Jammed J-head

Hello,

I've been using my Mendel90 for some time now. I just loaded his third roll of filament, directly after that i started printing. First layers looked poor so is decided so restarted print, in the next attempt its even worse. I tried to reverse the filament but it wasnt going anywhere; tried to gently pull it with my hands with the motors off, no movement at all.

I took the extruder part of the X-carriage. Two things got my attention:

A. The extruder block is cracked around the bearings of the bolt
B. Filament melted before the extruder. Cant be moved forward or backward.

I tried reheating the extruder to 230 C, left it for a minute and then tried to pull out the filament. The filament instanly broke and now i'm stuck with a plastic filled extruder. I tried to push the fillament through the hot extruder but it's not moving at all.

Any suggestions on this problem? Otherwise; where can i get a new extruder / other extruder that fits (so i dont have to print another block when i cant print :| )

Tom

Edit: The 'where can i get a new extruder' question is because the reprap pages tell me that this particular extruder is not available anymore.

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 06/13/2014 07:44PM by Epox.

Are we talking PLA or ABS?

To remove PLA jammed in the top of the hot end you need to heat the cold end to about 60C while the hot end is at extrusion temperature. The PLA is then like rubber and can be pulled out with snipe nosed pliers. If you have a hot air gun it is easy. If not I believe you can heat the whole hot end to about 80C on the bed of the machine with an insulating cover over it, such as a cardboard box.

Not sure what you mean by "this particular extruder is not available any more". We still sell kits and can provide any spare parts. The extruder design hasn't changed since December 2012.

---

[www.hydraraptor.blogspot.com]