Now a new problem, it can’t do the homing. It will move a little, then stop. At first, wouldn’t move at all.
When using butt connectors, don’t worry about twisting the wires. My hands can’t work with small stuff, so tiny wires, I can’t do much with. I can’t even see the wire, because my fingers cover it, so good luck. Do it by feel? Not sure I can feel the wire either, so good luck.
Twist it as good as you can, and keep the wires on top of each other, and push through the hole to where solder is. You obviously push one all the way through first, like the instructions on the inside of case say, I only read the instructions on the outside of the case, the first time.
Now if you are good with your hands, you can probably do a better job then me. When using heat gun, don’t keep it in one spot, that’s how you will get results like I did the first time practicing. Also, not all the shrink wrap will shrink if you do that. You don’t need to rotate wire though, just move sideways with the crappy reflector on the heat gun.
Oh and when pushing in, make sure the wire is still together on both ends, if not, you’ll have to try again, and again, and so on.
The fan spins, at least when the fan plastic cage thing isn’t on the printer, can’t tell when it’s attached, I can hear fans, not sure which ones. Maybe all of them. Maybe with a flashlight you can tell.
Put printer back in tent, as I might be able to fix it, with software, might just need to send gcode or whatever to it. Or reflash the firmware, don’t think that’ll fix it though. As resetting doesn’t fix it. At least the fan works, or should work.
Still surprised the soldering worked, couldn’t tell if the solder was even melting, either it melted, or the wires touching is good enough. You can test by messing with cable, if fan turns off, then you didn’t solder right.
And the hot end was on right, the cable just may have been in a bad spot. Said nozzle too hot or something when turning it on, with the cage on. Flipped it over, it turned on, but that isn’t good for the wire, as the cage will then touch the wire. Might not be able to screw it on. Didn’t even know it had a screw, it was the screw with the biggest top. That uses a screwdriver, not a shitty Allen wrench. I reversed it back to how it was, and made sure the cable wasn’t going under anything, instead push on the cable, so it can go through the opening on top of cage.
You can see the shitty soldering here. Too bad I didn’t take a video eh? Well, you’d see me struggling to twist the wires, or I’d fry my phone on accident. It doesn’t matter where I put tripod and camera, even if it was far away, I might still find a way to fry the phone. Should have at least taken a picture of how I was using the helping hands.
Oh and you’ll want helping hands, way easier. You only need it for the wire coming from the fan though, if the other cable is still attached to printer. Make sure the printer is off though. I put the helping hands on the bed of printer.
Going to go to the bathroom before messing with printer anymore. Got to lookup the article I saw on phone, on computer. Or find any article. Might look at OctoPrint and see if it can do anything. Or maybe there’s a plugin.
I think I basically need to reset the homing. Probably thinks it’s somewhere it isn’t. I moved the bed, and the hotend thing.
Might need to check some cable, might be on the main board. Too much work to do that today. If software can’t fix it, then I’ll mess with it some other day. Had a hard enough time with fixing the fan.
The limit switch is probably fine, I just sent M119 and says open. No idea where it is, so no idea how to see if it says closed with a finger on it. And hard to do, computer isn’t by printer. So good luck sending the command with your finger over it.
Clicked home button in OctoPrint, and it moved the hotend thing.
Oh and the heater block might be crooked from putting nozzle on, nice feature eh. Might be a pain to fix it. And OctoPrint disconnected from printer because of error.
But I guess, flashing the firmware might fix it. I’d switch to better firmware, but that is too complicated. And Klipper may have issues, nobody provided help to somebody on Reddit. So if I have that problem, I’ll be out of luck too. But how did the firmware kill itself?
The bed might be too high. No idea how to lower it. The level things don’t seem to lower it. Nice video, if you don’t read Chinese, you can’t see what they clicked on screen. Damn it, probably easier to do if you remove printer from tent. Don’t think that’s the problem, unless it’s supposed to go down more.
