Stops extruding after 4 hours

Vertex 3D Printer Vertex - Issues while printing
1

Hi,

I’ve had success with small prints so far, but I was trying to print a large ‘Maker Bot’ which should take 8 hours, i’ve tried twice now and both times after around 4 hours the nozzle stops extruding and jams, I have to remove the nozzle and clean it to get it working again. (I have printed a few smaller versions of the same .stl file but I wanted a larger version)

Otherwise it prints fine, it just seems to be after 4 hours that it packs up, the Z stage keeps moving down etc and there are no fault indicators…

Any ideas?

I’m printing with PLA filament, temp 210, flow 90, 0.2mm layers, 9% infill.

I’ve read that the chip on the carriage could overheat etc but I would have thought this would have happened sooner if it was at fault…

Thanks everyone!

2

Try printing at 195-200° with 75% flow. It’s what I do and I’ve printed for more than 10 hours without a hitch.

[quote=“milomx”]I’ve read that the chip on the carriage could overheat etc but I would have thought this would have happened sooner if it was at fault…[/quote] It’s always a possibility. I’ve put heat sinks on the driver chips to avoid this.

3

Thanks for your replies.

I will try adjusting the flow to those settings. I did try 200 degrees at 90 flow the first time and originally thought that was what caused it, the second time I ran at the default settings (210/100).

I was printing from a computer, could this cause it to stop passing filament though?

Thanks!

4

[quote=“milomx”]
I was printing from a computer, could this cause it to stop passing filament though?
Thanks![/quote]
I don’t think so. If there’s an interruption to the USB connection, the effect is generally drastic. The printer will stop dead (but still hot). You’d have to reconnect and lower the Z stage.

The fact that the blockage occurs around the same time suggests to me that there some feature in that model that is causing your nozzle to block. Perhaps during cool head lift? Or where the print speed changes? Are you using standard Velleman filament? Like Raby, I’ve printed objects for over nine hours without a problem, so I know it can be done. Can you compare the two previous attempts to see how close there were (roughly same number of layers) before the blockage occurred?

5

Hi.
Did you find solution to your problem? I have a similar issue.

6

I had the same problem, and if you look at the thread ‘unwanted retraction’ you can se some pictures
where i show how my printerhead looks like after some hours of printing.
the main issue is cooling off the hotend so the filament doesn’t melt in PTFE tube and therefore causing problems.
look at some of the other treads in here, it is a common problem.