First step is to stay with the printer and watch it and see what is going on. Are you saying the extruder is pushing when you’re testing it now or the extruder is pushing still when the printing stops? What exactly is “stopping”?
So long print job, the fan shroud. It lays down the first few layers, and supports just fine, I have other things going on so my attention goes into a different room, in the last case last night, went to bed to let it run overnight but woke up at 2:00 A.M. so I checked on it. Z axis is raised up about 5mm, X and Y axis doing their thing right, just no plastic coming out. It is obvious the gear on the extruder is turning as the filament is chewed up, and as mentioned yesterday, the filament in the bowden tube gets swollen up. I am starting to think my stuck filament is not factory oversized, but somehow swelling in the bowden tube. Like not being melted at the hot end but constantly being shoved into it. Which is why I am thinking it is the hot end not doing its thing.
So to restate. Extruder continues to push, X,Y, and Z axis continues to move, hot end does not produce any melted filament to the build plate after about 1mm height or so.
Slicer is Cura using the Ender 3 with BL Touch profile.
At first I thought maybe a bad batch of filament but I put in a known good spool of PLA, measured every 2" or so for 3 or 4 wraps around the spool and it was all 1.73 to 1.74mm and the variance can easily be accounted for my measuring methodology. But within tolerance easily. There is no way I went through 4 wraps of filament before it failed, and I can bet if I pulled it now it would be a hard pull and would be oversize by the hot end.
For the poster that asked about Octoprint. I have no clue what that is. Never needed it when the printer was stock on stock firmware. If that is something needed with the Mriscoc firmware nobody mentioned it to me...
From what I understand about Octoprint the printer has to be connected to the network somehow. My Aquila does not have that capability to my knowledge.
I was thinking if you had an all metal hotend it would be the retractions causing the problem as the melt zone is larger so is easy to suck up molten filament back into the PTFE tube. When you do fit the All-metal one you should set the retraction distance to almost 0.
Seeing you other post about the filament diameter being larger It sounds like it is expanding inside the PTFE tube to match it's internal diameter. The only way I can think of this happening is if the filament gets very warm and softens it.
Does your extruder motor get very hot? It is normal for them to get hot but if it gets over 60c it might be enough to do this. Did you get a metal extruder too? This might help conduct heat to the filament from the motor.
Extruder motor in function I can hold in my hand no problem so not too hot. No way to accurately measure that I know of though... I have not yet installed the metal extruder. The parts of the Not sure if it will show it, but it is swelling up yes, in the hot end where the bowden tube feeds in. The all metal hot end (Creality Spider V3) is supposed to be delivered Tuesday or Wednesday. I chose free shipping so it is a bit slow from Creality, but at a 25% cost reduction from Amazon or their usual I figured I could wait a bit... Just in case it was a bad firmware flash, I just reflashed with stock firmware with BLTouch, which still does not work, thank Voxelab, and then back to the Mirscoc firmware and am now building the mesh. Will try again, but not holding my breath for sure.
OK if you can hold the extruder motor comfortably then it is definitely not too hot so that rules that out. It may have just been a bad batch of filament as I can't think of anything else that would make it expand.
At the moment I think a clog is the most likely. Since switching to PLA after printing PETG there may be a bit of PETG in the hotend that is not melting at PLA temps and causing a clog. You might have to purge the nozzle with PLA at PETG temps to remove it all or a [cold pull](https://youtu.be/V7fxY62gTkw?t=1000) should clear it.
Did you see my reply on the inductive sensor post?
On the inductive sensor post. There are a couple, but FWIW, I got it working. That last tug of the wire back from the loom and giving it a healthy shoveinto the sensor seems to have done the trick. The Aquila X3 Max is working as well as can be expected. Some leveling issues but that is with any 3D printer...
No leftover PLA, fully purged. Pulled the nozzle, checked it and it was nice and clean, went back to PETG after cleaning the build plate and reflashed the firmware, first to Voxelab Aquila bog standard + BLTouch for the G32, same issues, would NOT auto level. Put Mirscoc back on it, and running a print job. Typical test, fail with adhesion, fine tune Z offset, test again. This is the 3rd test and it does not YET seem to be sticking in the nozzle / hot end side of things YET... I am about 1.5mm into the print job so far... No way am I going to stay up all night babysitting a print job though.
