Too much troubleshooting (Page 1 of 2)

I know exactly your feeling of chasing one problem after another.

After not printing for a week or so, but having the printer work faultlessly for a month or so before that, I ran into some trouble:

1. The bed would not raise past a certain height. The z stepper was simply spinning on the spot, and pushing the platform down slightly gave it enough purchase to move properly. Eventually I found that removing the anti backlash hack fixed it, and now I don't have it on as tight.

The lead screw and stepper seem to just sit against each other and rely on friction which troublesome at times.

2. The bed and extruder heaters where playing up as covered in my other thread. The 1284P was fried (but only in this one way) so I've put back in the 644P. Waiting on another 1284P from the UK, but at least I can print.

3. The idler arm keeps twisting sideways and missing the filament. When I printed the mk3 extruder replacement and drilled the mounting hole, I must have made it too big because it wobbles and has too much play. Several failed prints from that.

4. After a few days of messy prints and slow extruder heating, I've just discovered why. The calibration for my machine were stored on the removed 1284P's EEPROM, so my initial extruder calibrations and PID settings for my replacement hot end are gone. Now I'll have to retest and set those values.

Dramas like ours makes you appreciate when everything is printing smoothly and reliably.

You speak nothing but the truth for sure, I know personally the constant repairs and learning how to solve and perform each related task is time consuming...it surely set back several of the projects I had intended for this machine.   I'm not sure which idler-arm you have, but I know I have to use the one I made because of alignment and issues printing the mk3 version.

I feel your pain.

I came home to a 4 hour print that stopped after about an hour, because the filament snapped. I'd been using a piece of acrylic right on top of the steel frame, and the 90 degree turn was too much for the filament. It cooked in the nozzle for 3 hours until I got home, which surprisingly didn't clog immediately, but a hour or so later.

I swapped nozzles to clear the clog, but I did it with the Solidoodle power up, so I had the white LED lights. This ended up being a poor choice, as the +12v side of the hotend is always powered even if the extruder is off in software. I ended up shorting +12v into the 5v bus, which seems to have fried the ADCs on the 644 - they read very close to the same temperatures, 37deg on the hotend, 92 deg on the bed.

So, I've ordered a new Sanguinololu, with AVR chip, as I didn't want to roll the dice with other parts of the board being possibly damaged.

I just want it to work reliably!

Should have ordered an Azteeg x1.  Equivalent to the Sanguinololu, but you can control a fan on it without hacking up a mosfet.

True, but there are some very useful features they left out which could be vital depending on what you print.  If you are doing small, detailed things like figurines, you aren't going to get very good results without a gcode-controlled fan.

I've been using the same wires as Tim. I've had one fail since adding them. I do like them a good bit more though. For Quadcopters they make some 6 pin connectors with the same terminals kind of like to servo extensions side by side  which would be great. I just haven't found any long enough. I would like to mount that connection and heat shrink it to keep it secure.

I must have 500 rc connectors sitting around and thought about the bullets, deans, or xt. They all seem like serious overkill which is why I would like to use one or two long servo extensions. The connectors are crap no doubt, but I think the wiring bundle is just as big if not a bigger issue.  Jeffery have ever tried any of these high flex wires?  I think I may try some thicker gauge also, but with teflon or PFA shrink wrap around the bundle. Supposedly it is still flexible, but maybe slick enough I won't have as many issues with it shredding on the case and catching on the belt. The bundle is still going to be at a sharp angle frequently any way you look at it without bringing it in over the top and having an accordion ceiling.

that's why I'm not hacking it.  It prints adequately for my applications.  But I really do think the hackers among us are a great help, and to them, thanks for your efforts  ;-)

As for wire, I recently had a extruder heater line go open at the bend just before it's taped to the stepper.  Quick solder and shrink, and back in business.

Thinking about finding a suitable replacement on hand, looking for recommendations.

Elmoret...  The wire failed halfway between the back and the extruder...  However, at the time, I was in a rush and didn't put the replacement wire into the bundle, so I wasn't shocked to find it failing...  I am still pretty convinced that I will continue to use the jumpers. I use them for so many applications and have constantly been surprised by their performance. This is what I think I will try.

https://www.sparkfun.com/products/10376

John, as I said, I understand not wanting to offer the replacement parts for everything in the store. Just as this forum continues to be diluted by the same half dozen questions being asked over and over, I can only imagine the Solidoodle support backlog of the same issue repeatedly being asked. I am pretty convinced it would be invaluable if a pdf manual of first steps, descriptions of printer parts, major things to avoid, common troubleshooting, and then a set of instructions on mods from most necessary to completely optional. If this was created, the wait for the printer could be eased, and then very novice or hackers alike could read and then reference the manuals s be much more comfortable by the time their printer came. It would increase the productive discussion here, push forward interesting developments, save support time, etc....

We are working on some documentation at wiki.solidoodle.com. This will start to form the core of what you'd call the manual. As you might imagine, printing out physical manuals can be expensive over time, but it is something that has been on our mind, as a large number of users have a hard time finding on line support.
It has been slow going, as things move fast here at Solidoodle, and few of us have hours that can be dedicated to writing. The videos have been our attempt to stem the tide of tech support requests (over basic issues at least.) We are also working on public friendly technical drawing, and refinements to our print communications.

That said, we're open to suggestions.

Regards,
John

Fellas, you need to post links to these second source websites. Some did, THANKS. It would help the rest of us to rather than having to search by part name. If the wires are twisted wire rather than solid they should be able to take the flexing for a lot longer than being indicated.