Well here is an update on the request for the new 3D Printer modules for the A-350 to replace the one that I managed to bork.
The cost per unit is $119 USD plus shipping. So I order two of the buggers, and with a total out of being $252 USD for both. So hopefully everything will be shipped out by end of the week by snail service FedEx or preferably DHL.
If anyone borks, or bloobers a module, to get a replacement if not on their parts site, you will need to send an email to support@snapmaker.com and request the PayPal account information and state you want to replace a module you have borked or bloobered they will give you the price for shipping and costs per unit.
Yeah, I am going to add a Ring Stickup Camera into the Enclosure for just this issue. The backside cable exit is big enough for me to pass the cable through. The Ring will sit at the very back out of the way of the heated table.
you should also have a way of turning your printer off remotely. I have a wifi camera for monitoring and the machine itself is plugged into a wifi plug socket so that if something goes wrong I can cut the power using my phone.
Went down to check on a four-hour print that was two hours in, after babysitting it the first fifteen minutes - and the hot end is totally destroyed, big blob of filament that burned through the wire housings and leaked into the print head as well. Using the snapmaker-provided filament, and after a morning of successful 45- and 90-minute prints.
Starting to believe that I should have gone with the $500 CR10 - I thought for the dosh, I was getting a relatively trouble-free printer
That sucks. Other than constant monitoring, is there a good way to prevent this kind of failure? I’ve got a camera set up that I can keep an eye on when I’m working, but I’m also letting it print overnight when I have a bunch of long parts going, and it’s been fine so far.
Is there anything in the head that would detect actual filament movement? The runout sensor could tell whether there’s anything in the nozzle, but I’m assuming there’s nothing that would detect whether it’s actually advancing?
Well this wasn’t printing air - the filament was extruding, it was just sticking to the print head instead of the bed.
I got it all cleaned up last night, had to take the print head apart to do it. Haven’t fully determined what happened. The only hard evidence I have is that the painter’s tape on the bed is torn off for about 30-50mm around where the part was, and there is a gummy residue on the print bed. My guess would be that the nozzle hit the print bed and faffed the print - which would make sense if I hadn’t watched the first few layers print and adhere, after which point the nozzle should not have gotten any lower.
EDIT
A hot-air gun on low works surprisingly well. It’s a bit dicey as the PLA gets stuck to the plastic parts on either side of the nozzle. In my case, these parts were warped either from the PLA, or efforts to remove it. I can understand why the OP wanted to replace the entire print head - I no longer have faith that this one is within-spec due to the warping.
Not sure I replaced the hot end correctly. Couldn’t find a set screw so I worked it out with pliers. That video on the support page is obsolete - I think it is for Snapmaker-Original (and double checking, yes the same video is on the SM-O and SM-2 support pages for hot end changes).
I’m going to try and print with it today but I suspect there may be problems.
It seems you purchased new print heads but recieved the old design style of them? This concerns me slightly as I recently have had a new print head sent to me as well and was expecting to recieve the new updated design, will be dissapointed if they arrive and arent…
I installed a smoke detector above my enclosure and I use Octoprint. When the dog need to be let out, I check the camera feed on Octoprint to see if it looks well and just go back to bed.
I located the setscrew after clearing out all the PLA (and removing the nozzle). After seeing the (out of date) video, I thought it was supposed to be behind the side panel of the print head, which requires removing 4 or 5 screws. It is of course in the more convenient location, below the extruder gear in that pop-open slot. I must have missed it in the rush to get the thing apart and cleaned up - and of course there’s no maintenance section in the manual, just setup and “my-first-print-job” for the three functions.
To be fair it is just a quick start guide you get in the box. If you go to their website, there you can find the user manual. There are also many maintenance tutorials on the snapmaker website but they have it under FAQ which I admit is not intuitive, they should relabel that section as Maintenance Guides or something similar.
Yeah I eventually found that by trawling the site looking for any info under support. Usually I don’t bother with an FAQ page because they tend to be limited to stuff along the lines of “did you try plugging it in?”.
A maintenance/repair PDF would be nice.
EDIT: Just opened the User Manual and yeah, I’d already gone through that. It’s just a more detailed version of the quick start. Nothing about changing the hot end, disassembling the print head, calibrating the sensor, etc. That stuff is only in the FAQ (and perhaps if it is FA, that Q should be in the manual eh?).