Think the fan is working, clicked turn fan off button in OctoPrint, then the on button.
Error reported by printer Your printer’s firmware reported an error. Due to that OctoPrint will disconnect. Reported error: Printer halted. kill() called!
That’s what happens if you click home button in OctoPrint. Watching another video. And perhaps you need to turn printer on, then plug into USB. Might have basically done that though.
I think it’s freezing when homing. It freezes when OctoPrint says the above, you can’t do anything on the screen. You can’t update firmware on screen, no micro SD card slot on the back of the screen, unless you have to open it, nobody said you do though.
Wish I knew how the hotend wires were originally. Apparently one wire can mess things up, if it’s close to other wires.
The shitty soldering could be to blame. But the fan works, so what’s the problem? Well, some wire strands did break off, while trying to twist em. And it might not be resetting correctly, you need to save it apparently after doing so. There is no “Reset EEPROM” on my printer though. I’ll run the commands using OctoPrint. But reflashing the firmware, should have done the same thing. Maybe it isn’t freezing, maybe just takes a really long time. Connected to USB on Orange Pi Zero 2, and it detected it. OctoPrint can’t connect though, so probably frozen again.
Does it need filament to do homing? If so that’s lame. Funny though, if entire printer freezes, because no filament. Doesn’t work with filament in printer either.
Well, apparently, to flash firmware for it, you need micro SD firmware on the card at same time, or you’ll temporary brick it. See here. Or only for that firmware?
Either way, I’m going to put those other files on it, and make a new name for the firmware filename. Maybe that’ll update the screen, since I see no micro SD card slot on it, and I don’t want to open it to find it. Good instructions they provide eh? So maybe it wasn’t flashing it at all.
Maybe the new motor doesn’t work, and it’s freezing it. Unplug the extruder motor and try again. Flashing firmware with the other files, didn’t change anything. But I didn’t reboot after doing so, did it right after it booted.
Well, I got farther, the belt for the hotend thing, was too tight I guess. But had to turn off, because it was hitting the bed. Auto leveling doesn’t seem to do anything. Probably need to do what the video showed and change the height of the thing. Or use a + offset. Make it the max for testing.
And I give up for now, turned it off and unplugged. I’ll try reflashing firmware, using one of my PNY cards, apparently the card it comes with is junk. Also need to find the micro SD slot on the screen apparently. Too bad nobody says if you have to open it.
If you have the wrong CPU, that firmware won’t work. You might have to open it to figure out what CPU it has, too much work. How would voltage switch get moved? Guess I need to check that too.
After dinner, I’ll check the voltage switch, and if that isn’t the problem, I’ll try a different outlet on surge protector. No idea why it worked more then it was once. Maybe it is a power problem, as it moves really slow when not working, then freezes.
Can the PSU in it be replaced? Not sure I have any extra power cables, the kind it uses. I’ll check all the connections again as well. Pretty sure that is fine though. Maybe plug the power cord into one of those power things that tells you the wattage and voltage. Kill a watt, is what it says on it. I’ll tighten the belts back up as well, since I don’t think that’s the problem.
Maybe I plugged it into a different outlet, when it was sort of working, but had to turn off, because it was hitting the bed. I loosened all the things on the bed, does that mean it can go down farther now? No idea. I doubt it’s level at all though.
Still don’t know how you are supposed to update screen firmware, there’s no micro SD slot on the screen, like everybody says there is. I might try using a PNY card though. Maybe you just copy the screen firmware to the card, put in it, and it’ll update. And then delete everything, put main board firmware on.
I’m too lazy to open screen to see if there’s a micro SD card. Already set to the right voltage, as I thought, changed it, and changed back. Still not working. Tried different outlet as well on surge protector. Not sure it will reach the outlet itself. So I guess the printer may be fried. Or something on the main board is loose. Maybe the motor for the movement not extruder, is bad already. Or does the extruder motor make it go up and down? If so, the gears might not be aligned, but I don’t think that motor is doing anything, without printing. Didn’t reboot itself, with just the screen firmware on the card.
