Hey guys
so i realised that my extruder cover seems to be cracked. There’s a crack from the bottom left to the top right. I have had underextrusion issues so I think it’s that. Is it possible to get a replacement from 3D printing canada or creality? Or should I get a metal extruder?
currently, the extruder is held together with some electric tape and it seems to be holding it together but I don’t know how long this will be for. Any help is grateful
image from a few days ago
UPDATE extruder just fully broke. isn’t extruding at all now.
extruder- dec 2022 - jan 2023
metal is better, the plastic ones almost always fail eventually.
Poorly designed ones will fail eventually.
In the picture, it looks like a stress fracture at the screw hole like there was some space between the two screw bosses.
Hi Blaze
You can email support@3dprintingcanada.com and we can get you a replacement. Just saying from experience these extruders do break. Most of the time I recommend replacing it with a metal one.
This one will bolt in and it has the same brass gear in it so you don’t have to adjust e-steps.
We will honour the warranty on the unit but in this case, there is a better mousetrap.
Hey jason
Thanks for the reply
I ended up getting a BMG clone from amazon. I have the esteps calibrated and did my first overnight print with this new extruder. It seems that half way that it stopped extruding and the gears don’t seem to be turning. It also seems that the stepper isn’t locked and i can move the plastic loading gear on my own.
Any ideas?
almost for sure it’s a loose wire. Happens on extruders all the time. Never try to reseat them while the printer is on as you may lose the stepper driver on the board, Make sure the tension on the wiring where it connects to the stepper motor is not too tight, but on the same hand, it does need to be supported.
I generally will zip-tie it to something close with an “oops loop” to keep slack in the actual connection.
Just checked, the extruder cable isn’t loose. I just ran some gcode to extruder 100mm of filament. Nothing came out. I even tried it by taking the extruder off. Still nothing. Ideas?
Test the motor first, If you have it off, anyway, plug it in into the X axis plug and try to move the X axis and see if its dead, Remove the filament first just so it doesn’t grind it all up on you.
You are really just confirming the motor is not dead, If it moves as requested its good.
Then you are left with only 2 causes assuming the motor is good.
1st would be the wiring, second would be the dead stepper driver.
Wiring you can change the end at the board for the X-axis, and plug the x-axis wire into the E-axis location, So essentially you are now using the X-axis wire as your e-axis one. Now this time you will have to heat the extruder but now attempt to run the extruder movement. If it moves then the wiring for the e Axis failed, If it does not move the stepper driver is dead.
Possible Extruder gear not tight on motor shaft?
It’s tight
Stepper motor is not dead, it spins when connected to the x axis cables. I think it’s the stepper driver… ;-;
Is it possible to get a replacement on the warranty?
Hi Blaze,
Yes, it’s a warrantable item, We have to test it here and verify it wasn’t shorted out or anything like that. It’s a report we have to fill out so our checks have to be done.
Are you local to us here?
Send an e-mail to support@3dprintingcanada.com and include a link to this thread and we can take care of it.
Hey Jason
So just wanted to let you know that I turned it on this morning and accidently selected extrude instead of heat. Seems that it’s working! I don’t know what the hell happened but I guess it’s working. I got a print out of it and it seems to be working. Thanks for your help!
It died again. I’ll be emailing you guys shortly. Sorry about that
Weird. it keeps working and sometimes stops… It’s like the stepper driver just like starts working again? I just power cycled it and its extruding again… This is getting weird. Like it wasn’t working a few minutes ago and now it just magically works?
You think I should get it checked out?
it sounds more than likely a bad wire if the stepper dies it dies, Double check the wiring test we did earlier but as it runs wiggle the wire around, Maybe it’s the connection in the back of the stepper motor. in the correct position, it works? maybe?
I’ll check the wiring again.
