so is it my extruder or the PLA ?
i was printing some part and after a few layers the extrusion stopped.
i pulled out the filament, cut off the end and inserted the end again… i did this a few times; every time it got stuck…
i tried to clean the nozzle because i thought there could be something blocking it.
finally i did it by hand… pushing the filament into the hotend… stopped for a few seconds and try pushing more thru it… but it was impossible to get more material thru it!
I had the same problem with my Simple and thought it was the filament, stepper motor, clogged head, too much tension, lack of tension, not enough heat, and so on.
In the end I swapped the hotend and that solved everything and I was back to printing like new. So I’m not sure what was up with the old hot end, but one other thing that came of this was the realization that the nozzles will also wear out over time with the opening appearing to expand over time due to what I would assume many hours of filament being jammed through it.
going to get a spool of PLA “made in germany” next time.
Looks like normal “pla heat creep” behavior. The heat from the hot end is moving up the extruder and causing the pla to get hot too soon…making it swell and clog.
My symptoms looked like heat creep as well, and I already had a fan on the extruder. The problem went away with the hotend swap, but it made me wonder if the ceramic cartridge on the PB Simple simply breaks down over time?
I noticed that I couldn’t touch near the top of the barrel cause of the heat but on my new one I could at least touch it for a few seconds.
White filament killed my printrbot hot end too. It started to print crappy before, but when I tried white, it completely ruined the hotend. I replaced the hot end ($60) and it’s printing like new.
was just about to write : everything is fine now…
cleaned the hotend; made sure all left material between nozzle and heatbarrier is gone and screwed tight together… when all of the sudden…crack…filament jam.
My wet PLA was behawing the same, try drying it ant than try to use it again.
Maybe you need a cake box too? I’m adapting my Kossel Mini to be more humidity resistant.
grml ok i’m going to make some temproraly windtunnel with some impeller pointing at the j-head…
Have same problem with “Full metal” hot head. Finally I drill it with 3mm and insert PTFE inside. No more problem with PLA. Best way is to polish inside, but it’s impossible in my case.
I have this problem with a specific brand of pla. I have two spools of pla, of two differents brands. One does the same things you shown every-single-time. The other spool is almost finished without any problem.
@Andrea_Fontana Sometime I found soap in ingredients of PLA may that help to extrude?