Hi guys. Please check my previous post for any background questions, I don’t have it in me to go over everything again.
Long story short, I was having issues with clogging that were being caused by my hotend not reaching the reported temp. After a few days of troubleshooting and diagnosing the motherboard and Klipper settings, I gave up and decided the motherboard was faulty (even though I could not perform any tests to determine in) and bought an SKR mini. I got that all set up, and the printer has been working flawlessly since then.
Until now.
Same exact problem; one print goes perfectly fine, next print, failing to extrude by the 4th layer. I removed the clog, restarted the print, now can’t even extrude the priming line. Fearing the worst, I disassemble the hotend, try hand feeding filament, and once again I am unable to push more than a few centimeters through before it gets clogged up. A probe thermometer reads ~160C while Klipper reports 200C.
What could possibly be happening here? The board is an aftermarket replacement from a completely different company, so I doubt it’s a recurring manufacturer defect, but I have no idea what else can be causing this.
At this point I’ve spent so much time and money trying to fix this printer that I could almost buy a new one, but at this point I’m not convinced even that would solve the problem.
Have you run a PID tune?
And when you installed your thermal probe and heater cartridge did you use thermal compound?
Edit: Sorry for the really basic questions but in my experience clogging issues typically have a frustratingly simple solution.
Edit2: Does your printer have a screen not connected to Klipper?
A PID tune is pointless if the printer is not reading temperature correctly. It is for gauging how much power to send to the heat cartridge, it does not effect temperature readings.
Yes, thermal compound was used in appropriate places.
I can interact with my printer via klipperscreen or the mainsail web UI. Both give the same temperature reading. I don’t have any way outside of Klipper to talk to the printer.
I might try installing marlin on my previous board to see what the gets me, if anything.
Do you have the correct thermister type set in the firmware? If there’s a reporting difference that could be why. (This one bit me on my first 3D printer rebuild, now I’m way more vigilant about it)
Without a nozzle installed are you able to push the filament through the hot end? (This one bit me on one of my printers due to faulty hot end and there being a piece of metal partially obstructing the filament path. Sucked to diagnose but was an easy fix once it was found)
Is everything on the hot end tightened down still? (This one bit me a few weeks ago after a couple bolts on my hot end worked themselves lose after months of use)
Is your extruder still functional gripping the filament? If it can’t grip properly (or is jamming) this can cause clogging issues.
I’m sorry that I forgot to respond to your comment.
Unfortunately, everything you mentioned here is working properly.
No worries
And dang that it’s not one of those things as the things I mentioned in my comment are relatively easy to fix
Edit: Best of luck on solving it and I really hope to see you post about how you fixed it as I’m hella curious
I have a new board coming in tomorrow that I’m 90% positive will work just fine. I’m running low on suspects for what could be causing the failure, but I’m going to take a few precautions with this one (using only a surge protector, for starters) and see if it makes any difference in longevity. I guess I’ll make an update if it dies again, or maybe again after a month of continuous work. There are a few people that have been in every thread, I’m sure they’re curious as well haha