Double check to make sure the filament IS PLA. I made a mistake ordering without check to make sure of that.
After a few prints, the points where the extruder checks for leveling will develop divits, or even holes in the tape, screwing up subsequent points the extruder checks for leveling. You can save on tape if you simply carve out a section - a square - around that and or other check points and stick another piece of tape in it’s place.
I only have Makerbot filament. I keep it in the plastic bags with the little silicon packets to keep it dry when not in use. Even though I didn’t know any better until reading everyone’s posts here, I figured there must be a reason they are shipping it in bags with absorbing packets…lol. Common sense can go a long way sometimes. I can easily change the tape I have tons. I will do that Monday when I get to school. Easy enough
Never mind the filament jam detection. If you didn’t mess with it, its on by default. Call makerbot and ask nicely. You might be able to get a second smart extruder for free. Good job on keeping the filament dry. Fresh filament is the best kind. You can dry it a 60C in an oven of some sort. Also be sure to keep it clean when its on the machine. Dust gets all over filament.
the makerbot slicer has always worked around issues great for me. Sometimes there is an actual large defect, but 99.5% of the time the makerbot slicer just makes it work.
Print only 1 thing at a time. The bird, once it has started, cant be stopped. And if it messes up, that little bird will kill your lock ness monster. As much as is possible, print only 1 thing.
Ok we can do that
I probably do have the old extruder. I am not sure if they look any different. But if the update was for the new extruder which is what I am hearing and now it doesn’t work. That would make sense.
I am in constant contact with tech support. They keep askng for all kinds of things logs, serial numbers of the printer and extruder, types of computers I am using when it makes the errors (dell, HP, and Toshiba ) laptop or desktop, operating system (windows 10). Hopefully there is a common denomination that will cue what is wrong. They were going to send a new extruder then started asking all of these questions and said they had to check all of this first.
Please know I absolutely love this printer. It is the best ever! It was so easy to use and the students have learned so much! They are eager to come to science. The other 2 teams of students are jeleous and want to use it but I can’t bring their teachers into this century. This product has made a huge difference in the lives of my students. They are Title 1 students who usually feel like they cannot go anywhere and they will be in dead end jobs the their lives. This has them talking about computer design and engineering for a living and we have only done 3 products. The difference of this one printer is staggering for them. This is why it HAS to work. I can’t let this interest go. The 8th grade teachers are learning to use it now to prepare for this group coming up and the high school is ordering maker bots now too. We have made a commitment starting with this group.
We are using tinkercad right now. I will do as you suggested and check them with the other programs to make sure nothing is wrong with the tinkercad files
2 words. Printrbot Play. It will cost you as much as those smart extruders more or less, and unlike the play, it JUST WORKS. and when it doesn’t, there is some legitimate thing you can do to make it work. Good job on bringing the title one folks up. Kids in my school got it rough. The 5th gen is a heap. A HEAP compared to the printrbot play. Its loud. Terrible extruder. Slow. You cant fix it. Makerbot cant fix it. That’s why people NAIL IT TO THE WALL. I have to wrangle my makerbot. Figuratively speaking, I have to grab it by the horns, and throw it on the ground, tie up its legs, just to get it to perform reliably. On the printrbot play - add the heated bed (which is larger) and now it can do ABS. Modify it like mine and it will do Nylon. There are a few more things you will have to learn over the makerbot, but you can write it down step by step on 4 sheets of paper. If you can return the makerbot, and buy x5 printrbot play, your life will be better.
This is how I set my first layer height. I call it manual Z axis calibration. Add this tool to your bag of tricks. No warrantees voided. But now your first layer will stick. You will have to learn what a good first layer looks like, but once you know what too high and too low looks like, you can fix it with a click… click…
