Hi all,
Hey I am trying to print a box: http://www.thingiverse.com/thing:408189. How ever it seems into the second hour of print my extruder stops extruding. The too head continues to move as if it were printing. I get the same results in Cura, Matter control, and simplify 3d. I don’t think there is a blockage because when I restart the print it begins as normal extruding perfectly. Anyone have any ideas what could cause this. This is the first print that I have done that takes longer than 3hours.
Your idler arm tension screws are probably too lose. make sure they start with about 8mm between the two washers on either side of the spring, and then if that doesn’t do the trick, crank them down further. Also, if you are getting any lifting on the part, that puts pressure on the end of the nozzle, which is basically the equivelent of sticking something into a hose and expecting it to still spray. Overextrusion can also cause that condition. I’d start with the tensioner arms though.
What filament type? If PLA it could be heat creep.
Is it about the same height that the print stops? Make sure the computer controlling the printer isn’t going to sleep.
yes it is pla.
Which part of the box are you trying to print? You may want to run the STL(s) through netfabb or MS’s online repair tool to validate that there are no issues with the model… looking at the box in S3D, it detected some self-intersecting faces… which I think is pretty minor, but could affect the print.
As for the heat creep, the basic problem is that the filament gets too hot in the hotend chamber and swells or melts too early. Thus the filament gets “clogged” or “stuck”. The additional heat seems fine for ABS, but PLA is affected more since it has a lower temperature range to become liquefied. The solution is to provide more cooling to the heatsink. The forum community users have come up with conversions and mods to better cool the heatsink. Most involve replacing the small blower with a 30x30 box fan utilizing the same wiring. Here’s one that seems like a quick drop-in:
https://forum.lulzbot.com/t/taz-hexagon-40mm-fan-mount/1799/1