Heatbreak Clogged - What to do?

Hi all,

Due to a bad micro-blower, I now have two of these hexagon heat-breaks that are clogged. (Photos attached)

I’ve not found any good info online for how to fix these and I really don’t want to spend $70 on a new one.
One of them clogged on the first day I installed it.

The clogged material is eSun PLA+

I tried the cold pull / atomic pull with no luck.

I’ve heard about various methods along the lines of using a blow torch to heat the entire part up or tiny drill bits.
I don’t own a blow torch or drill bits that small, but I could buy them if necessary.

One of my heat breaks has the nozzle removed.
The other (new) heat break has the nozzle attached.

Thank you for any help!
I really need to get my printer up and running ASAP for a client project.

Best,

Jack


With pla, an easy way is find the closest thing to a 3mm wire rod you can find, heat the hot end up using the built in heater while holding it securely with tongs, and attempt to manually force the plastic out by using that wire as a plunger, if it goes, you don’t have a clog, you have a nozzle too close to the bed or overextrusion problem. If it doesn’t go, with the hot end at 160 or so, attempt to remove the nozzle itself. This will void your hot end warranty, but your in a hurry. Don’t remove it cold, you’ll snap it. Even attempting a removal warm may snap it. To remove the nozzle, power off the heater once you reach 160 or so, then use an insulated crescent wrench or a normal one with a hotpad to brace the heater block, then a smaller wrench to remove the nozzle. Then heat it back up and repeat the wire plunger trick. Let it cool back down, clean the nozzle threads, try and dig any debris out of the nozzle, consider buying a new nozzle since just the nozzle is cheap and prime ones on Amazon could be there Tuesday for a compatable 3mm e3dv6 nozzle. Then put it back together.

I do not recommend this way to anyone but:

An 1/8 inch drill bit is close enough to the right size for the feed path. But if you use one get a real cheap one as the heat will remove the temper in the bit. But pretty much anything like these two ideas(this one and the one above) voids the warranty. :frowning:

Be careful of the brass fitting in the top of the extruder, it will be very soft and damage easy when that hot.