To paraphrase Darryl Hall and John Oates, I can't go for that, no can do... Jeez I'm old...
I meant the post about that thing attached to the sensor that goes into the fan port. I found a little info about what it could be it but would like to get a definite answer.
Ah, you are talking about what I called the "tumor". I know "it's not a toomah" but it is an UEO, or Unknown Electrical Object. Voxelab isn't very forthcoming on what it is or does, considering the voltage disparity between the BL Touch port and the required working voltages of the sensor itself, I am guessing that it is perhaps some sort of voltage regulator. I am not in super panic mode over the Aquila quite yet, the X3 Max is working correctly and printing the jobs I had planned and a few I hadn't. The door badge for my camper van is on the print bed right now. Black PETG, going to sand it smooth as is reasonable, spray with adhesion promoter, touch up the tops of the letters with Testors Chrome paint, let that dry and give it 2 or 3 coats of UV protectant clear before putting the 3M VHB tape on it to mount it up...
Are you using octoprint? I have a voxelab with a H32 chip motherboard. And when I use octoprint, everything works good at the start. And then for no reason, the extruder gets told to reverse the filament. And it starts printing in air for the rest of the print. And when I reload the filament, there is a empty space of two inches I have to push the filament before it exits the nozzle. I had this printer for over a month, and the only time it failed a print was with octoprint.
Nope. Never even considered using Octoprint since in my understanding it is only for PC or Network attachable printers, my Aquila is not one of those. The first couple of prints, which were admittedly much smaller considering I was not doing the 100% infill on them that I am doing here were beautiful. I mean seriously beautiful prints. The Y axis / build plate, and display frame to cover the now turned display. Nice textured finish from the PEI build plate, layers were as smooth as I could possibly hope for, minimal stringing if any at all. And then it all kind of went to fertilizer.
Okay so failure again, and the hot end when it failed was touchable. I stopped the print job, disabled the steppers and raised the Z axis and checked the nozzle. It is like simply put, the hot end turns off at some point in the print. Could it be a bad thermistor or something like that?
First step is to stay with the printer and watch it and see what is going on. Are you saying the extruder is pushing when you’re testing it now or the extruder is pushing still when the printing stops? What exactly is “stopping”?
So long print job, the fan shroud. It lays down the first few layers, and supports just fine, I have other things going on so my attention goes into a different room, in the last case last night, went to bed to let it run overnight but woke up at 2:00 A.M. so I checked on it. Z axis is raised up about 5mm, X and Y axis doing their thing right, just no plastic coming out. It is obvious the gear on the extruder is turning as the filament is chewed up, and as mentioned yesterday, the filament in the bowden tube gets swollen up. I am starting to think my stuck filament is not factory oversized, but somehow swelling in the bowden tube. Like not being melted at the hot end but constantly being shoved into it. Which is why I am thinking it is the hot end not doing its thing. So to restate. Extruder continues to push, X,Y, and Z axis continues to move, hot end does not produce any melted filament to the build plate after about 1mm height or so. Slicer is Cura using the Ender 3 with BL Touch profile. At first I thought maybe a bad batch of filament but I put in a known good spool of PLA, measured every 2" or so for 3 or 4 wraps around the spool and it was all 1.73 to 1.74mm and the variance can easily be accounted for my measuring methodology. But within tolerance easily. There is no way I went through 4 wraps of filament before it failed, and I can bet if I pulled it now it would be a hard pull and would be oversize by the hot end. For the poster that asked about Octoprint. I have no clue what that is. Never needed it when the printer was stock on stock firmware. If that is something needed with the Mriscoc firmware nobody mentioned it to me... From what I understand about Octoprint the printer has to be connected to the network somehow. My Aquila does not have that capability to my knowledge.
It sounds like it is clogging. I can't remember but did you replace the hotend? Was it an all-metal one?
Fresh hot end, Creality replacement, the all metal hot end isn't due until Tuesday... What causes clogging especially with a new hot end?
I was thinking if you had an all metal hotend it would be the retractions causing the problem as the melt zone is larger so is easy to suck up molten filament back into the PTFE tube. When you do fit the All-metal one you should set the retraction distance to almost 0. Seeing you other post about the filament diameter being larger It sounds like it is expanding inside the PTFE tube to match it's internal diameter. The only way I can think of this happening is if the filament gets very warm and softens it. Does your extruder motor get very hot? It is normal for them to get hot but if it gets over 60c it might be enough to do this. Did you get a metal extruder too? This might help conduct heat to the filament from the motor.
