Ultimaker printer is not responding

falc · November 14, 2014

Ok

I have an older ultimaker, early 2012 with no upgrades and has been sitting on the bottom shelf of the closet for almost 2 years.

2 days ago i started again with the latest firmware and latst cura. I was able to print a pretty good calibration block.

however, yesterday i was heating up the extruder when suddently the blue led on the top of extruder went out and communication with the printer also went out.

When i plugged in the usb cable to a usb port on the monitor all those ports shut down. this happened only once

I still see the arduino in windows hardware settings and i am able to upload new firmware via cura.

The communication checks in cura seem to be ok but still i am not able to connect.

When plug in the USB cable alone the fan starts spinning slowly, i see 2 green leds burning on the PCB and a fast blinking orange on the arduino.

so:

- Arduino still recognized in windows

- fan is turning slow with only usb cable, full speed with power cable

- no blue led on extruder

- no connection in cura

- still able to upload new firmware

what could be wrong ?

gr5 · November 14, 2014

no blue led on extruder

The cabling that runs to the head has a reputation for tiny opens and breaks. Hopefully this is the only issue.

What about the servos? Do they work? Do you have an ulticontroller?

To test the servos it's easiest to do it through USB. After connecting USB to a computer, you can run pronterface/printrun which is a fantastic, free, (easy to use gui) program for controlling and debugging your printer and can be downloaded from here:

http://koti.kapsi.fi/~kliment/printrun/

Or you can use Cura print window in "pronterface" mode which doesn't have nearly as many features but you can still move the steppers.

Try moving X, Y, Z axes (E axis won't move without heating head). Also consider heating up the print head to see if that works also. Probably not if the cabling to the head is broken. Or it might be reading "temp error" if the wiring is broken which may disable all steppers - not sure.