There are a couple of things you could check on the XY axis.
Move the head by hand to the back right corner and home the head, and see if the noise occurs when it's only moving on the X axis, and move it to the front left corner and see if the noise occurs when it's only moving on the Y axis.
I just got my UM3 today and I hear the ticks as well. Like Erin said I believe it could be the XY axis. I noticed the default print speed in cura for UM3 was much faster than what I use from S3D,Once I turned the speed down I noticed the noise stop. Maybe try slowing down the speed a bit to see if that helps?
If it's the same sound as I have you can feel it on the Z axis. Just rest your finger on it gently at the bottom, if its that you will feel it. If you do try this you put your hand in your printer at your own risk.
To stop mine I manually levelled the print bed, turned auto level to never and it's been silent since. The bed stays nicely level between prints so there's no real need to keep levelling as far as I have seen so far.
Hope this helps
Edited by Guest
1
If it's the same sound as I have you can feel it on the Z axis. Just rest your finger on it gently at the bottom, if its that you will feel it. I
I can feel the ticking in the Z axis. No sounds when just moving the head around. I'm happy I finally am making some progress with this...
This brings on another question: WHY is the Z axis ticking (or at least broadcasting the ticking sound)? I am 100% sure that I leveled the bed very accurately by hand (did that 10+ times, I am getting this ticking sound after every manual leveling).
Maybe @sandervg can enlighten us as to what the UM3 is doing/trying to do here?
I'm sure that Ultimaker wishes to get to the bottom of this, especially if the ONLY way to shut it up is to disable the auto bed-level mechanism. So ultima(ker)tely will come up with a solution I'm sure! 
(unlike you I am not going to disable this feature, the ticking sound is not really annoying me)
Edited by Guest
If it's the same sound as I have you can feel it on the Z axis. Just rest your finger on it gently at the bottom, if its that you will feel it. I
I can feel the ticking in the Z axis. No sounds when just moving the head around. I'm happy I finally am making some progress with this...
This brings on another question: WHY is the Z axis ticking (or at least broadcasting the ticking sound)? I am 100% sure that I leveled the bed very accurately by hand (did that 10+ times, I am getting this ticking sound after every manual leveling).
Maybe @sandervg can enlighten us as to what the UM3 is doing/trying to do here?
I'm sure that Ultimaker wishes to get to the bottom of this, especially if the ONLY way to shut it up is to disable the auto bed-level mechanism. So ultima(ker)tely will come up with a solution I'm sure!
(unlike you I am not going to disable this feature, the ticking sound is not really annoying me)
It's not ticking so much as making a Z axis adjustment, this would be one step you are feeling of the stepper motor. It's just adjusting the build plate height because you have auto level turned on. It doesn't matter how many times you manually level, the sensor will always measure slightly different to your manual leveling.
Auto levelling is just a tool to make printing easier for the masses and away for everyone to have successful prints without the need to keep manually adjusting. The sound is not a fault, it's just a byproduct of auto levelling. All printers with auto levelling do this. I think the Ultimaker steppers are fairly quiet, I still turned auto levelling off though.
@Zwakie, it sounds like you like leveling your build plate manually 8)
Edited by Guest
1
Not entirely sure if everyone is hearing the same ticking because there are no recordings of those, but it appears so. In that case, based on the description it looks like you are noticing the active leveling. Like @Krasnoyask says, the sound is a byproduct of active leveling (which officially is slightly different from auto level).
Active leveling means the Ultimaker 3 will use the first couple (approx 10?) layers to compensate for any offset. That is most likely the ticking sound that you hear.
If you want to confirm, put your index finger on the threaded rod when it is printing. You should feel a mini turn at the same time with the ticking sound and that should also be the proof it is the Z motor adjusting.
...Like @Krasnoyask says, the sound is a byproduct of active leveling.
Thanks for confirming. Like I wrote before, I can indeed "feel" the ticking on the Z-axis when the ticks occur.
Active leveling means the Ultimaker 3 will use the first couple (approx 10?) layers to compensate for any offset. That is most likely the ticking sound that you hear.
You are correct about the 10 layers that the active leveling does it's job, I believe I read this in the "Day 1-6 and 7th day rest" series on the website.
I am now quite sure this is what I am hearing since the ticking sound stops after having printed 10 layers. What I wrote earlier about the sound being there throughout the print was wrong, apologies for providing that faulty information.
Anyway, another really accurate manual level did indeed minimize the ticks to the point it's almost absent. (yeah, manual leveling is what I love most, duh )
I will leave this matter to rest now and am happy that the ticking sounds can serve as a control tool to confirm that the active leveling systems actually works.
