1 Topic by DynamechGT (edited by DynamechGT 2013-05-04 23:44:47)

  • DynamechGT
  • DynamechGT
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Topic: Causes of hotend clogs and precautions

What are the causes of hot end clogs and how can we prevent clogs from happening?

Since clogs seem to be one of the more annoying problems we can encounter with our printers, it's something I'm looking forward to avoiding.

I'll be receiving my SD3 sometime this week and although I anticipate some normal complications over time, I'd like to minimize  headaches as much as possible.

I've seen a few pictures of people cleaning their filament by threading it through a foam sponge sandwich to reduce dirt and debris from getting into the hot end.  I certainly plan on doing this.

My questions are:
What do you think causes hot end clogs?
What do you do to actively avoid clogs?



-DMGT

2 Reply by pcpoirier

  • pcpoirier
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  • From: Wichita Ks
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Re: Causes of hotend clogs and precautions

Letting the hot extruder sit for more than 15 minutes.
Old filament.

3 Reply by dubbsd

  • dubbsd
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Re: Causes of hotend clogs and precautions

1. setting at temperature and not extruding.

2. debris in filament.

3. PID not Tuned.

4. Extruder does not line up with Peek.

5. Filament getting to hot above extruder causing a tangle which causes the filament  to set in the nozzle and bake.

Ultimaker S3.

4 Reply by ronsii

  • ronsii
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Re: Causes of hotend clogs and precautions

Causes: Bad filament, impurities in filament, overheating filament(hotend), scraping kapton(kapton stuck in nozzle)

Prevention: Make sure the bed is level and gapped, research filament sources- avoid bad rep suppliers, tune the hotend(PID's) to minimize overshoot temps, make sure the end gcode turns off the extruder when print is done, don't print at SD temps over 205( if the filament seems to like it hotter look for different filament)

These are just off the top of my head... Oh also make sure the filament spools are clean and no contaminants are on or near the roll as static charge can pick up tiny bits and eventually they will make it near or into the extruder and hotend.