I am just curious as to how many hours of printing can you do with a brass nozzle before you choose to change it.
I seem to be starting to get problems with my original levelling screws also so I ordered nozzles and springs from Amazon. The weak screws that came with my Ender 3 pro have always been a nuisance but the last two days I noticed that the bed was going out of level with nearly every print.
My ANet got an E3D hotend a few weeks after I assembled it. Since then the nozzle is in there for about three years and the printer was doing a lot of prints and crashing during my learning phase. It printed PLA in the past and ABS for the last two years, when the TronXY took over the PLA department.
I replaced a nozzle only once on my TronXY after two and a half years and several hundred hours of printing. When printing prototype files for my GeitPrinter the TronXY was running 24/7 for several days with different print jobs. The “original” nozzle was even the nozzle used by the pre owner, who used the printer at least a year himself.
In fact I could have used the old nozzle as the prints were still fine, but I swapped the heat pipe which had a burned ptfe tubing inside and was about the same age, so I decided to swap both while I was on it to save time. I put the old nozzle into storage to be used as emergency reserve as such things usually break on Fridays.
I guess it overall depends more on what you were printing. Stuff like carbon fibre will enlarge the nozzle over time and very quick. Also if you like to crash the nozzle into some metal print bed, it does no good, but when only printing PLA, TPU or even ABS there should be no big wear off and it will work almost forever.
Since I bough several hot ends for my GeitPrinter I now have a huge nozzle storage as they all came with multiple diameters and sizes.
I don´t see a reason for getting a hardened nozzle until I want to print carbon fibre or other materials which tend to eat cheap nozzles for breakfast.
I have a collection of different sized tips that I have barely ever tried. I think I know why people default to 0.4 diameter. Especially for PLA. I have a roll of PETG I have not tried yet and am thinking of trying some TPU that can be printed on my ender 3 pro.
Here’s an idea @roon4660: why not just replace the nozzle on New Years Day, every year? From everything I’ve heard and read, unless you print abrasive filament, it should last at least that long. And, at 50 cents apiece, it’s a pretty cheap option.
My nozzles still work but I decided to try some new ones. I still think heat creep for whatever reson is my main problem. That’s why hot weather gave me the most problems I’ve had. I’m not sure about my metallic looking silk filaments not having irregularities that plug up my bowden tube. Maybe I should try printing as cool as I can and that would help. I never seem to get a clog with the white I’ve been using for lithophanes and they tale 16 hours or so to print with my settings.