Extruder motor not working on Ultimaker original

[Stan 0]

Hi, I am posting here because I belive the problem could be more a software problem than a hardware one. Everything works well on my Ultimaker Original except the extruder motor which is not working at all. I mean the motor desn't rotate even when it is free and the nozzle temperature is above 170°C (210 in my case). I am using Cura 15.04.3. The extruder motor works if I plug it to another motor port i.e. X or Y or Z and the motor port of the extruder works well (I attached there another motor and using the pronterface UI it worked). So hardware seems to be ok but still no printing... any idea? Thanks

[peetersm 124]

Strange that you can use pronterface to move another motor plugged into the E motor port on the board, but the actual extruder motor does not work the same way. (is your testing motor the same spec as the extruder motor?)

Is this a new issue, have you tried re-flashing the firmware with Cura?

[Stan 0]

Thank you for your help. The motors are the ones provided in the kit, the only difference I can see is the flat side on the axle to accomodate the small black gear. Yes I reflashed the firmware.

[Stan 0]

OK! Tried again, the Extruder motor works when connected to any other port and unfortunately the other motors don't work when connected to the Extruder port. Probably this morning I made a bit of confusion with cables and deduct a wrong thing. I just repeated the test and these are the results.

[Stan 0]

OK! Solved it by myself, someone had fun inverting the extruder motor stepper driver by 180 degs. Very poor quality control on my Ultimaker Original, parts missing or wrong and now electronics inverted... it could have damaged the board (not sure it has, now I am testing it). I am very disappointed, lost two days trying to fix it.

[Dim3nsioneer 557]

Does it only occur to me or is there a very systematic problem with recent UMO kits having the stepper drivers mounted the wrong way round? It seems to me I've read about this at least three times for the last week. Someone at Ultimaker production must have had a very bad day. Actually two persons as quality control has failed too.

[lukas_SLO 0]

Hi guys! I'm having the identical problem with the extruder motor. It does not rotate regardless of being plugged to E1 or E2. I spent many hours:( trying to figure out the problem, until I came to this post. Stan, I wonder how you fixed the motor inverter, is it just the electrical issue? Thanks and best regards!

Luka

[lukas_SLO 0]

Anyone having similar problems? I still can not get the extruder to work....the machine was unboxed just yesterday.

[Dim3nsioneer 557]

The stepper drivers are gone if they are plugged in the wrong way round and power is switched on. Please get in contact with your reseller/distributor.

[Stan 0]

Hi and sorry for the delay in my answer due to the holiday time

The printer works perfectly now so inverting the stepper driver chip (by a 180° rotation) solved my problem. Here a link to one image showing the correct chip position (you can see on the left side of the board the chip correctly placed, mine was aligned as the others on the right side and this is wrong!!!!)

http://reprap.org/mediawiki/images/thumb/5/5e/UM_PCB_v1.1-Pololusteppers2.jpg/400px-UM_PCB_v1.1-Pololusteppers2.jpg

please note the last jumper should be in the open position on the Z axis (the last one on the right side of the board on the side of the stepper driver), if you don't put it in this position all the prints will be made at half size

Also be extremely careful when you remove the chip, have fun

Edited January 7, 2016 by Guest