gr5

Well if you are only going to print 0.4mm I can sell you a core with a 0.4mm ruby nozzle where the eeprom reports as a AA 0.4 so you don't have to type in the nozzle diameter (although really, how much works is it to enter a single number, "line width" into cura). I have one hardcore left in the store (will have a few more in a week or so) and plenty of UM3 ruby nozzles. So contact me soon if you want me to reserve the last HC for you: thegr5store _at_ gmail.com. If you send me your existing core then you can save money and also might be able to get away with not calibrating when you get it back as the x,y and z shouldn't change. Or I can send you a fresh new core.

There are many species of animals where (usually the male) they put in a ton of effort in mating rituals or offerings/gifts. Women appreciate getting useless things that take effort such as flowers or poetry. There's something impressive about putting a lot of effort into something that isn't needed. It's definitely not always about mating and romance as even competing males appreciate/like seeing this behavior in others. So yeah, it's more impressive to see this Friday indicator than to see that you now drive a new speedy red Tesla.

I think neotko is saying you have this force budget. The extruder can push with about 5kg. The ruby is a longer passage so it needs maybe 50% more force than usual nozzles at a given speed. So if the bowden takes up 1kg friction and the tfn takes up 1kg and normal nozzle needs 3kg you are fine (adds up to 5kg) but with the ruby you need 4.5kg for the same print and so you get underextrusion. I don't really believe that's the problem. If it was you could cut your print speed in half and now the ruby should need less force than a regular nozzle at the original speed and should extrude just as well as the regular nozzle. I think there is something in the narrow passage or just above it in the ruby. It may look perfect but something is probalby wrong with it such as some tiny piece of debris that entered the nozzle along with the filament. Personally I would try burning it out. It sounds like ruby can handle temperatures up to where brass melts and brass will glow red hot before melting and it sounds like there is no glue involved.

Not sure about the freeze. Is the extruder retracting during the freeze? If so then try printing much slower - half the speed you were printing - actually try printing at 20mm/sec just to see how much better the quality is at the "freeze" spots. Also what is your: nozzle width, layer height, print speed, print temperature. These 4 values interact and if you print too fast you will need to set the flow to 130% like you did.

First of all I would print it with the circle down flat on the bed. There is a rotate feature in cura. Once rotated with circle "down" you can disable support and the part will print much more beautifully and also much faster. It's hard to tell what the problem is but from looking at the pictures it looks like your part has an outer and an inner wall with nothing in between. So if you pass an imaginary line along the rotational axis of this part (the tip to the base) you will pass through 4 (not 2!) sets of meshes (surfaces). First the tip of the part, then - maybe a half millimeter later a second surface. Then nothing for a short distance - maybe 5mm? And then 2 more meashes. Is this explanation clear so far? Anyway the thickness of these walls are much less than 0.8mm (the minimum wall thickness for a .4mm nozzle as it makes two passes. Did you create this part yourself in CAD? View the part in "xray mode". You have your normal mode shown and slice view shown but there is another view mode called xray. In that mode anything colored red (dark red, light red, bright red) is a problem. I don't think you have this issue but that's another possibility.

Don't know weight limit but you can put the spool on the floor. But it will take days to go through a 1kg spool. There are many things that are a "pain" with 3d printing and having only 1kg per spool is not one of them. I recommend you get high quality filament such as UM brand or colorFabb. Some of the cheap chinese filaments on ebay will cause you MUCH more pain than having to change spools every few days.

Just take it out. It helps with airflow a little but mostly it's purpose is if your part gets partly done and is vaguly shaped like a hokey puck and then comes loose it will slide around the build plate and filament will keep coming out of the nozzle and get up inside the head. But if you avoid autolevel and your parts stick like hell to the glass or instead if you check your print's progress every 30 minutes then you are unlikely to run into that problem. I guess I would order another one from fbrc8 but print without it. disclaimer: please don't go after me if you ruin your head because it filled with plastic. I mean I've been printing for years and never had this problem. But MANY other's have had this problem (hocky puck sliding around creating massive blob that enters the print head).

Yes. While writing your post - when you are ready to insert a picture, click the 2nd icon from the right within the post editor (image gallery) - immediately go to the second tab in the image gallery and then drag and drop a picture onto it (it doesn't say you can do this but it works).

The Ultimaker printers require zero modifications to print in zero gravity. They can print on their side or upside down. I have done this a few times - printed with the printer laying on it's side. I thought it might help overhangs but no such luck. Also Ultimaker once hung a printer upside down from a rope at a show. it printed fine. However the printers on the space station need to be completely enclosed to prevent small pieces of filament from drifting away and also to filter the air. There are probably several modifications to make a printer safer.

UM2 definitely has auto0.g. I used it recently on a um2go, um2ext and um2 (plain) last weekend. I don't think there is a gcode to load materials.txt though. But who knows.

What does that do? Please explain a little more.

Well that's great. Now you'll have 3 perfect sides of glass to print on instead of 2.

Oh yeah. That sucks. I've probably done 1000 prints and that only happened once. I think it was CPE. I don't that's ever happened to me with ABS or PLA. I flipped the glass and it hasn't happened since. This is rarer than you might think -- it's unlikely to happen very often. I would contact your supplier just to see what they say. They might send you a free glass. Also consider contacting fbrc8.com - they might either send you a free one or at least they will quote you a price. There is a type of glass called neoceram that is probably better (flatter but might still spall like yours did). I should get off my butt some day and see if I can get a large shipment and sell those at a good price in my store. Are you certain it was ABS? And not CPE or PET or UPET?

