do the math (which I get),
But where does one find the Marlin files that he edits in the Arduino????  Or is this
handled another way with the S3?????

LOL... feel like a newb all over again....

Matt

thanks Hazer...

I went through severla things over the last few days to try and correct my issue I was having...

Here is the play by play:

1.  Got myself an E-string and attempted to clear clog by running wire up thru nozzle.  This seemed to help some
BUT after a little bit of printing, it went back to clicking and slipping.

2. Broke down and decided to try and remove the nozzle to clean it...

            ~ Followed the step by step instruction on the Youtube disassemble video...
            ~ Made sure I heated the extruder before attempting to remove
            ~ Cleaned both the brass tube and nozzle completely and allowed them to soak over night in acetone.
            ~ There was some signs of charred and burnt filament which was removed completely
            ~ reassembled hot end...

I felt pretty confident after cleaning and reassembling everything... but it seems that was all for naught.... After turning machine on and firing up Repetier, I set the extruder to heat... and what came next was unexpected....

The extruder temp cycled from around 185 to 210 again and again and never settled to a steady temp...  I let the heater run for some time thinking once it got hot a bit it would settle... NOPE.   And when I tried to extrude filament... I got the same slipping clicking crap again after just a few minutes....

I have added a pic of the Temp Curve...

Not sure what else I can try here....

Did I fowl up my hot end?  Should I just replace it?

.... sucks not being able to print... got too many projects to finish....

Let me know what you think....

Matt

thanks 2n2r5...

that balanced out the heating issue... now calmly cycling between 199.4 and 200.2... so MUCH better...

Now to figure out this damn clogging click issue... I know I cleaned it out good enough

CuJo3131, it sounds like you have checked the clog problem pretty well but I'm really surprised this is not it.

I had some of the same problems:

1. Got a clog
2. Took it apart, cleaned it.
3. printing would work fine but then kind of die out (Several prints that were good for first inch then less and less material)
4. Lots of dust and slipping at the gear that drives the filament.
5. Noticed black bits from time to time when using transparent orange filament.
6. Did the PID tuning.
7. Tightened the spring (so gear would slip less)
8.  drove and reversed filament several times manually until I didn't see anything black in the light filament output.
9.  Lowered temperature to 195.
10. Manually sets temperature, extrude manually about 15 mm to gets the filament that has been sitting in the hot end for some time out and then hit the "run" button.

I've had no clogs for about 3 months now but I'm not sure what I did that allows it to work. I'm running 5 different spools of filament from 3 different places.

Mark...

Thanks so much for the reply... that is alot like what I am getting...  I had no issues printing at
all until I started using this filament from the Folgers Corporation... and now... well it has been a pain.
I did take the hot end apart... cleaned the brass tube really well and swabbed it out with a q-tip and acetone...
Cleaned the tip really well (or so I thought) and tried again....

Just nothing... lotsa clicking and slipping... and very little flow at all... I tried the temp from 195 to 205 with no real
change in results.... made sure the filament was not tight on the spool or binding...  I am at a loss.

I have a new hot end ordered... and hopefully that will correct this issue...

just hate having to wait for parts and loosing the project time...

Matt

LOL....

Good one!

What I meant to say was Folger Tech LLC

http://sidewinder181.wix.com/folger/

When I went to this filament is when I started with the problems... first few prints were amazing and then ugh....

Right now my printer is sitting... waiting... hopefully new Hot End will solve issue...

Matt

Whoah. Not cool Joel!

Tell you what, if you send me a quick e-mail at [email protected], and I can set you up with a support phone call to make sure you are well taken care of.

Cujo, This thread went dead and I hope you got your printer working.
I have had every possible mechanical failure with my SD3.

My most recent failure has been the slipping extruder.  Just like yours, the servo was clicking, not the gear stripping the filament, which I have also dealt with.
I used this site for the 100's of hours of troubleshooting.  The multiple replies on this thread lead me to suspect a partial clog.  After 5 full dis-assembly and cleanings of the HotEnd, it appeared that doing more cleanings while expecting different results would be futile.

I jumped on the PID cal, Servo Chip tuning, Hotter Temp, Hot Servo, Spring Tension, Buy an E3D, and buy a new Hotend red herrings trying to fix this clicking with no success.

During troubleshooting, in the home position, the extruder clicked occasionally.  When I bumped the speed to 200mm/min it clicked worse but only after 2-3 seconds and 50 mm/min gave no clicking at all.  The HotEnd temp was set to 210.

So, I tried printing at a much slower speed.  There was still serious clicking on the first few layers so I suspected nozzle back pressure would make it appear like a partial clog.  So I removed my 1/4" sheet of glass and air printed.  It still clicked. 

I took the advice from wardjr and ordered the E3D.  Except I still needed to get the printer working in order to print the MK5. 
So buying an E3D is not a solution to a problem, it is an upgrade to a working printer.  Unless, of course, you printed a MK5 prior to the machine heading south.

As I could not waste any more time on this machine, I was going to give up like many others have done with their Solidoodles.

But then I replaced the Green Folgers filament with a spool of black that I had ordered from SD when I bought the machine and it has not skipped a beat since.

Obviously, the melting point of this Folger filament is much higher than the SD brand.  I did not feel comfortable running the PEEK above 210 but will attempt to melt the Folger when I have upgraded to the E3D.  It also seems like the viscosity of this filament is thicker than the SD filament even when thoroughly melted.  It may not be all about the temp.

Also, curling of the extruded plastic happened with the Folger and not the SD.  Even though curling would seem to be an indicator of a partial clog, it caused me to waste alot of time cleaning a perfectly good nozzle.

One final thing is that I had made some good prints with this Folger Green when I first started using it.  Otherwise I woud have suspected it right off the bat.  Folger may have different consistencies in their pellet batch.  Don't know, but:

Bottom line, DON'T USE FOLGER and be very suspicious about cheap filament.