Thanks for educating me on this system
1
IF is that small tickticktickticktocktocktocktick tick tock tock is the autolevel system compensating the z of the first layers.
To completely remove that you need to do a manual calibration only (doing a manual calibration & setting auto calibration yo Never). That's what I use since I don't like automagicall stuff that i can't control.
I think there is more to it than just the autolevel system correcting for sub-optimal manual leveling. I have two reasons for this assumption:
1. It keeps doing it, even after paying real attention to manual leveling and making sure that the layer-thickness of the very first layer printed is very consistent height-wise
2. The ticking sound does not stop after the 10 layers that the autobed-level system is supposed to do it's task; in my case it keeps ticking throughout the entire print, regardless of how many layers are being printed (done some prints > 700 layers and enjoyed that sound until the prints finished).
So I guess we have to start a quest to find out WHAT ELSE might be causing this ticking sound. As the original poster of this thread I cannot locate the source of the sound and have no clue how to pinpoint what is causing it. If anyone has any idea, please share it with us so we can start printing quietly
Hey, Zwakie,
Did you ever find out what is causing the noise?
Have you tried putting spray air into the feeder to clean it of any filament debris that might be caught in there?
Did you ever find out what is causing the noise?
Yeah @fbrc8-erin, it definitely is the bed-levelling after all.
As I wrote in my last reply, I had given the idea that the sound lasted throughout the entire print, which was not the case. Apologies for the confusion, but thanks for asking!
Did you ever find out what is causing the noise?
Yeah @fbrc8-erin, it definitely is the bed-levelling after all.
As I wrote in my last reply, I had given the idea that the sound lasted throughout the entire print, which was not the case. Apologies for the confusion, but thanks for asking!
I'm sorry, it looks like I missed the last response. I was reading the earlier one where you'd mentioned the clicking being ongoing. Glad to hear it's working well!
1
Did you ever find out what is causing the noise?Yeah @fbrc8-erin, it definitely is the bed-levelling after all.
As I wrote in my last reply, I had given the idea that the sound lasted throughout the entire print, which was not the case. Apologies for the confusion, but thanks for asking!
I'm sorry, it looks like I missed the last response. I was reading the earlier one where you'd mentioned the clicking being ongoing. Glad to hear it's working well!
Your helpful responses make up big time for being sorry about having missed a detail Thanks again!
2
Not sure if this was added but when I got my UM3 I didn't see one rod was not snapped in. I was hearing some knocking with was I think the rod.
Might be worth checking if it wasn't already.
hey I have possible a different knocking issue, mine is definitely feed related.
a few things to help people trouble shoot.
Create a large (6") round disc and add a skirt.
-If your tics are constant then it is feed related.
- if your ticks speed up and slow down then it is compensating for a plane that is offset, continue to the next test.
Create a large (6") square, add another skirt
- if ticks happen only on one of the directions then you have a belt issue (or atleast something isolated to that axis)
- if it happens on both directions and it slows down and speeds up along the x-y directions then it is a z offset it is compensating for, try and level your build plate.
no reason to even complete these prints, you just use it to lay a few lines of the skirt while figuring out the ticking sound.
Edited by Guest
ArunC posted a topic in UltiMaker Cura,
.thumb.jpeg.0b7a05eafc09add17b8338efde5852e9.jpeg)
Dustin posted a topic in Firmware,
Recommended Posts
fbrc8-erin 272
Could it be the feeder? Does whether it's printing in PLA or another material make a difference to whether or not you're hearing the sound? Has the tension been adjusted on the feeders?
Link to post
Share on other sites
Zwakie 21
Thanks @fbrc8-erin for sharing your thoughts with us.
Tension on the feeders have not been changed.
The feeder could indeed be the source, but (if memory serves me well) I have those ticks also during travel moves, which goes a little against the thesis that the feeder is the source. To be sure I will do a test print with long and slow travels across X/Y. If no ticking during travel chances are it's the feeder, otherwise I have to look elsewhere, right?
Regarding materials: I did not pay real attention, so can't tell if there is a correlation between material used and the volume and intensity of the ticking sound. I however did observe variations in these sound-variables.
Another observation is that the sound-pattern itself definitely is repetitive in nature, it strongly seems related to the X/Y-position and direction of movement of the print head (this is why I initially found the bed-level system to be the best suspect).
Well, 'nough said for now, first will do the test to see if the sound is there during travel moves...
Link to post
Share on other sites