After heating the hot end to 200 degrees, a small amount of filament leaked out before I hit the extrude button. But when I hit the extrude button, it clumped up and fell off. Since then it won't extrude anything.
Does this mean the hot end is clogged? If so how do I fix it and how do I make sure it doesn't happen again as I have no idea what I did wrong.
I had the loose nozzle and started leaking. Tightened it up once it was hot and stopped a lot of excess filament leaking onto the prints
In my opinion the guide does not pronounce enough the contact of the nozzle to the throat.
You can search for tutorials on getting rid of leaking nozzles. There are a lot.
The major point is that the nozzle needs to stick 1mm out of the heating block. Then you screw in the throat firmly against the nozzle. After heating up the hotend screw the nozzle again firmly against the throat.
Do not use too much of the PFTE tape so that it does not get in the way.
After this re-mount of the hot end I have no more leaking at the lower and higher side of the heating block.
As described before you have to push the PFTE tube until it hits the nozzle.
I am getting blobs forming just above the the hotend nozzel in the throat. I'll push the PFTE tube further in and see how it goes. I push the filament in 6cm but not the PFTE tube.
Should the throat be the same diameter all the way? I may have some filament melted into the end next to the nozzle. There is a hole the same size as the filament in the end next to the hotend.
PFTE tub not all the way down looks like my problem. 3rd layer of the little boat is down. The detail in the middle lifted a little but the main 1st layer is in place.
Thanks Michael, this makes a lot of sense. I'll try that tonight. Fortunately the printer came with a bunch of those clips you suggest printing out. I had no idea what they were for since they are not mentioned in the instructions. So I'll add those to my printer as well.
I don't have my printer yet so take what I'm going to suggest with a grain of salt. However, this hotend looks to not be an "all metal" hotend. This means the PTFE bowden tube essentially goes all the way through the coupler, heatbreak, throat, and butts up to the nozzle. This is very similar to many printers that already exist out on the market. The following is what I did on my Ender 3 which had a similar problem.
You should be able to disassemble the unit into another two additional sections that they do not show in the instructions. The bowden coupler, named PTFE Coupling in Stage 4 - Step 4, should be removable from the heatbreak, named heatsink in the same step. With the hotend completely completely disassembled you should now take the PTFE tube pass it through the coupler, down the heatsink/heatbreak, through the throat and into the heater-block.
Again, I don't have my printer here but this is what I did on my current 3D printer. Put the hotend back together with the PTFE tube through all the components but do not attach the "coupler" and the nozzle. Doing so should allow the tube to move freely through the hotend, or at least should be easier to move through it. Once all the other pieces are assembled you should see the tube right near the opening where the nozzle threads into the heater-block. This next part depends on how tight of a fit the tube is. Pull the tube back through the hotend just enough so that the threads for the nozzle are clear enough to start threading the nozzle into the heat-block. Thread the nozzle in. The end result should be that the tube is now in direct contact with the nozzle.
At this point you should have the PTFE Coupling not attached. Slide it back and attach it making sure that you're not pulling back on the PTFE tube and sliding it away from the top of the nozzle. Depending on the fitment it can be difficult to move the coupling around. Pressing down on the black ring around the upper face should allow a little more freedom when moving it. Remember the goal should now be that the tube is pushed firmly up against the top of the nozzle and the the coupler will hold it all in place. When the printer does filament retractions the bowden tube will want to move. Without this coupler in place it would move with the filament creating a gap between the nozzle and the end of the tube. Filament will likely melt in this area causing clogs and jams.
You should also make sure that the bowdwn tube on the extruder side is firmly seated. I highly suggest that once you get your printer printing is to print some of these clips: https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:2798864. They fit in that ring on the upper portion of the coupler on both the extruder and hotend side. Compressing that ring should release tension on the bowden tube for removal and insertion which we do not want to happen during the normal process of printing. These clips prevent that.
I took the extruder apart and found a big glob of hardened PLA. I heated the extruder up and was able to pull it out with a pair of pliers and that seems to have fixed the issue. Not sure how it started though. Does anybody recommend the 'Luke hot end fix' to improve this kind of failure?
I was nor able to push the white PTFE tubing 6cm into the hotend. In the manual there is a black tubing mentioned which was not delivered.
So I was concerned because of the warning that the hotend would be damaged if the tubing is not inserted deep enough.
Fortunately I had purchased the dual extruder which I did not mount yet.
But I tried the blue PTFE tubing from this set and it could be push 6cm into the hotend. So I partly assembled the filament feeding through the splitter for my first try and it worked.