@Hauke I’ll have to track it down. I saw 2 videos of the head yesterday, one was of the 2.0 head where he did an upgrade of the internals including the gear, the other was the 2.5 head and the gear slips right off the motor, I thought I saved it but I didn’t. I’ll track it down.
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Thanks a lot! Btw. found this rendering of the new version: https://support.snapmaker.com/hc/article_attachments/4404843402647/_____.png - it looks detachable. But it is a rendering after all, and your photo looks different…
Let#s see, perhaps I’ll dismantle my print head this weekend just out of curiosity, perhaps I was wrong all the time even with the old printhead…
@Hauke isnt that the old version? It’s missing the vent slots on the front.
If you look carefully, the slits are there, just very low-key.
@Hauke WOW lmao I never would’ve noticed.
Did tody a first print with 11x11 levelling - it’s sooo much better for me! But levelling takes so much longer sigh Anyhow, I guess this will become my new standard.
Finally Success!
SnapMaker sent me a new 3d print module, they figured that there was issue with the height sensor on the one I had. Installed the new module and ran an 11 X 11 calibration on it.
Printed out 5 test prints with no problems, then ran some production prints, again, 1000% better then with the other module.
There is one little ding, but I can live with that.
Also came up with a way to reliably imbed 50 mesh nylon screen in the print.
I’m testing the models now, and if they work as expected, then I can finally begin production.
Thanks for all of your help.
Now how do I mark this as solved on the forum?
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How?
Share and share alike, and all that.
@eh9 theres articles about how to do it, I thought I linked it here.
I want to hear from @gwfami about what ended up working for him.
I was thinking about making a Hackaday instructable about it, but since you are so curious, here’s a quick overview of what I did.
It’s a 2 step process.
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I printed the first few layers of the shape that I wanted the screen to be in, had the printer pause with M600 (change filament command) which I put in the gcode just after the middle layer. A piece of the screen was then placed over the just printed part and secured to the print bed by blue painters tape. The print was then resumed and the rest of the layers are then printed. This creates an insert piece which secures the screen and allows for the next step. Since the screen protrudes through the edges of the printed part a second encapsulation is necessary.
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I created a cutout in the final model to hold the just created part with the embedded screen. This model was allowed to print to the layer just before the cutout would be printed over, the print paused again with the M600 command, the pre-embedded screen part was then gently placed in and the print resumed. The result is a part with an imbedded screen which looks and acts like it was injection molded.
This description needs pics showing the steps. I’ll work up some and hopefully make it clearer.
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For me, this is the SM2 in a nutshell.
In need of a larger bed size I bought an F350 a month ago, and since then my expectations have plummeted from expecting great print quality down to merely hoping it would keep working and now down to praying daily that it doesn’t mess up yet again, as I listen to it shrieking throughout the house like some demented banshee.
My trusty Flashforge Finder (yes, of all things) reliably knocked out a thousand hours of prints over three months without any need to be nannied every millimetre of the way, many of which were of a quality superior to most of this SM2’s abject efforts. With the SM2 I have managed less than a hundred hours of finished prints, about half of which were of barely acceptable quality and a few were okay, the rest being sheer failed dross.
I am sick to death of constant re-calibration after re-calibration, only to have an identical print fail immediately after one that worked, which is simply unconscionably bad performance. I do not have the time left in my life to spend weeks and weeks testing a very large and very expensive paper-weight over and over and over again, it gets very boring. And I certainly do not have the time to jump through the 94 quadrillion hoops of any support ticket that I might fantasise about raising for whatever good that might do.
With the utmost respect to the above poster, the notion that one should endure ninety days of relentless struggle to get a wayyyy over-priced machine to work as it should do from day one just lets SM off the hook.
And mods like glass beds, fan shrouds, extruder replacements and so on and so forth are just masking the defects of a machine that should be a whole order of magnitude better at the job than the SM2 actually is.
For anyone who may read this it is not intended in any way personally, if you are happy with yours then that’s great.
But I am done. The very moment I can afford it I am jumping ship and I shall flog this bad joke and buy a 3D printer.
Awesome. Am pleased you finally have the problem resolved 
Amen. Thinking about selling my system and getting something else that is more reliable. Anyplace here to post “for sale” items?
Now you have your printer sorted I would hold off and get some printing done first. You may end up liking the results and not regret thinking of selling it. I have read quite a few reviews on various printers including resin ones, they all have their negative reviews. Perhaps you were just unfortunate in getting a machine that had problems.
Sounds like you’re frustrated beyond help So sell your SM2 and look for another product. If it comes to size, have a look at Prusa XL, if it keeps its promises (and Prusa has a reputation to deliver on their promises), this will be the next big thing in terms of a “it just works” printer. With CoreXY this is a machine with a huge potential. Only thing it will not do: CNC milling. Not sturdy enough, and most likely will never be, even if modded.
Btw. this would be my recommendation to anyone: If you are just after a 3D printer, don’t buy SM2. SM2 only makes sense if you want all three workloads.
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Dear Hauke,
Thank you for taking the time to respond to my rant and offer a constructive suggestion, it is very much appreciated. You are right, I am frustrated beyond help, but I shall refrain from much further dumping here. Suffice it to say that this morning I have had five failures and yet another re-calibration cycle (5 x 5 with the touch-screen. I did once try an 11 x 11 manually but in my case it just made things worse). The Octoprint Bed Visualiser plugin shows that the mesh now has a variance twice that of yesterday’s. Enough !
(On a side note, this is not delusion born of unwillingness to try. I have spent many days poring over the forum posts on all the issues of the SM2 and I have applied many of the techniques, including dismantling and re-seating the bed for example, that have been suggested by the very helpful posters, to little avail. The machine does print, eventually, but the result is just not commensurate with the effort demanded. In contrast, my Finder never drove me to any forums and needed a bed re-calibration only a single time in three months).
I had considered a Prusa as a definitive choice. Even though the current models are smaller than the F350 I could have worked within the constraint. But I decided that I wanted to expand my maker horizons a little with a spot of laser cutting, using the new SM 10W unit (and an enclosure) later on when it stabilised as a product, which was why I purchased the F350. But with the profound deficiencies (for me, I hasten to add) of the SM2 this trajectory is just not viable. So it is time to sell up and move on. If anybody on here from the UK wants to negotiate a purchase I shall be only too happy to correspond.
Once again, thanks for your words.
dune.
I’m this close (two fingers almost touching) to selling my SM A250. Problem is I can’t seem to find anyplace online to give me an idea of what a slightly used one is going for. Anyone have any ideas? Standard SM A250 with an additional flexible bed thingy, homemade enclosure with carbon filter. Purchased in September of last year.
Google/ebay/amazon have not been my friends on this.
According to this thread €0.5-€3.0 + shipping.
Although he never delivered as far as I know. (at least not to me). (I’m sorry, couldn’t help myself)
I recently saw an A350 listed for €1400 on a Belgian site: https://www.2dehands.be/v/computers-en-software/3d-printers/m1809786229-snapmaker-a350
(listed, not sold yet). I have an alert on that site just in case someone is selling a broken one for parts.
I guess the reasonable price is whatever anyone would be willing to pay you.
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clean your surface with pure alcohol and set the speed to 20mm/sec, it should work perfectly