Prusa I3 Stopping, Skipping, Power Issue?

My Prusa I3 printer has been working without issue for some months when a couple days ago it started to throw tantrums:

The first couple failures had the printer simply stopping. No error messages, just stopped.
The next couple of failures had the printer skipping on both the x and y axis's

When the printer was just stopping I thought that the issue might be the USB connection from the OSX host that I generally use to drive it so I tried a Linux host and got the same result.

I also thought that it might be the power supply so I swapped out the ATX for another (one of the LED drivers) and got the same result.

On one of the latest failures I tried doing some manual control of the printer after doing a disconnect/connect and noticed that when both of the heaters were on something in the power supply seemed to trigger a circuit breaker as the printer partially, though not completely?, lost power. Turning off the heated bed seemed to bring it back.

Nothing on the Ramps board feels like it is running hot.

I am not sure how to best diagnose this problem from here? I do have a spare Ramps board that I could pop in...except that popping is not a good description of the process...

Any ideas would be appreciated.
Wisar

Looks like the power supply isn't rated enough, and when you have all heating elements taking huge current it overloads the power supply and triggered current protection.

What is your power supply rated, and what is the +12V rail rated?

alvinhochun:

The ATX is rated at 500w though I am not sure how what the 12v rails are specifically. The LED Strip Driver is 240W on the 12V rails.

I can certainly get another power supply but I would like to understand why these two power supplies are suddenly problematic? I have printed 10 reels of filament without an issue and suddenly the printer decided to call a labor action!?!?

Wisar

I don't know, maybe some parts have aged? Maybe there is a short somewhere on your boards?

You can try measuring the resistance of your heated bed. Also measure the voltage drop of the power supply with all your heaters on. If your multimeter can handle a lot of current, you can also try measuring the current (note you need to connect it in series to measure current).

Resistance seems on the heated bed and extruder seem to be ok. I have also not been able to find a short (thinking that maybe one of the feeder wires that moves a lot may have gotten frayed). There is a pretty significant voltage drop when the heated bed kicks on (12 to 11.2) but I am not sure if this is more than is tolerable or not based on other posts here.

The printer is back working again though...after finding some clear indication of a problem (as shown by the picture). I am not sure if this is the chicken or the egg however! The internal contacts of both connectors are pretty corroded. Could this have developed over time leading to the meltdown or should I be looking for something else?

Wisar