Advice Need on fixing a UM3

[Dantan 0]

 

Ok...   sorry,  but there is a bit of a preamble before I get to the meat of my questions.  

ME: I have been using an older generic 3d printer( QIUI II)  with Simplify 3D,  for a while.  Still climbing the learning curve with CAD to do stuff.

 

I was given a "Decommissioned"  Ultimaker 3.  I do not know how much it was used,  but I am going to assume a fair amount.  (school environment).   Unfortunately,  the way it was "decommissioned".  it was replaced, and then someone put a sign on it that said "Still works, needs a little TLC".   It then got put in a pile of other stuff, to be taken to the recycling center on campus.   What sucks is that then the facility guys show up with be carts, and TOSS everything into the bins..  yes..  with stuff TOSSED in on top also.  

 

End result, by the time I got it,  things I *know* are an issue,  Missing one 6mm rod/rail for the head to travel on (I replaced),  Missing Power supply, missing filament spool holders.   I can also see that one of the wires for the heated bed cable has kind of burnt out/exposed wire.  I think it might also be missing a cable that I do not know what it does..  called the "NFC" cable?  maybe it goes to the filament roller thing that I do not have?

 

The head has in it an AA .4  and a BB .4  nozzles, which look ok... but probably no big deal to replace.

 

I did buy a power supply off ebay...  when I turn it on, the control knob lights up,  but the display screen is blank.  

 

So..  my long rambling question:  Does it sound like this is worth saving?   Do you have any suggestions that I should check,   to see if it has other problems?     I can put some money into it,  but $3000 for a working used UM3 ,   or more for other models, is not really in my budget.

 

 

I would LOVE to get this machine working , because it is way more advanced than my current printer.... but.... I need to decide if it is reasonable to rebuild it,  if the parts are ultimately too expensive.

[gr5 2,266]

Where did this $3k come from?  What?  Are you going to have to pay $3k for this?  I'm confused.

 

So it's a pretty nice printer.

 

NFC - don't need it.  My UM3 currently has nothing plugged into the NFC connector and it works fine.  That feature scans RFID codes on filament spools but only for UM brand filament...  anyway my point is don't worry about that.

 

power supply - what did you get exactly?  You need one hell of a beast of a power supply.  You need 24 volts and it is a LOT of current.  So much that it's not unusual for the actual power supplies to balk.  But only after you power up the heated bed which isn't an issue for you.  yet.  So which power supply did you get?  Officially I've seen these on UM3:

GST220A24-R7B
GS220A24-R7B
 

I'd get the GS and not the GST as the GS puts out just a little more power.  But either should work.

 

As far as hours used in a school environment...  odds are it was not used much.  When it boots you can check how much those "nozzles" (they are called cores) were used to get an idea.

 

Well I'd spend $10 or so for the olimex-serial-F cable and connect that up to see where bootup is failing.  One failure mode is that the "hard drive" on these things gets a bad block and all you have to do is reformat everything and they usually recover nicely (and map the bad blocks safely away from future use).

 

Or you could try the recover procedure if you don't want to spend the $10.  You may have to do the recovery procedure anyway.  But getting the $10 cable can tell you if it is failing bootup due to communication with screen, communication with print head, or something else.

 

Anyway recovery procedure is discussed here:

https://support.makerbot.com/s/article/1877624822572

 

And I have information about the olimex cable and how to use it here:

gr5.org/unbricking/

[JohnInOttawa 104]

I bought a 'rescue' UM3 and rebuilt it a few years ago.  (with parts and advice from gr5 and erin at frbc8 - just a shout out).

 

The rebuild brought the unit back to full operation, the thing I will say is that almost everything on this machine can be replaced. (even parts of the print cores, but that is a whole other creature)

 

One thing I found useful was going to github and getting the full CAD drawings for the machine.  In my case, some wiring was off and covers missing, so re-establishing correct routing and getting the proper sense of how the print head went together was made much better with the github files. One thing github will also get you is the actual part numbers for things you might need to order. 

 

https://github.com/Ultimaker/Ultimaker3

 

Good luck!  Let us know how you make out!

John

 

Edited January 10, 2023 by JohnInOttawa