It works fine. Just don’t get the cleaning wire near the flame (don’t ask how I know). Again, this is for those cases where the clog can’t be resolved in situ. And, yes, it’s only worth it for more exotic nozzles or when your propriety brass nozzle is out of stock due to COVID. 
Cheers
There is that.
I have been having some filament feed problems on my Ender 5 Pro. I finally discovered the cause. I bought a duel gear extruder and installed it on my machine. I had a problem, at first, with the grub screw on the stepper gear bumping against the extruder frame. I lowered the gear just enough so the grub screw would not catch on the extruder frame. What I finally discovered was that by lowering gear so the grub screw just barely cleared the frame, that the filament groves in the two gears no longer matched One gear was slightly offset from the other. I installed old single gear extruder and now everything is working properly. All because a tiny grub screw needed to be placed a little less than a mm down on the gear than where it was located.
However, I have the single gear extruder mounted on a direct drive unit and everything is operating smoothly. So maybe I don’t need the duel drive to get smooth filament delivery to the nozzle.
I use regularly Magigoo on my mirror bed for ABS, PETG and yes what DrVAX said about it, is totaly true!!!
I would check out this video which you might find helpful. It covers how to set retraction and various other settings that impact stringing.
I have been having some trouble with nozzle clogging. I just discovered that the nozzles that I ordered the other day are MK8’s. I also just discovered that, unlike Ender 3’s, my Ender 5 has a Mark10 hot end. In short, I am running MK8 nozzles in a MK10 print head. Dumb question! Could that be the reason I am having clogging problems?
Now, I am really confused. I just saw an ad for MK8 nozzles on Amazon, and that ad states that these nozzles fit Ender 5’s. Should I order MK10 nozzles or continue trying to use the MK8 nozzles that I already have?
According to this video [U]3D Printer Nozzles - MK8 vs. MK10 - YouTube, what you say is impossible. The woman doing the video says MK8 nozzles have 6mm thread and MK10s have 7mm, so it’s impossible to fit one type into the other’s heater block.
Also, the stock hotend on my Ender 5 has MK8 nozzles. The hole in the back of the nozzles is too small for a bowden tube to fit inside.
Well, it looks like I do have the MK8 nozzles afterall.
I swear, earlier today, I read somewhere on the internet, that the Ender 5 had a MK10 hot end. I have since looked for the information, but cannot find it again.
When I first got my printer up and running, I printed this: [ATTACH=JSON]{“data-align”:“none”,“data-size”:“thumb”,“data-attachmentid”:2902}[/ATTACH] with no problem
For the last couple of days, I have only printed one very small project completely. Everything else comes out looking like this: [ATTACH=JSON]{“data-align”:“none”,“data-size”:“small”,“data-attachmentid”:2904}[/ATTACH][ATTACH=JSON]{“data-align”:“none”,“data-size”:“small”,“data-attachmentid”:2905}[/ATTACH]
Nothing of any size will print completely. 1/3 to 2/3 of the object prints, including skirts, and then the filament just stops feeding while the printer continues to run. If left alone, there will be a gap between the object and the nozzle with the printer running just like it was still printing something
I have tried different slicers, different nozzle temperatures and different printing speeds. No matter what, I get an incomplete model.
By the way, the skirt and lower portion of the model print just fine, so I assume that filament feed speed is OK. I will test that in a few minutes.
One possible part of the problem could be with the nozzles I got from Amazon. I went back this morning and read the reviews on this set of nozzles and discovered that there were a lot of complaints concerning the size and quality of these nozzles. I just don’t know if poor nozzles could be causing this much of a problem. I have tried 4 of these nozzles and have had the same problem with each of them. I just don’t know.
By the way, I am using a new roll of eSUN filament, so bad filament should not be a problem.
Does anyone have any ideas on what I could possibility be doing wrong.
I am sorry about fuzzy photos. GoPro Hero 6 doesn’t appear to want to focus well up close.
Just curious, and trying to get more information. Can you tell if the extruder is pushing filament or at least trying to? I have had problems where it jams and just doesn’t move any through.
If it is trying to extrude and the nozzle or hot end is blocking, you should get some bad noises. I think you may have to watch it print and wait until if fails, could you make a video at that point and share it?
I usually check filament extrusion by using Printerface or Cura. I connect a computer to the printer via USB, launch Cura, go to the Monitor page, then preheat the hotend, and enter “G1 Z100” into the G-Code box. That moves the Z axis out of the way. Once it’s moved, I enter “G1 E100 F250” into the G-code box. All being well, 100mm of filament gets extruded onto the printbed.
Thank you both for your advice., I will try everything tomorrow. I have worked with this printer most of the day and I have had it for now. Now is the time for a little TV R&R
When the printing stops and the machine continues to operate, the is no stepper or any other kind of noise. The printer sounds like it is printing normally.
After a couple of days reading articles and watching countless You Tube videos and trying every suggestion that I came across, I have decided that this printer is going back to Amazon. The replacement will be here tomorrow.
