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So my Creator pro extruder keeps failing. Both right and left. At first I thought it was the PTFE tubes, but after changing them and cleaning every part of the extruder, as well as replacing the PTFE setup for an all metal solution, I still get jams.

It seems to start jamming after about the first minuet of printing. I am almost certin it has something to do with the steppers. Both my right and left stepper get really hot. About 100 degrees C. Today while trying to diagnose, I lightly pinched the filament as it was eaten by the machine and it stopped pulling after very very little force, also the stepper was sort of clicking back and forth as I was pinching. I had never had a look at the under side of my creator pro, but I took a look and I don’t see any way to adjust or test the current going to the steppers.

2 Likes
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Bump up your temp and slow down the machine, ABS 230 and PLA 220… speed 50-60 Anything lower/faster and you will outrun the heat in the nozzle.

PETG is very prone to this and must run a little slower.

The clicking is normal for a stepper motor that has too much load on it…

Depending on the age, it may be time to replace the heater cores.

Wiggle the stepper wires while its printing… If you have a cut wire, it may be loosing amps…

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Stepper motor current is controlled via the gcode:
I have the following two lines in my startup gcode

G130 X20 Y20 Z20 A20 B20 ; lower stepper Vrefs while heating

Heating of nozzles etc here

G130 X118 Y118 Z40 A118 B118 ; default stepper Vrefs

get the steppers to full current again before starting to print (A and B being the extruders)

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You might also need to clean the drive gear. The only time I had jamming was when the filament I used had air bubbles. try reducing the amount of retract to 1mm at most.

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Like I said originally I have throughly cleaned each part of the extruder, including picking built up gunk out of each tooth of the drive gear.

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I can monitor the machine as it prints. It gets plenty of heat. I am also heating the machine to proper temperatures, and am not printing above 50mmps

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Not sure how lowering the current while heating will help? Won’t that just delay the problem? How do I adjust the current using g code? Can I just the scripts?

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The block may stay hot but the nozzle itself can cool down to quick. I’ve had it happen a few times with petg.

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Last time I had a little piece of filament was stuck in the gears. I retired the extrusor and cleaned it.

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Ok i have finally figured out the issue. After taking the stepper out and testing the torque, it had plenty. Still weird that they’re running so hot. I changed the nozzle with a brand new one, and the heater cartage with a generic one I had laying around (which is causing some problems of it’s own). Still it didn’t work. Finally I figured out that the tension spring for the filament just didn’t have enough mustard left in it. I ran to the hardware store and got a heavier spring and it seems to work well. Running a test print now to confirm.

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Hi,

At what nozzle temperature are you printing at?

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Good deal. Thanks for reporting back. On a side note my steppers run hot to the touch also but I think it is ok.

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I hope you have it fixed. If not, try printing cooler. One thing you said is that it is happening when the print after the first few minutes. It could be that you are getting PLA heat creep, that the pla is slowly getting warmer and warmer, thus softer and softer, as the heat creep travels up the pla until it gets to a point that it is too soft to push through anymore.
This is common with all metal hot ends, but can happen with any setup.

Just try lowering print temp and see if it goes away.