Temperature issues when upgrading to Marlin

I've been running Sprinter successfully for the past couple years on my Prusa Mendel i2 and am looking to upgrade to Marlin (1.0.2) to take advantage of some of the new features. Unfortunately, after configuring Marlin and connecting to Repetier-Host and/or Pronterface, I am having an issue with the extruder temperature. It basically shows an additional extruder, which I will refer to as Extruder # and the temperature matches what my extruder actually reads. When I turn on the heater, Extruder 1 shows the target temperature and Extruder # shows off, but both current readings increase as the nozzle heats up. I've attached two screenshots to try to explain what I'm seeing when I turn the extruder on or off.

This behavior is not constant though. When I go to actually print something, I run into different issues. As soon as I tell Repetier-Host to run, it locks the Extruder 1 current temperature reading at whatever temp it was at when I pressed Run, and then increases Extruder #'s temperature to the desired value. The graphical display then follows Extruder #'s values. When Extruder # reaches the target temperature, the print does not begin. It continues to hold, presumably waiting for Extruder 1 to reach the correct temperature. I can't figure out what is triggering this addition extruder temperature to display since I haven't indicated anywhere in the Marlin Firmware or Repetier settings to use more than one extruder. Also of note, each time I connect to my printer, the number of Extruder # changes but it is always a 7 digit number.

Does anyone have any suggestions on how to address this issue?

A further note, I can upload Sprinter and successfully print with that firmware on both Repetier Host and Pronterface, so it looks like it's within the Marlin firmware.

Any help will be appreciated and if anyone needs more information, please let me know.

Attach a copy of the config.h from Marlin

Config.h attached. Thanks.

Only thing I can think of is that the extruder 1 and 2 temp. Sensors are commented out instead of defined as 0 which lets marlin know they're not in use. I'm not sure if the code checks for these to exist, but should throw up a compiler error or warning. Uncomment the lines and see what happens.

I actually commented those out in an attempt to address this issue. Putting them back in causes no noticeable changes; I'll leave them uncommented though for consistency sake. Anyone have any other ideas?

Did you clear the eeprom if you're using one? Maybe there are some left over settings of sprinter that's causing repetier host to think there's another extruder?


You can clear the eeprom using arduino studio, load the eeprom_clear example from the file menu.

Any settings like PID values, steps per mm are also cleared so make sure you've got those settings stored somehwere.

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 10/29/2015 08:40AM by imqqmi.

I did not see any mention of the board you are using. I assume it is a Ramps 1.4 by the settings. Is that the case?

Yes I'm using the Ramps 1.4. I'll try to clear the eeprom before my next attemp when I get back to the office tomorrow and let you know how it goes.

Clearing the eeprom did not resolve the issue unfortunately.

Can you try an older release of marlin and see if that solves it? If that's the case you can open an issue on marlin github.

No change when trying 1.0.1.

The only thing I can think of from here is you are making a change in the firmware you shouldn't be making.

Are you making changes in files other then the config.h?

The only thing I can think of from here is you are making a change in the firmware you shouldn't be making.

Are you making changes in files other then the config.h?

No I haven't changed anything besides the config file. Does anyone have a working Marlin setup for Ramp 1.4 that they could send me?

I'm wondering if it is a mechanical issue that the Marlin firmware is picking up but Sprinter doesn't for whatever reason.

Maybe start with a freshly downloaded copy and edit the config file from scratch. I'm not implying that you did, but some copy the config file over from an older or newer install and things tend to break. You can also try downloading an older version of marlin, could be a recent change that breaks stuff. Use arduino studio 1.0.6 as newer versions make give unexpected results or throw errors at you.