Ultimaker2 Feeder System - Improvements and Ideas

[IRobertI 520]

Well... I wouldn't mind testing You've already given me some free PLA so I can't really ask for more there but I don't have much of the flex to test, maybe a couple hours worth if I were to guess.

 

[cor3ys 28]

Hi GadgetFreak

I would be up for it i only had a 2m lenth that 3dfilament sent me to test....

 

[gadgetfreak 7]

Cor3ys, please PM me your address and phone number (needed for shipment w DHL).

Robert, of course! Skicka mig din adress på mail igen bara

 

[cor3ys 28]

Wow cool PM sent :grin:

 

[DidierKlein 729]

Printed you design yesterday, just need to take the time to change my feeder.

I should maybe try to do the V2 extrusion test from illuminati with the stock feeder and after with yours to see if anything changes. I'm planning to test filaflex too in the following days.

Thanks for the design i'm also probably going to print you spoolholder

 

[skint 61]

I`m always up for testing anything... but gotta wait to get my laptop up n runnin first :(

 

[fingerpuk 0]

Printing this new design now, looking forward to trying it out

 

[dieselpower 0]

Seems this is going to be one of the mods I will do first, once I get my UM2 :cool:

 

[sebastian 0]

It would be really really great if somebody could do some testing of Roberts new design for:

- NinjaFlex filament (big and long prints like 10 hours or so because short prints of NinjaFlex can be done on UM2 stock feeder)

- Loooong print testing (prints between 20 to 50 hours) to see how it holds up

any takers?

We will ship free filament, both NinjaFlex and standard PLA to the first brave ones (within Europe) that would like to do some testing like that.

Please send me a PM if you're up for it!

Cheers

Daniel

 

I am currently running two Ultimaker² with Roberts feeder design including ~24h prints. Works flawless til now. Both feeders are printed in PLA.

Before I used Geeks feeder design which also gave great results but broke at the filament guide and the lever when printed in PLA. Therefore I switched to Roberts design.

The original feeder caused clogging problems after a few weeks on both printers due to material abrasion.

Thanks Robert and Geeks for your great work!

Sebastian

 

[geeks 1]

Before I used Geeks feeder design which also gave great results but broke at the filament guide and the lever when printed in PLA. Therefore I switched to Roberts design.

 

Oh! :shock:

 

I always the one I printed. I did not have this concern. Were there any defect in the printing of my pieces? :oops:

 

Should I reinforce the guide?

 

Thank you for your valuable information.

 

[sebastian 0]

Oh! :shock:

 

I always the one I printed. I did not have this concern. Were there any defect in the printing of my pieces? :oops:

 

Should I reinforce the guide?

 

Thank you for your valuable information.

 

There were no visible defects in the printed parts.

The filament guide was under pretty much stress especially visible during retractions and broke below the two mounting screws at the printer. I printed that part in ABS afterwards and that worked great.

The lever broke right at the lower screw hole. Actually i don't know how that happened :???: But there is only a little material around the hole. Maybe you should increase that?

Sebastian

 

[geeks 1]

I used to spend a tap holes M3 2.5. As the diameter of 3mm - 0.5 steps, it is 2.5mm.

 

If you have not referred directly tapped, there are chances that it was indeed broken! :oops:

 

[sebastian 0]

I used a tap for all holes.

Sebastian

 

[geeks 1]

Ok!

 

So I do not see what could have caused this problem.

 

But I can still do an update with a little more material. Do you have a picture of the break that I realized

 

[gadgetfreak 7]

It would be really really great if somebody could do some testing of Roberts new design for:

- NinjaFlex filament (big and long prints like 10 hours or so because short prints of NinjaFlex can be done on UM2 stock feeder)

- Loooong print testing (prints between 20 to 50 hours) to see how it holds up

any takers?

We will ship free filament, both NinjaFlex and standard PLA to the first brave ones (within Europe) that would like to do some testing like that.

Please send me a PM if you're up for it!