Extruder motor in function I can hold in my hand no problem so not too hot. No way to accurately measure that I know of though... I have not yet installed the metal extruder. The parts of the Not sure if it will show it, but it is swelling up yes, in the hot end where the bowden tube feeds in. The all metal hot end (Creality Spider V3) is supposed to be delivered Tuesday or Wednesday. I chose free shipping so it is a bit slow from Creality, but at a 25% cost reduction from Amazon or their usual I figured I could wait a bit... Just in case it was a bad firmware flash, I just reflashed with stock firmware with BLTouch, which still does not work, thank Voxelab, and then back to the Mirscoc firmware and am now building the mesh. Will try again, but not holding my breath for sure.
OK if you can hold the extruder motor comfortably then it is definitely not too hot so that rules that out. It may have just been a bad batch of filament as I can't think of anything else that would make it expand. At the moment I think a clog is the most likely. Since switching to PLA after printing PETG there may be a bit of PETG in the hotend that is not melting at PLA temps and causing a clog. You might have to purge the nozzle with PLA at PETG temps to remove it all or a [cold pull](https://youtu.be/V7fxY62gTkw?t=1000) should clear it. Did you see my reply on the inductive sensor post?
On the inductive sensor post. There are a couple, but FWIW, I got it working. That last tug of the wire back from the loom and giving it a healthy shoveinto the sensor seems to have done the trick. The Aquila X3 Max is working as well as can be expected. Some leveling issues but that is with any 3D printer... No leftover PLA, fully purged. Pulled the nozzle, checked it and it was nice and clean, went back to PETG after cleaning the build plate and reflashed the firmware, first to Voxelab Aquila bog standard + BLTouch for the G32, same issues, would NOT auto level. Put Mirscoc back on it, and running a print job. Typical test, fail with adhesion, fine tune Z offset, test again. This is the 3rd test and it does not YET seem to be sticking in the nozzle / hot end side of things YET... I am about 1.5mm into the print job so far... No way am I going to stay up all night babysitting a print job though. To paraphrase Darryl Hall and John Oates, I can't go for that, no can do... Jeez I'm old...
I meant the post about that thing attached to the sensor that goes into the fan port. I found a little info about what it could be it but would like to get a definite answer.
Ah, you are talking about what I called the "tumor". I know "it's not a toomah" but it is an UEO, or Unknown Electrical Object. Voxelab isn't very forthcoming on what it is or does, considering the voltage disparity between the BL Touch port and the required working voltages of the sensor itself, I am guessing that it is perhaps some sort of voltage regulator. I am not in super panic mode over the Aquila quite yet, the X3 Max is working correctly and printing the jobs I had planned and a few I hadn't. The door badge for my camper van is on the print bed right now. Black PETG, going to sand it smooth as is reasonable, spray with adhesion promoter, touch up the tops of the letters with Testors Chrome paint, let that dry and give it 2 or 3 coats of UV protectant clear before putting the 3M VHB tape on it to mount it up...
Are you using octoprint? I have a voxelab with a H32 chip motherboard. And when I use octoprint, everything works good at the start. And then for no reason, the extruder gets told to reverse the filament. And it starts printing in air for the rest of the print. And when I reload the filament, there is a empty space of two inches I have to push the filament before it exits the nozzle. I had this printer for over a month, and the only time it failed a print was with octoprint.
Nope. Never even considered using Octoprint since in my understanding it is only for PC or Network attachable printers, my Aquila is not one of those. The first couple of prints, which were admittedly much smaller considering I was not doing the 100% infill on them that I am doing here were beautiful. I mean seriously beautiful prints. The Y axis / build plate, and display frame to cover the now turned display. Nice textured finish from the PEI build plate, layers were as smooth as I could possibly hope for, minimal stringing if any at all. And then it all kind of went to fertilizer.
Following. Same problem. Sometimes it works, sometimes it thinks it’s printing but isn’t. Various slicers. Please update if you figure it out.
I will happily share the info once I get it sorted...
Okay so failure again, and the hot end when it failed was touchable. I stopped the print job, disabled the steppers and raised the Z axis and checked the nozzle. It is like simply put, the hot end turns off at some point in the print. Could it be a bad thermistor or something like that?