- LCD was intact and used a thin tape to hold it in place.
- I opened the bottom, and confirmed fan connections (there are now multiple) are firmly connected and correct polarity, and wires are firmly attached to their connectors.
- One of the metal panels (the front one), had a screw that stripped; so to check the metal reflector and LED clearance, I unscrewed the top - this is a big mistake - simply don't do it without first disconnecting the display cable (the display cable is behind the front cover, invisible to me due to the stripped screw):
- While holding the top of the printer (LCD panel and Z axis) in my hand, something shifted causing a slight tilt, breaking the LCD wire off right at the edge of the LCD (on closer examination I determined it is not user fixable, and had to order a replacement display).
- I have added tape over the LED terminals (it did not have the tabs mentioned in the wiki).
- I proceeded to check the other cables, all seems connected well and had a bunch of hot glue over them.
- Stepper motor is connected without issue.
After replacing the LCD at the top (though it may not be perfectly connected at this time - more on that later), I powered the machine and follow the steps to test the end-stop homing and leveling.
Finally it was time to get the UV LCD on (placing a paper over it). In the menu, behind Utilities there is a button "LCD" this turns the UV LED on and off (this button does not indicate the current UV LED status - you should know when you turn it on and when you turn it off). When I turned it on, I noticed the display shape in a very dark blue hue (for different people, it will look different). From the photos I expected it lighter, but at first did not think about it too much.
Showing a custom image on it to test the display - I did not figure out how to do it.
As per the wiki, I tried a Dry Run Test with the paper over it - I was unable to distinguish between the display and where the part was
So after this I prepped it for printing and started a print with resin in the bath. I sliced the Tiny Lattice by James Armstrong as my test print, at 0.05mm layer heights and default time per layers (the Creation Workshop have builtin for Wanhao resins; figuring it will simply work, and fine tuning can happen from there). After almost 3 hours I came back to the printer expecting either a big block of resin, the size of the X and Y dimensions (though not full 20mm height as there wouldn't have been enough resin in the tank), or a failed print (though at least something) or a nicely printed lattice cube - I found ... nothing.
It turns out that none of the resin hardened at all.
After this I attempted a very crude manual printing, by homing the printer, turn the UV LED on for 20+ seconds, then simulate a layer change (3x +1mm, 1x +0.1mm, 3x -1mm; this should have me 0.1mm above where I started, the redo a layer exposure). I did this for a few layers thinking I would have a flat surface the full X and Y of the printer. When I lifted it up out of the tank, again nothing - no solids in the tank, not even a perceptible change in the viscosity of the resin.
So here is my question, is the LCD by default dark, completely blacked out except where the crystals are energized or any other reason why I can't even get it to start curing? The LCD connector, I checked the pin 0 locations to ensure I have it correctly orientated, and it "clicked" anything else as a point of advice?
Once again the warning: don't take the top off without first disconnecting the LCD wire - it is extremely fragile and a very expensive part to replace (not difficult - the replacement I got, included the glass and the backlight strip was already cut and the backlight was easy to remove and).