Cheers

Daniel

Just an update:

We've sent spools to Robert and cor3ys for testing and are eagerly awaiting results!

We also got offers from other nice people here on the forums but currently the time/budget is up for this little test with sending to them.

Fingers crossed for flawless ninjaflex extrusion

 

[profepaco 0]

Just beginning to print the new feeder!

 

[flashp0int 0]

Moved to the new feeder as well.

5-6 hours of printing since without any issue.

I have to load the filament with more care though. When the filament gets into the nozzle, the motor is tough on the filament and grinds some.

 

[profepaco 0]

So this is the first time I publish a picture in this forum. It seems too large...

Ok. So I have just finished and used the new feeder. I had two problems at the beginning.

1.- Massive under extrusion. I do not why. Probably I did not push the filament hard enough to the nozzle.

2.- After cutting a piece of the bowden tube, following the instructions, now the bowden tube tends to leave the feeder. It is difficult to have it attached to the feeder. Is this a possible problem?

Now it seems to print ok, after removing the filament and place it again.

Three questions. Please help me:

1.- How much pressure to the filament in the feeder. Just the minimum? a bit more screwing a bit the screw to control the pressure?

2.- As you can see in the picture, I am using the additional part top print flexpla and similar. Is it a problem to leave it there when printing regular PLA?

3.- Should I change the pressure in the feeder when printing flexpla or similar?

Thanks in advance.

 

[IRobertI 520]

You can manually prime the nozzle with Maintenance -> Move material if the priming+skirt/brim isn't enough. Or just push harder when you first feed the filament so that you see some of it coming out of the nozzle before closing the arm.

Check that the area where the collet (the white thing) is supposed to grip the bowden, make sure the bowden isn't damaged. Also check inside the collet and make sure that the little metal teeth are clean and not damaged.

1. It depends. It should be tight enough so that the filament doesn't slip out but not so tight that it deforms the filament too much.

2. No problem leaving the guide in there when printing with standard PLA but one of the goals was to have as little as possible of the feeder touching the filament before it got into the bowden. The guide was an attempt to make printing with flexible filaments work better than the standard feeder.

3. I've only test printed a couple of things with flex so far but I did not adjust the tension when I did. It seemed to work fine with the same pressure.

 

[profepaco 0]

Thanks Robert.

BTW, after printing your design I see it is very elaborated. Congratulations.

 

[cyan 0]

Printed Robert's design:

Turned out nicely

I was surprised at the force on the bearing with the tension screw at its minimum position, but when I tried to print with it, it immediately started grinding the filament, so I quickly got over my concerns and tightened it about half way, which seemed to grip solidly without mangling the filament too much. Is there a more scientific way to set the tension correctly?

With only half a kg of PLA through it, the stock feeder was already showing signs of wear:

 

Pic of the filament fed by the stock feeder:

 

Fed by the new one:

 

Is there a good test object I can print to validate the performance of the new feeder?

 

[gr5 2,167]

Is there a good test object I can print to validate the performance of the new feeder?

 

Yes. Read this first post here:

http://umforum.ultimaker.com/index.php?/topic/4586-can-your-um2-printer-achieve-10mm3s-test-it-here/

 

[DidierKlein 729]

Printed mine too:

 

And added the spoolholder too

 

 

Pimp my Ultimaker 2

 

For the moment i printed around 10hours and no problems.

 

You suggest not putting the filament guide on on regular PLA? In my case it moves up and down a bit during retractions (less than 1mm movement).

 

I like the fact that you can release the pressure immediately, and it fits really good. It's well designed and it looks cool great work. No i have to get my hands on some flexible filament to see

 

Thanks robert

 

[IRobertI 520]

What's moving up and down? The guide? Surely it can't be the guide? I was actually worried that people would have trouble getting it on and off because I made it fit on there so tightly.

Personally I print without it when using normal PLA.

 

[takei-naodar 0]

Btw just asking but is someone even using my version of the feeder?