To cut a long story short, I managed to clog on my Taz 5 switching from ABS to Nylon, got down to last resort after some time using Google and got the blowtorch on the nozzle.
The thing I read said to heat for approx a minute til the smoke and yellow flame is gone, I heated for about 15/20 seconds before the brass completely discoloured and I stopped immediately. It got most the nylon/abs mix out of the nozzle but there’s still some incinerated crud burned onto the bottom and I still can’t see through the nozzle.
I tried poking wire through it but it was really flimsy and just curled and probably scratched the inside of the nozzle.
I’ll be buying a replacement tomorrow, but it’s works printer and work will be needing it tomorrow so I really need to get this nozzle serviceable if at all possible if only for a day.
Is it just a case of putting on a brave face and giving it the heat? Or does anyone have any other ideas? Is the nozzle likely to be wrecked?
Also, will replacement nozzles have to be the same as the one that comes on the hexagon hot end? I’ve seen some with a hex shaped nozzle which a socket would fit over, that would be better for me as I could use my torque wrench to tighten instead of having to guess by hand with a spanner.
The hexagon shaped ones are E3D V6 nozzles, which are compatable with the hexagon.
Every time I hear the words “blow torch” and “3d Printer” in the same sentance, I cringe. Alot. Did yiou at least remove the thermistor and the heater core from the assembly before you tried that?
Assuming you didn’t cook your electronics, try heating the nozzle to 160c, turn it off, then use a tight fitting crescent wrench on the block as a backing bar and a smaller crescent wrench on the nozzle to remove it. (wear gloves) Assuming the nozzle doesn’t strip, you should then be able to clean it and potentially reuse it. Acetone will eat any residule ABS, not sure what would eat Nylon.
Eventually. The carbon particles are mixed with the plastic, which acts like glue. the acetone in the case of ABS will eat the glue and free the carbon soot from the surface. It probablt wouldn’t touch the Nylon in this particular case though.
The nozzle has been removed from the hot end, don’t worry. It would have been insane taking a blowtorch near the printer itself. Taking the blowtorch direct to the nozzle was a last resort after a 2 day acetone soak, then the heated nail trick, also tried manually screwing a screw in but both achieved nothing more than making a hole in the soft spongey filament stuck inside.
I managed to clear the nozzle tip after another overnight soak in acetone and finally getting the wire through. Fingers crossed it will print ok today.
Good to know about those hex shaped nozzles, they’ll be much easier to remove and reinstall. Are they still of the same quality? Has anyone used different nozzles?
28AWG magnet wire is good for getting into the nozzle openings. Its usually solid core copper, so it shouldn’t flex when when removing acetone melted ABS. I think I tested a .35mm nozzle, but it could have been just a .4 or .5 nozzle.
A bamboo skewer(used for BBQ) should fit through the threaded opening if you need to push filament through. I’ve never tried this, but I use a skewer to help align the hotend to extruder when assembling.
Anything carbonized probably needs to be scraped off or physically dislodged.
I ordered one of those E3D V6 nozzles to try, I’ll report back with how I get one with it. Also bought another standard hexagon nozzle too. Both 0.5mm.
I have my nozzle off fairly often, due to it being at work it can be printing for a couple of hours or so unchecked when we’re busy, I still haven’t got round to building an enclosure and it’s not uncommon for some of the taller prints to fail. It’s alot easier to take the nozzle off to clean everything off than trying it whilst everything’s on. Just a shame I wrecked it this time, although it still printed as well as it needed to today.
I think I might get a load of nozzles in, so I can have one designated for each material. Nylon doesn’t half make a mess and can take ages to cold pull/extrude out fully.
Good to know about the copper wire, I’ll get some of that ready for next time, I’ve always just pulled a wire out of my wire brush to push through.
Fitted the replacement (original) nozzle today, on perfectly, it extrudes wonderfully straight now, but now I’m faced with a new problem. Filament is just dripping out of it. Only used village plastics ABS set at 240 but it’s dropping out about 1.3mm per second under no load. This never happened before and it’s a bit problematic. It doesn’t just drop out straight either, it curls straight up and gunks all around the bottom of the nozzle so I have to try wipe it off without interfering with the first layer of the print.
Also re levelled the bed, this time with a dial gauge for the first time. The bed is sagging by 0.1mm in the middle, is this normal? Is there a way to account for it or is it replacement bed job?
it’s not unusual for a taz nozzle to drip some filliament, especially if you go over 230c. Dunno why your previous one didn’t, was it a smaller one?
It’s actually normal with a stock Taz, and it’s not the bed that is sagging. It’s the X and Y rods flexing under weight. The fix is hardened rods, or one of the more crazy number of parts mods, like the Openbuilds X and Y axis modifications. .1 is a bit more than normal though.
My old one did drip but at a manageable rate. This one is dripping really fast. I don’t know what the tolerances are on the nozzle opening, or if this ones slightly different? I bought it off someone who supplies hexagon hot ends, although it just says 5 on the side rather than 0.5 like the old one did.
Regarding the bed, the bed itself is sagging in the centre, unless the Y axis rods are dropping really low. I removed the whole print head bracket and put the dial gauge on in its place which weighs a lot less, it measured -0.10 in the centre. Maybe the X axis rods will sag a similar amount in the middle with the heavier print head on to compensate.
