Y or X axis switch error

[Danieljenzen 0]

Hello! the topic says it all

Printer was working 100% fine and just did a 35 hour print.

After this i thought about doing some maintenance on the machine to keep it fresh, cause lately, ive bought a new printer, and rotating its extruder head around feels alot less resistant than my old one, i sometimes had to put alot of force into moving the printhead left and right(standing infront of printer)

And noticed the printer wasnt finishing the top layers too good, so i tried to tighten the pulleys and basicly everthing i could tighten. including centered some axis, as one of them was sticking out of the printer. so everything looked 100%.

After this i pressed "home head" and it went all just fine, but when i went on to start a print, the extruder head always does "home head" first, and this is where the Y axis sensor switch probably stopped working. "switch error, contact support"

Ive read alot about this in the last 3 hours:

The metal tip is bent corrently

The sensor emits the faint click sound when moved to, as in activated button.

ive checked absolutely all pulleys, belts and screws.

i even took off the left big white cover to see if any cables was pinched while tightening the short belts and whatnot.

No cables look damaged, although i noticed for some time that it looks like some of the belts or something, is getting grinded on, as i found lots of black dust around the engine, same for the X engine, on top of both engines. i have no idea if this has anything to do with it.

Only thing i didnt do, was removing the bottom plate, this happend while i was trying to give the machine some tightening up, so it couldnt have done any damage in the main board.

The machine has run 1000 hours of printing. 04 nozze, bought this one from Netherlands via ultimaker.

[gr5 2,172]

First of all - never ever remove the panels.  Not side, not rear, not front, not top or bottom.

Better to remove the metal cover.  It comes off with one or two screws depending how old it is.  Very easy to remove.

Did you check if that metal cover is shorting out the limit switch cable?  That happens a lot.

Consider running this software:

pronterface/printrun (it's free and an easy gui to use):

http://koti.kapsi.fi/~kliment/printrun/

And I think it can tell you if limit switches are triggering or not - start with a working switch.  It's important to get this working again.

This is a very very simple circuit - either open or closed and easily tested - you can remove the connector underneath and test it with a multimeter pushing and releasing the limit switch and watching the resistance change from near 0 ohms to near infinite ohms.  You might have damaged the wiring and you might have to replace all the wiring for this limit switch.

Edited August 20, 2015 by Guest

[Danieljenzen 0]

Hello, thank you for you answer.

I cant think of any reason how this is possible, NEVERR touched the switch or the cables, i just adjusted the extruder head so i could tighten the 2 pulleys in that corner and centered the axis.

In that case, am i able to get the switch pack by warranty or something? the price for the parts is 15 euro, which is lovely, but 30euro freight? :/

[gr5 2,172]

I'm sure you can get a free switch but you should diagnose the problem first down to the part that is failing. It could be the board, the switch the cabling or the switch is not being pushed far enough. You can test all of these things very easily. Time to get started. Start by either installing pronterface and testing the whole system at once with your finger pushing the switch or better locate a multimeter and start by taking off the bottom cover (and while at it see if the cable fell off the board).

[gr5 2,172]

For example if the metal cover has cut through the insulation on the switch wiring you should photograph that before contacting support.

[IRobertI 520]

I know you said you had checked all the pulleys, but just to make sure, did you also check the one directly on the stepper motor shaft? I've seen this error in person 2-3 times (different printers) and every time that's where the problem was.

[Danieljenzen 0]

I know you said you had checked all the pulleys, but just to make sure, did you also check the one directly on the stepper motor shaft? I've seen this error in person 2-3 times (different printers) and every time that's where the problem was.

 

Oh yes, i went over all the pulleys i touched the first place many times.

And yes, i removed the inner white cover after gr5 told me to, and checked the stepper. Its tight and running good. I cant believe how this could happen.

As i mentioned in the first post, i pressed "home head" to check if everything was allright after the tightening, and it went fine, but when i started a print, thats when it went wrong, and havent been able to use the printer since.