I recommend PLA. It can handle moisture and is pretty stable. I have a few PLA prints outside in the sun, rain, snow for a few years and they look as good as new.

Oh and you shouldn't need any (or EXTREMELY little) oil on the rods. They have ball bearings inside. Sometimes it helps to take those out and clean the ball bearings with wd-40 and then dry thoroughly and re-lubricate with a drop of oil or less than a drop.

Photo of a few prints. Is it always the same spot? Most likely it's related to Z movement. It is getting hung up. With mostly equal probability it could be the Z screw, the Z nut, the Z rods, or the Z bearings. It's possible it's also other things like an overheating Z driver - it might shut off for 1/4 second due to overheating and your bed could drop a tiny bit. For example it could be 20mm from glass is where things start to get too hot. But if it gets "good" again above 20mm then it's probably mechanical. Slide your bed up and down many times by hand with power off trying to feel if you can detect the bad spot. To separate rods from screw issues, remove the screw. With power off, remove the Z motor and screw and pull it out the bottom. Slide the bed up and down and without the stepper involved any problems are VERY noticable. A quick hack fix/test is to put a heavy weight in the back of the bed. 1kg or 2 pounds is about right. If the problem comes and goes then often a very thorough cleaning will help. Many people have bought a new Z nut of higher quality and that has helped many people. Many others replaced the vertical rods or the bearings which fixed their issue. It's hard to say for sure.

Well you can probably just put these gcodes into a text file, save as move.gcode and put it on the sd card and print it: M302 S0G92 E0G0 E100 The first command allows cold extrusion (moving extruder without heating up nozzle first). The second one tells the extruder it is at position 0. The last one says to move to position 100mm. This assumes there is no load (the filament is only part way into the bowden). If you plan to actually extrude at the same time then you need to slow it the hell down using "F" or feedrate. You probably want it to take about 1 minute so that would be 100mm per minute or F100 and so change the G0 command to this: G0 E100 F100 I think that should work. There is an "ultigcode" mode on the UM2 - not sure if UM3 still uses it - I haven't paid attention. If it is in ultigcode mode then the E100 will move 100 cubic mm. I'm pretty sure the UM3 doesn't use this volumetric method. Most printers don't. Or if it were me I would ssh into the printer. First put it in "developer" mode on the front display. Note the IP address while doing that. Then download PUTTY and ssh to that ip address. username is root password ultimaker. Then do: cd /usr/share/griffinpython3 command_util.pysendgcode M302 S0sendgcode G92 E0sendgcode G0 E100

You can push the head around by hand when the printer is off or when you first power it on but before you start a print. Push it all the way to the front. It sticks out. At least it does on my UM3.

Here are 2 versions of a front cover for um3 where there is an area that sticks out so the head doesn't hit the front door.

I know you have some kind of needle so run that needle up and down the inside of the ruby (nozzle sex?). Do it dozens of times and try to scrape the inside of the nozzle clean - you can't scratch ruby with mere steel so don't worry about that. Something is in there somewhere. This should fix anything adhering to the walls deep where you can't see. Also it could be something at the top of the ruby (the hardest spot to get to). so do an atomic pull but while it's cooling again run the needle up there to push any blockage into the slowly cooling pla. Do it 10 times. Then when it's cool do the atomic pull (with the needle long since removed). If none of this works, try working on it while it is not attached to the printer. If you have a gas stove you can turn it on medium. I put a drop of water on the nozzle then hold the nozzle with pliers and heat until the water boils all while counting seconds. then I double that count of seconds. So if it takes 10 seconds to boil all the water away then I hold it in the flame for another 10 seconds. Then you can push filament by hand into the nozzle and experiment. For a brass nozzle I have heated to 400C to burn everything to ash. That might help possibly. Ruby can handle well over 1000C (brass will melt first but glow cherry red before it melts so you aren't likely to overheat it). Of course hold the nozzle with pliers.

Nice. But the print head is going to hit the door. :(

I don't think he cares about strength - just heat resistance.

Please mention in your settings that you own a UM2+ as I always look there (under your icon) first even though it was right in your first post. Also please post a photo of what you mean. Some parts are incredibly easy to remove support. Such as the shape of an umbrella in the normal orientation. Some parts are harder as you have to get inside a tiny hole and pull out large pieces of support. I rarely use support and when I do I usually design it myself in CAD.

@GTK2011 - to summarize me and yellowshark: ABS is a difficult material and hard to get it to look as nice and still be even half as strong as PLA. There are other materials that can handle higher heat than PLA. How hot is this part likely to get?

Well I'd start with a different color. Anything other than white. Then I'd also enclose the printer - put an open box on top and something covering the front. You want a big hole in the back for the bowden. Then I'd set bed to 100C to get the air warmer (and to keep parts from curling off the glass). Then I'd set the fan to 30% and the print speed to 20mm/sec and print a cube and check the corners. If they look bad then increase fan to 100% and see if they are better (but now the part will likely be weak along layer lines). In general higher fan and slower printer speed = better quality particularly for those walls/corners.