Adjusting the M2 extruder

[Jonathan Hirschman]

I'm suddenly having all kinds of difficulty getting a PLA to feed
reliably; this is for a gcode file that's printed perfectly in the
past, with a "known-good" reel of PLA. I'm pretty sure that the issue
is operator error.

So, can someone tell me how to adjust the extruder correctly? My
method, which as served me well before, was to just muck about with
the two screws until it just worked. It'd probably be a good idea to
learn how it should actually be done.

[Rick Pollack]

Jonathan - the only adjustment is the filament tension (horizontal screw on the filament drive). which two screws are you referring to? are you sure the issue is not related to the spool not turning easily?

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[Jonathan Hirschman]

Hi Rick!

See, just goes to show that it likely is operator error ;)

The two screws I'm referring to are the filament tension screw, as you
indicated, and the idler wheel screw. I was under the (faulty?)
impression that the idler wheel had to be adjusted as well - it does
seem to have an effect on how straight the filament is.

Yes, it is possible that the problem is that the spool is not turning
well, although that hasn't been an issue in the past. Symptoms include
what I think is advance skipping (clicking from the extruder),
filament not advancing when it should, or not enough advancing. This
never happens while printing perimeters, or the initial skirt - it
starts to happen during infill, even the first solid layer.

The way I've been doing it is:

Set Pronterface to advance 50mm of filament,
Tighten tension until the slightest amount of binding happens,
Back of on tension,
Test by moving another 100-200mm of filament through click/bind free.
Make sure idler is turning. If the filament is curling, I adjust the
idler wheel screw until it doesn't.

Thanks,

jh

[Rick Pollack]

PLA does not require much tension. The idler screw should be all the way in but the bearing needs to turn freely - that does not need to be adjusted once set. If the extruder is skipping the the tension is probably too high. you can also try turning the temp up a few degrees.

[Jonathan Hirschman]

Thanks for the tips. Up and running, nice and smooth now.

Cheers,

jh