Printing stops halfway through

[Otsuka 0]

Hi there,

Hope someone can help me!

I have been trying to print out a simple cylinder container but it seems that the printing stops halfway through.

Have tried printing twice but both stopped printing at exactly the same position. Please see the attached images.

 

I have lowered the printing temperature to 190 but not sure if this makes any difference?

 

Hope to hear some advise soon!

 

Thanks,

[GregValiant 1,330]

What printer is it?

[Otsuka 0]

Hi Gregaliant, it's Ender 3 v2.
Thanks

[GregValiant 1,330]

Most Ender's and the CR-10's have the same hot end.  They are prone to clogging at the bottom of the bowden tube where it is supposed to butt up against the nozzle.  After printing for an hour or two the clog gets enough warm material built up that it impedes the flow of the filament to the nozzle.  It usually doesn't skip steps, but extrusion gets iffy.

Zooming in on your first image - the extrusion looks iffy as a couple of layers hardly extruded at all.

The problem can be caused by a combination of things.  The cheap Creality hot end, insufficient cooling from the hot end fan, too long retractions, a lot of retractions in a short distance, bad coupler on the top of the hot end, the bowden tube is damaged where it meets the nozzle, the bowden wasn't cut off exactly square, heat creep, and on and on.

Those parts probably don't have many retractions so you should focus on the hot end.

Heat it up to 180 or 190 and then pull out the bowden tube.  Remove the nozzle.  Find a piece of wire (like a coathanger) that is about 1.75mm and shove it down through the warm hot end.  See if a plug of plastic comes out.

Cut 6 or 7mm off the bowden tube and make sure it's a nice 90° cut.  Put the nozzle in and snug it up, then back it off 1/2 turn.

Shove the bowden tube back in so it is hard against the back of the nozzle and put the lock clip back on the coupler.  Then snug the nozzle the rest of the way so it's tight.  That should provide a good seal to the bowden.

 

Now, I did all that several times.  I replaced the couplers with Parker-Hannifin models, new bowden tube and a little jig to make the cut exactly square.  My Ender 3 Pro continued to have problems an hour or two into a print.  I changed the hot end fan from the stock 4010 to a 4015 ball bearing model with about twice the flow.  Added a baffle inside the hot end housing to direct the fan discharge right at the heat exchanger.  I still had problems.  At that point I bought a new hot end that was a clone of the stock hot end.  That lead to a new saying "When you clone a POS you shouldn't be surprised that the clone is also a POS!".

Now I have an all metal hot end and it's all good.  It still needs the bowden trimmed back once in a while as it does rotate in the coupler and get chewed up, but the printer prints very well.

[Otsuka 0]

Hi GregValiant, thanks for your advise!
Well I needed to order some tools to remove the Bowden tube.. 

 

Once I get the tool delivered, I will definitely give it a try.

Fingers crossed! 

 

Thanks again 🙂