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Hi, I bought a new FlashForge Creator Pro about a month ago and everything was going great until the left nozzle stopped working a few days ago. After some minutes with it, I managed to put it to work again, It had a clog.

But now the problem is that, although the way is free from clogs (or it appears to be so) the printer is not extruding. If I put it to work then the left extruder won’t extrude a thing, but if I gently push the filament a little, it comes out just right. The moment I stop pushing the filament from above, it stops extruding.

Also if i heat the extruder at 230 or more, a little of filament starts caming out, and it I took it out and pass a guitar string through the nozzle it comes out just fine, so I’m almost sure it is not clogged anymore.

I don’t know what it can be, the machine is pretty new and was working right.

I’m using:

PLA from 205 to 215º

Simplify3D software or FlashPrint, depending on the case

Default settings for the Creator Pro PLA profile, I only use to change the layer height (between 0.2 and 0.3 in general) and the infill percent (between 15% and 50% depending on the model).

I also levelled the plate thousands of times and I’m almost sure it is in the right place.

If you have any advice it will be well appreciated. Thanks in advance!

UPDATE (Solution):

First of all, thanks a lot for all your kind comments and fast responses, it is nice to have a whole community receiving and helping you this way.

I just managed to solve the problem. I half followed a youtube video to get to the motor and clean it and I say “half” because the Creator Pro from the video was different than mine, so I couldn’t follow the tutorial step by step, but id didn’t matter because I found the problem much before entering to the motor.

When I had removed the front fan from the left extruder (the one which wasn’t working properly) I saw small pieces of white pla between the motor and the tube that goes into the nozzle. I carefully removed then, put everything back in place and now it’s working just fine.

Again thanks for your answers and ideas!

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hmm,

So you say that if you gently push the filament down the extruder, it works, but if you let the motor push it down it doesn’t work?

Is that correct? becease if so, than it looks like the motor drive doesn’t get a grip on the filament,

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Hi, it seems like the nozzle is still clogged and I would recommend to clean it using the Atomic method (cold push with Nylon filament).

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Welcome to the community and congratulations on getting your FFCP, honestly one of the best FDM Printers around under £1,500!

Sorry to hear you’re having an issue with extrusion. I know this can be frustrating, but fear not. It’s likely a relatively simple issue.

If you’re able to still push filament through manually, then it’s likely that it’s not (entirely) down to a residual clog. You may still have a partial blockage which is creating too much force for the extruder to push past (effectively making your nozzle smaller than 0.4mm, but it’s more likely that there’s residual material left around your extruder gears from when you first experienced your block.

When you get a block, unless you stop your printer, instantly (and I mean instantly), the gears that push the filament along are going to keep trying to push the filament despite having nowhere to go. The gears quickly grind away at your filament and cause particles to build up in between the teeth on the gears reducing the amount of grip they have on any material put between them. If this get’s too built up, the gears won’t have enough grip to extrude your filament.

I’d advise you remove your extruder block and open it up so you can clean your gears (a sharp tipped pair of tweezers can be useful for this as well as a hard bristled toothbrush). Clean out the gears and pop it back together. That should hopefully get you back on track.

I’m planning on doing a tutorial for this at some point soon on my YouTube channel so feel free to subscribe if you don’t want to miss it at 3DRevolution

If you want to keep your nozzle and extruder especially clean and/or if you find yourself constantly switching between different types of filaments (especially those which work under different print temperatures), I’d thoroughly recommend you invest in some floss cleaner filament. You can check out my review of some here for a better idea of what it is and how it works.

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Out of curiosity, check the Teflon tubes that go into the Nozzle, they may be blackened and need replacing.