When trying to fix the extrusion problem, I did discover a couple of things that were wrong. I discovered that the Bowden Tube was not firmly seated to the nozzle. Fixed that. I went through the procedure listed above by Ender5r, I got the filament extrusion to exactly 100mm I then set the “flow” in Cura to get a wall thickness of 0.8mm The white cube below had a wall thickness of 0.9, but the red cube is exactly 0.8mm.
I then printed the filament guide and when it finished, I was really excited because I though I had solved my problems.
While trying to print the string test tower, the old problem re-surfaced again. I tried to print a second (different) string test tower and had the same failure.
I did notice one thing after the printing failure. The extrusion stepper motor is not trying to advance the filament. I just stops trying to advance the filament. I does, however, retract when it is supposed to. After retraction, the stepper motor puts the filament back where it was before retraction, but no farther. There is no stepper noise or clicking coming from the extruder
Also of note. No adjustments or changes were done to the printer between printing the cubes and the second string test tower. The strange thing is, what did print was beautiful. No flaws or stringing or any printing errors you could mention.
When the new printer arrives, tomorrow, the only modification I will make is to install the Capricorn Tubing. Everything else will remain stock until I have a much better understanding of 3D printing.
Thank you all for the advice and help you have provided to me as I tried to overcome the problems with my Ender 5 Pro. Let’s hope the new printer will be problem free.
[ATTACH=JSON]{“data-align”:“none”,“data-size”:“thumb”,“data-attachmentid”:3110}[/ATTACH][ATTACH=JSON]{“data-align”:“none”,“data-size”:“thumb”,“data-attachmentid”:3111}[/ATTACH][ATTACH=JSON]{“data-align”:“none”,“data-size”:“thumb”,“data-attachmentid”:3112}[/ATTACH][ATTACH=JSON]{“data-align”:“none”,“data-size”:“thumb”,“data-attachmentid”:3113}[/ATTACH]
I would check these things before starting to print: [LIST=1]
According to the LCD in the “About Printer” section it reads 'Creality 3D 1.1.6.3 Ender 5 Pro". Does this mean that I do not have the latest firmware on my printer?
When the print failure occurs, the bed continues to move (down) as it should to where the nozzle and the model just gets farther and farther apart if the printer is allowed to run.
I have come to the conclusion that the problem has something to do with the extrusion stepper motor is not getting the signal to advance of some reason. At this point, I just don’t know.
One other observation. When the printer fails, after it cools down, you can start printing again without doing anything. And then it stops feeding filament again. Let it cool and then it starts printing (feeding filament) again.
Oooh, that does give me an idea. Can you place a fan so it blows constantly on the extruder stepper motor, preferably one that can blow a good amount of air? Let’s see if overheating is the issue with the stepper: i.e. perhaps it is going into self-protection mode to preven burnout.
Now, given my own experience, I’m not writing off the idea that it could be the firmware. You could try what I did: upgrade to the TH3D Unified firmware.
It might also be interesting to take note of the vRefs on the extruder stepper’s driver chip.
However, if you’re getting an exchange from Amazon, I wouldn’t do anything to the printer. Give it back the way you received it (as much as possible).
I placed a fan onto my extruder on the ANet A8, too.
When printing for hours with alot of retracting it got quite hot and the PLA started to soften due to heat spreaded from the drive shaft towards the gears driving it. The heat even started melting the extruder motor mount around the screw holes, so the motor started rumbling on each retract/extrude. Of course in my case the enclosure caused alot of those problems, too.
However, now I have an ABS printed mount and usually do not print PLA anymore, but the fan is still there blowing onto the motor and into the gears with the filament.
If the fan works, it might be an idea (on the new printer) to attach a heat sink to the stepper motor. I kind of have 1 on mine: you may recall seeing the photo I posted of my extruder mounted to an aluminum plate when I converted my printer to quasi direct drive ([U]https://forum.drvax.com/filedata/fetch?id=870&d=1592261464[/U]). That aluminum plate really does cool the extruder stepper quite a bit.
You are right. This printer is going back and I won’t do anything else to it.
By the way! Does the “Creality 3D 1.1.6.3” listed on the LCD indicate old firmware? If so, should I try to update the new printer to 1.1.8 or the TH3D Unified Firmware. Does my printer have a bootloader so all I have to do to update firmware is just run a .bin file when I turn the printer on. I am going to a little research on the TH3D Unified Firmware to see if it is something I feel I can do without things getting to involved.
I just had another thought… Remember, I said that when I tried to run the printer the first time, it would not boot up and I discovered a screw holding the power supply on was causing a short in the system. Do you think that that misplaced screw could have caused something to not work as it should regarding the extruder stepper motor?
Ender5r… I am running a direct drive very similar to your setup. Amazon.com As you can see, it has a backing plate similar to yours (maybe a little smaller) and I should have been getting some cooling from that.
