Last piece of filament

Hi,

How do people cope with the fact that the motor is about 30cm from the extruder. Do you just discard the last piece or do you manage to push the last bit of the previous filament through with the new one? I tried to push it through but the filament was just passed the hobbed insert and the new piece would not catch to push it through. In the end I had to take the bowden tube out of the drive assembly and pull the old piece out.

Can any tell me what they have done to try and find a solution?

Thanks

Hello, I have had my filament break in the extruder and did exactly what you tried and it worked. All I did was set the extrusion length to the longest on the the web interface at medium speed with the hot end on and pushed the filament real hard and the hobbed bolt gripped it.

It depends on the print if that works. If you have lots of retractions in the print your results might not so good. But if you print larger continuous stuff it works pretty well.

Just push the new filament in behind the old one - if it is in the middle of a print do so before the old filament reaches the hobbed bolt. Then just keep a steady pressure on the new filament until it is well past the hobbed bolt so retractions don't push it out again. Hold the extruder with your other hand while applying the pressure, otherwise you will be pushing the X arm out of true and the print will be distorted at that place. (Or you can unclip the extruder completely while feeding the new filament). Ensure both old and new filaments have a squared-off end - if either is tapered the new filament can slip down the side of the old and get wedged in the Bowden tube.

Dave

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 01/31/2015 09:12AM by dmould.