Printer Suddenly Acting Up - Conclusion

Printer was simply trying to go too fast!   Someone on the RepRap Forum suggesting I try a slow down and it worked.  I was trying to print at 60mm/sec.   With the same printer he indicated that he prints at 20-30 for customer work and 40 for his own.   In fairness Wanhao Support had said to slow it down to 50 but I was running at the default for the printer from Simplify3D and was being stubborn!   In a post or two I will show some results.

Printer Suddenly Acting Up - Part III

Ok, nothing had completely solved my issue entirely though each thing that I did seemed to help a little.   The latest changes that I have made were to replace the hot end and PTFE on one of my extruder's, and more importantly, to replace the spacers on the clips that hold down the FR-4 on my build platform.

Here is a photo of the hot end and PTFE tubing that I replaced.   To me it does not look like it is in bad shape.   Additionally, I only replaced one side and the other is performing the same as the side that was replaced.

That leaves a tighter build platform as the culprit.  Which I can believe.  Here are two photos of a print before and after the build platform fix.

As you can see on the right most of the whiskers are gone.  Interestingly, though, not all.

What confuses me is why it is always the same place on the print that we see this issue.   Doesn't that imply a slicing issue?

Printer Suddenly Acting Up - Part II

I am not sure this is resolved...but...my first thought was that something might have worked loose.  I checked everything, or so I thought, and did not find anything that was noticably loose.  I did tighten the bolts that hold the sides of the case but these are not structural.  They were, however, very loose and it did seem to help a little?  Could just have been me.

In any case my post on the Reprap Forum confirmed my original suspicion that it is probably something loose so I checked again.   This time I remembered to check the two bolts that hold on the extruder assembly and sure enough they were a little loose.  I do mean a little but every little can count.   So I tightened them.

In order to check these bolts I had to take off the directed cooling duct that I have installed.  This duct not only blocks those bolts but it makes it challenging to see the nozzles.   Once it was off I was able to notice that the nozzle that I have been using was in bad shape with caked on plastic.  So I cleaned it.

I have done a couple small test prints and I think it might be ok now.   In a few minutes I will do the real thing.

Instructables

I have started to do some instructables.   In some cases using content already posted here and in other cases a new topic.   Here are links to the three that I currently have published:

 

Building a 3D Printed Pan Tilt Case for a Raspberry Pi

 

This instructable describes the building of a case for a Raspberry Pi that incorporates a pan-tilt assembly for the Pi Camera.  posted on Apr 19, 2015

 

Maximizing 3D Printer Build Space

 

This instructable presents a way of securing glass or FR-4 without using a binder clip there-by preserving as much build space as possible...and...avoiding having a nozzle drag across a binder clip!  posted on Apr 18, 2015

 

 

 

Dual Extrusion 3D Prints Using Sketchup and Simplify3D

 

This instructable illustrates how Sketchup can be used to create dual extruder (e.g. two color) 3D prints using Simplify3D as the slicer.  posted on Apr 8, 2015

 

As you can see one of them has been "featured" for what that is worth!

Printer Suddenly Acting Up?

I am at a loss!