My pro printer likes to gnaw my filament like a mouse.

[bobFalcon]

Hello, nice to meet you all,

I bought a creatbot D600 last week, and I have a really hard time to make it work properly. I humbly require your help to resolve this mystery.

-The problem : As I do with every new printer I get, I try to print the 3Dbenchy , in PLA, with a 1.75 mm filament, and a 0.4 mm nozzle.

-The main issue is : at one moment during each print, the filament gets stuck in the nozzle, resulting in a quick underextrusion then no extrusion at all (pic n°1). When I remove the filament from the extruder, I can see it is gnawed by the filament feeder (pic n°2).

- What I tried :

I am in contact with a Creatbot engineer since the beginning, but his advices have been... unconclusive. I should have used creatware (the creatbot software, but the installer available online is infected with a malware... so if somebody has a clean up-to-date installer, I am interested), so I use the last version of cura, with custom printer.

Temperatures : I tried a range of extrusion temperatures from 210°C to 240°C.

Retractation: I put 1,5mm in the beginning, then removed completely retractation.

Speed : I tried 20 to 50 mm/sec.

Flow rate : 80% to 140 %

Compression nut : I tried to tighten it and untighten it.

Manual extrusion : No problem when I extrude the filament with the panel.

Shell : 0.8 mm

Top/bottom : 0.8mm.

Layer : 0.2 mm

Whatever the parameter, the result is similar. (sometimes, the filament is stuck even after the first layer).

I don't know if you require more data. If so, just ask me.



I hope you can help me to solve my issue. Thank you for your time.



PS : Sorry if there are mistakes, english is not my native langage.

[MikeyBoxP]

Hmmm seems like you've tried almost everything I was going to suggest. Because you said it sometime gets stuck even after the first layer, I wondering if there might be a problem with your nozzle somewhere causing an intermittent clog. Maybe someone else can suggest something else but thats the only thing that comes to mind.

Good luck

[bobFalcon]

Thanks for your answer. My n°1 suspect right now may be the extruding gear. It seems to be "flat" when in contact with the filament. So it has a small area of contact with this filament. But the engineer of creatbot seems to disagree with me...

[Roger3D]

Do you know what extruder is being used can you post a pix of it .

[bobFalcon]

Sure. This is the right extruder. I can make pictures on different angles if needed.

[Maradu]

Did you calibrate your extruder? If not, you should do this!

[bobFalcon]

What do you mean by calibrate? You mean tightnening the compression nut? If yes, I did that, and the extrusion works fine when done with the command panel.

[GrantB]

From experience, I dump all the steel toothed extruder gears & get the brass equivalent diameter.
the brass is most reluctant to hold any filament shreddings.
additionally, the pressure springs in most MK10 type extruder drives have a stainless shiny spring.... Stainless steel is absolutely useless as spring material.... get proper dull steel springs that will not compress & go soggy with heat like the stainless ones do.

if the spring in the extruder has gone soft, then you have no hope of pushing the material thru the extruder.
Alternatively, you may just have a blocked nozzle

[bobFalcon]

Thank you for your detailed answer. I must admit I have never changed a toothed gear. It is the first time I encounter an issue with it. Are they "standard"? I mean : do they have the same "fixation" to the rotor? What brand would you recommend ?

[steveprinters29]

The problem probably is with the extruder gear which is made up of some metal. Metals generally eat the printed portions and you get results as if the objects have been gnawed by a mouse.
Change the metal extruder gear to some plastic one and see the results.

https://www.3dprintersonlinestore.com/reprap