But maybe it doesn’t work cause I have no filament sensor. There’s a command you can use to disable it. And probably only works with their firmware. If all fails, I can just try an older firmware, I guess. Might not be able to download the firmware it came with. Or was it on the same firmware? Think it was one behind.
Now it’s saying the nozzle temperature is high. Guess I need to look at hotend. I doubt it’s hot. Loosen the thermistor screw, which one is that? There’s two weird things on the hotend. The other one might fall out if you loosen it too much. Hopefully that didn’t fry it though. Don’t even know what a thermistor is. And if I losen the circle thing, it might fall out too.
And good luck fixing it. I opened the part where wires go, but no idea how to unplug anything, and not everything is labeled. I was going to try replacing the parts on hotend with the new parts that came with new hotend. Not sure which white wire is the right one, I think I found the red wires. The thing under screw apparently broke, it’s not connected to itself anymore, like a circle.
Where the wires go, something melted in there, like glue or something. Heat gun perhaps? No idea, something that looks like solder in there too. So now I think the nozzle wasn’t the problem with printer. Didn’t need to remove it apparently. Where the cables are, is that the motherboard? Perhaps not, think it’s just for the cables and micro SD card.
I’ll just order a better motherboard at some point, and perhaps whatever the cables are connected to, or is that the motherboard? No idea. But it’ll be a massive pain in the ass, good luck screwing the board in with it on it’s side, you’d have to push up, with probably an Allen wrench.
Actually, I won’t do it myself, as the screws are too small. And I can’t screw in small screws very well. They might replace the motherboard, but I don’t even know what CPU it has, so I don’t know if I can use third party firmware. I’m not messing with the printer anymore. The fan works, but apparently more then that was/is broken.
And that is the motherboard.
Look here. Don’t think that’s the real Creality site though. And you can see where everything goes in the pictures on that. Don’t ask me how to unplug anything though.
I think at this point, I should just sell it.
Didn’t need to cut zip tie probably, well to replace the cable maybe. I was just trying to get a better view. Watching video. You need a screwdriver, probably the one it came with.
And board is probably fine. It’s probably just glue. And they put printer on the side.
How much is a clone motherboard? Well, I might know how to replace cables now. It’s also labeled on the board. Or at least that one. Should save the image. Hmm, I think there’s only one white connector on the new cable. Does it somehow plug into two spots on the board? SKR Mini E3 V3 perhaps that and a new screen, my screen might not work with it.
Or don’t use the shitty screen, and use Klipper. It won’t even stay on the side of the printer. It works with Klipper. I clicked their affiliate link, cause I’m lazy. Under $50. If the printer is ever working right, perhaps I will upgrade the board.
I have a feeling, I’m gonna break the other thing that goes under the screw though. And why was the printer almost working? Then I had to shut it off, cause it was screwing up. I don’t want to order another hotend. If I do, I ain’t removing anything from it, well just the nozzle.
And I wonder if the power cord is the problem. Maybe the eGPU uses the same cable. No reviews on the SKR Mini E3 V3 saying if it works with my printer. There’s other options for different printers, but nobody said anything about my printer.
According to Reddit, the SKR Mini E3 V3 works.
Expensive printer. I should have bought a cheaper one. But it was only around $220 for printer itself. So probably one of the cheaper ones. If I ever get the courage to replace the hotend parts, maybe I’ll get a new board in the future. The hotend itself should be fine, but the other parts might need to be replaced, that the new one came with. Didn’t know how to plug it into the board, or where the board was. I just got lucky and found it. And how do you replace power supply?
Says it’s a drop in replacement, for all screens? Including my screen without a micro SD card?
The link with that motherboard, that has images of what goes where, I printed the image out. Just on regular paper, but with photo printer, laser printer isn’t color. You may or may not need color, but the photo printer doesn’t get used much.