Adam_UL

Replaced both the nozzles on the printer, so things have improved a bit but the extrusion still seems a little off. Does anyone have any recommendations for different nozzles? (types/suppliers/etc)

I think we will try a new extruder head, this is a bit upsetting as we just replaced that head a month or two ago 😅. Would any more photos of the extruder head give more clues? As When I've removed it, it looks fine.

😔No Dice

thanks Torgeir 🙂, it seems strange that small plastic particles could cause so much of a problem. I'll give it a go 🙂

With these results after the first 10 layers 😢. The Support material (mat2) is working fine, I've just removed it. Material 1 does not seem to be being extruded.

This default is being used:

There appears to be some small amount of residue from previous reels of plastic within the bowden tube, not enough to cause a blockage though? Do you have any advice on how best to clean them out? or just remove them and run them under a tap.

We've got a box to keep filament dry in the lab. And it appears to run okay on the rollers in there. But I could remove some of the silica gel to make it move more smoothly.

We've got a box to keep filament dry in the lab. And it appears to run okay on the rollers in there. But I could remove some of the silica gel to make it move more smoothly.

Hey Smithy, thanks for replying. middle fan is working fine, the bowden tube is old but doesn't look damaged (what should I look out for). white filament is brand new and dry. (PLA) Here are some pictures of our setup:

The black one shows what the print quality is normally like. And it's not since changing the plastic either as the black PLA was also behaving like the white PLA.

I think I've also got an extrusion issue but can't quite work it out. I've cleaned out the nozzle a number of times, tried manual leveling of the nozzle but can't work out why the towers come out so porous?

Do you have a photo? it's quite hard to follow your description.

So I got it out! but the reason it was stuck was quite unfortunate. It looks like that the flood was so bad that the unwanted plastic collected above the heating element and prevented the spring release mechanism from working. If the wires to the heat element were still connected, it might have been possible to melt away some of this plastic. My advice if you suspect this has happened to you is to accept that your print core is busted and remove sections of it with pliers being careful not to damage the rest of the printer. Then buy a replacement core. In most other circumstances the heat gun approach would work, but in this case it risked melting other parts of the printer which would end up costing you more than just a new print core.