[gr5 2,172]

@IRobertI - are we talking about the same issue? i think the issue was:

"switch error, contact support"

Right? So something is wrong with the wiring of a switch? Also this can be caused I assume by the Z switch. If you lift up the bed with power off you can see underneath there is a long screw - that screw fits into a hole in the bottom of the machine - sometimes a bit of plastic falls in there and the Z switch stops working. You can test it with a screwdriver or toothpick or inserting something skinny into that hole and listening for the click.

[gr5 2,172]

This issue is about as easy an electronics issue as you can imagine. It's as simple as a light switch. Do you have access to a meter? Do you have a friend who knows how to use one? This is a 10 minute issue - not a 2 day issue.

[IRobertI 520]

@IRobertI - are we talking about the same issue?

 

Yup, believe it or not In the scenarios I've seen this error the stepper is spinning but the head doesn't move (or doesn't move enough). I assume there's some sort of time out for the homing routine that causes it to flag a switch error when it doesn't see a switch being triggered within X amount of movement.

[Danieljenzen 0]

I figured it out!

I know gr5 told me never to remove the transparent cover, but i had to. I noticed that one of the switch cable looked abit sketchy and i wanted to give it one last try before i sendt it back.

As you see on the photoes, the Red cable, looks like its supposed to be welded to the switch, but the connecting point of the cable and the switch was waaay too weak and small. So i trimmed off some of the red rable on the end to give it bigger space to "connect with", mounted it on the switch with the black sleeve, and it worked!

This might have happend due to VERY VERY small vibrations on the cable, as it always has been very close to the Y-axis engine belt, i might be wrong, but when i tighten those pulleys, that might have been the last hanging atom connecting the switch to the printer shaking loose by the slightest touch on the machine.

I have no idea if it will hold like this in the long term, but it shouldnt be able to shake loose anytime soon.

[gr5 2,172]

The switches are only used in the homing procedure. So once that is done you don't have to worry about the switch failing 5 hours into a 30 hour print. but at some point if you have a friend with a soldering iron and some skills you should have them fix this.

[Danieljenzen 0]

The switches are only used in the homing procedure.  So once that is done you don't have to worry about the switch failing 5 hours into a 30 hour print.  but at some point if you have a friend with a soldering iron and some skills you should have them fix this.

 

Yes agreed, thank you for your consistent help gr5 on my other posts aswell, i seeme to be running into ALOT of problems in my starting days as a 3d printer, each and everytime crushing my sould and leaving me clueless, but eventually fixing it. This rollercoaster of crushing dreams and rebuilding it really saps the energy out of me.

[gr5 2,172]

Try take deep breaths and concentrate only on that. Then remember we are here to help you.

[Danieljenzen 0]

http://www.thingiverse.com/thing:903411

Printed these with:

0.2

0.8 shell

100% fill to get watertight

30mm/s

bottom layer 10mms 0.3 layer

outershell 20mms

im trying to make this but the print either get extremely ugly or the White pot doesnt get watertight. I use my old printer for the white part and 1 month old for the blue part. This is how they look.

I'm already printing very slow and ofc, ive tightend everything as asked and cleaned the nozzles. Why am i not getting this right? I see plenty of others printing with PLA getting this right even with the "fast" simple setting and looks nice from cura which i also tried, i had to stop cause of the stepper engine slipping filament....

im spending more time on this forum that printing lately

[Danieljenzen 0]

i guess its worth to mention. i use PLA/PHA from colorfabb

[gr5 2,172]

What's the problem? not watertight? Or you don't like the prominent layers?

I'm going to assume the watertight thing - this is tricky - most people who print water tight items regularly like to overextrude - Joris is an expert at this with his cups. So you could set the flow to 150% - or even better use a larger nozzle. There's a guy in Oslo who sells alternate nozzles for UM2 at 3dsolex.com. I would be very tempted to use the 0.6mm or 0.8mm and overextrude about 130 to 150%. Best to do it in one pass instead of two .4mm passes.

[Danieljenzen 0]

thank you for quick and good answer as always.

I could rather just smear some silicon or something on the inside to make it watertight if needed though?

By the way, am i able to get one of the screws for the axis pulleys? i noticed that im missing one.