Ultimaker 3 Extrusion Disaster

[etdesrochers 0]

Hello Ultimaker community, 

This morning I came in to work and I found our Ultimaker 3 in this disastrous state, as you can see in the pictures. This UM3 is heavily used since 1 year and a half but is always maintained and taken care of by me. 

 

So I started a print on Friday, White ABS in printcore 1, Nylon+CF in printcore 2. The print was supposed to go on for 2 days, but it seems it somehow stopped and kept extruding on itself for a long time. Yes, what you see in the second picture is a huge chunk of plastic that pushed open the printcore door, a composition of both my materials.

 

Both printcores were stuck in this huge chunk of plastic, and the printcore door, impossible to pull the cores out. I managed to disassemble the whole print head, cut the plastic carefully, and get the printcores out. Fortunately, I saved everything but the two AA printcores. 

 

This is a very unsual situation, in a year and a half I've never seen such an extreme case of failure. I am sharing this today because I would like to hear your thoughts on what could be the cause of this and if any others experienced such a failure. My theory is that the head stopped all movement for some reason but kept printing just like if it was still moving.

Thank you!

[Dim3nsioneer 464]

There is one important thing you can and should do to avoid such a situation.

Check the silicon nozzle cover regularly and change it when any of the cutouts for the nozzle starts to disintegrate.

 

My theory what happened in your case is that the nozzle cover was damaged and material started to flow into the head. At some point, it pushed the front bracket open and then the print head started to rip at the already printed pieces pushing the glass plate out of the fixation which then stuck to the print head somehow and pushed it out of the sliding blocks.

[etdesrochers 0]

That makes sense. My nozzle cover was very used yes. I didn't know it was an important part. The X and Y positioning rods poped out of their socket, so that could explain why it kept extruding in one place. Thanks for your help!

[RubberRudder 0]

Mine did the same brand new. 
Fan door would flop open, due to weak magnets. 
Not as ugly as yours but it did push the glass off and jammed the Z motion.
Had a deadline to meet so had to overnight a new printhead and cores. $600 +  
It's ridiculous not to have a pause signal sent when the fan door is opened.

Just had to replace the Wifi card and now the camera has quit...

love the warranty, support its great..... I'd rather not have to replace parts every month.