Printer Stops Printing

[nebby85 0]

I've had an issue with my printer lately (UMO HBK) at seemingly random periods due a print my printer will stop printing. it is become increasing frustrating as i can't locate the source of the problem.

I find we i go to check on the print the printer as appeared stop dead in its tracks. the display just says "Ultimaker ready" which is odd as this only appears when the machine is initially turned on.

at first I thought it was the new 14.12.1 software so i revered back to 14.09 i did the same with the firmware although i dont know if that is any different anyway.

i manage to get a couple of prints out last night an early this morning but then it starts to play up.

i'm starting to think that the printer is overheating on the mother board. the weather has been very hot this last week.

any ideas would be greatly appreciated

 

[ultiarjan 1,223]

What exactly is happening when it stops ? does the head stop in mid air ? does it still extrude plastic ? did it happen with different prints (different gcode files)?

I had a few times issues like this when copying gcode files from dropbox to an sd card, probably took out the card to soon or something else went wrong while copying.

 

[nebby85 0]

the head just stops where its at. the printer just seems to have stopped all processing of the gcode.

i successfully printed 4 items of the same gcode but no more than 2 in a row without the problem. i have changed the gcode file a few times in cura but still get the same problem occasionally.

i put my printer in an air conditioned room and i didnt have a problem.

its the first time ive used the printer since november. it was cooler back then but now we are in the heat of summer.

 

[nebby85 0]

I walked in and watched it die about an hour ago... it was 15hours into a print... luckily it was printing 3 separate objects on the bed it was half way through the 3rd one.

I had it back in my study with the ceiling fan turned right up that it was about ready to take the roof into orbit. but when my printer died I noticed the ceiling fan was off which I think my partner kindly decided she was going to turn it off.

I saw the controller screen flashed with random symbols then it appeared that the printer just reset. as though it had been turned off and then on again.

I noticed that the extruder motor was ridiculously hot that I could barely touch it... I don't know if that is the cause of the "reset" but I would say its a contributing factor.

 

[pm_dude 27]

You may have power fluctuations. If the power drop even for just a slight moment it will reset. uSB printing also reset the printer when connection to it.

[nebby85 0]

i think you maybe be right there. it doesn't seem to have a stable power supply and its since the heated bed upgrade.

this morning i checked on a print to find that it was almost out of filament. i paused the print swapped out the reel and as soon as i pressed the knob on the controller again the printer reset! extremely frustrating.

i wonder if i can run the old power supply through the mother board and just use the new one for the heated bed board?

 

[mastory 44]

I had some hardware crashes that I think were related to static electricity. At least twice my printer would be printing along fine until I touched the frame. Its been a year or two since this happened. I don't recall if the printer reset and homed, or if it just hung in the current location requiring a reset. Probably a search of my postings would reveal a better description of the problem I experienced. I do recall that it happened only in the dry heating months of winter. I never addressed the problem and it hasn't persisted. This may be because most of my prints are under 2 hours and I just haven't been printing long enough duration prints to see it again.

Matt

 

[nebby85 0]

i still seem to be having problems with the printer just stopping.

its either an over heating or power fluctuation problem for sure. Is there a chance that a power flux can be caused by the stepper motors over heating? i'm thinking that the cause is the extruder motor getting too hot. i have ordered a heat sink and a fan to help cool the motor i'll see if that helps my cause.

the problem only seems to happen during the day. since its the peek of summer at the moment i think the room its in gets too hot. unless its got something to do with power distribution in the house.

i dont have a problem at night its cooler and there is little power usage in the house.

i'll see if the motor cooling works else maybe a UPS will help, on that note can some tell me what sort of load the average UMO power usage is?

 

[xisle 34]

I have had my printer do the same as yours several times over the last few months. It happened again yesterday. The printer will just "freeze" in the middle of a print.

I have also seen the LCD display fill with random characters while printing but it continues printing. If I depress the controller knob to enter the menu, the display returns to normal.

My printer is attached to a UPS. I am printing via USB.

I did have a heat sink fall off one of the stepper driver chips that I haven't glued back on, but that has been off since I got the printer one year ago.

The printer is currently in a 24 C room.

I will hook a multimeter to my UMO sometime today and post results on current consumption.

 

[xisle 34]

I ran some current tests at the output of the standard 19V power supply on my UMO with no heated bed. All ratings are in mA and are based on the Fluke meter's 10 samples/second average calculation. This data is by no means scientific or complete.

220 C, 0.3 mm layers, 25/50/75 mm/s print speed:

322 At Idle

698 1 mm X/Y stepper move (returns to idle current within 60 seconds)

712 1 mm Extruder stepper move (immediately returns to idle current)

732 1 mm Z stepper move (returns to idle current within 60 seconds)

1500 Homing print head

2000 Printing while print head cooling

2068 At idle, with stepper 'brakes' on

2200 Heating print head

2500 Printing with fan at 100% and print head cooling

2660 Printing at 3.0 mm^3 (25 mm/s) (no fan)

2750 Printing at 6.0 mm^3 (50 mm/s) (no fan)

2810 Printing at 9.0 mm^3 (75 mm/s) (no fan)

3500 Printing with fan at 100%

3750-4000 Printing and heating

230 C, 0.15 mm layers, 50/100/150+ mm/s print speed:

2700 Printing at 3.0 mm^3 (50 mm/s) (no fan)

2870 Printing at 6.0 mm^3 (100 mm/s) (no fan)

3090 Printing at 9.0 mm^3 (150 mm/s) (no fan)

3120 Printing at 10.0 mm^3 (166 mm/s) (no fan)

~4000 Printing and heating (was spiking over the 4 A limit for the range)

 

[nebby85 0]

i get the random characters appear also.

perhaps the power supply isnt up to the task. i dont know off the top of my head what the output is on the power supplies but im running the 24v one that comes with the heated bed kit.

im not home for another week so i will check it out then.

 

[nebby85 0]

well in case this helps anyone... I put a heat sink and fan on the extruder motor and I have not had a problem in about 6 days of nearly 24 hour printing in most of those days. I haven't actually got the fan plugged in yet so the heat sink is coping by itself.

 

[timoaito 0]

Hello You all,

I'm new for 3D printing, but have a bit knowledge of electronics. My problem is as many of yours, printing stops suddenly, with no visible reason. My print lasts 6 hours, but haven't finished once. Have tried 9 times, no gcode changes and printing stops in different phases. BUT -when printer stops printing, both temps reset to zero and ulticontroller reads DWELL.... instead of printing... This happens allways when printing stops.

I've put fans on every motor and one extra under the machine. I have even checked temps with thermal cam, nothing wrong with those. All motors under 30 degrees celcius.

I'm printing from SD with heated bed. Bed has it's own power adapter so it shouldn't hazzle anything.

So does anyone have knowledge on how is the text DWELL... displayed or what is the cause of that? I found a thread where someone wrote it could be G4 command in gcode? There is no G4:s in my code.

I'm very confused with this :???:

 

[timoaito 0]

Well, looks I'm answering my own question :mrgreen:

So, problem solved! Reason was not temp sensor wires nor tempsensors themselves. I disassembled whole electronics and everything was as supposed. So, back all stuff and kept reading this forum. I wondered few people asking about ulticontrollers menus... -Aha! No such menus for me. :arrow: My firmware was very old. So uploaded Marlin and since then printer has been working as charm! :-P