Ender 3 under extrusion/stepper skipping

[KMDPB]

I have and ender 3 that has worked flawlessly until now. It is under extruding and the extruder stepper is skipping. My guess would be that it's a clogged nozzle but I have stuck a needle through the nozzle a few times to no avail. I have also changed to new filament thinking maybe the older filament was bad. Haven't been able to figure this out yet, any ideas?

[XEMON]

Have you tried swapping the wiring harness to a different stepper?
This will tell you if its coming from the stepper or something else.

If the stepper works great all the sudden, then the next step is to swap the plug on the board.

I had a pin on the harness get loose causing really wired behavior; took me a while to track it down.

[JonM]

Try doing a cold pull on the nozzle. A needle won’t unclog it completely. There are good videos on YouTube explaining the process. Once that’s done, check your extruder to see if the gear is clogged up with filament. I sometimes need to take a toothbrush to mine (especially after using filaments like wood PLA). You should also inspect the bowden tube to make sure it’s in good shape and not clogged. Once the path is clean and clear, check your flow rate and calibrate the extruder. When you extrude 10mm of filament, it should measure 10mm. Hopefully this helps.

[XEMON]

Ho, and for clogged nozzle, i just replace them ... I dont bother cleaning them anymore ... they are too cheap to spend the time cleaning them.

Also, do you have the stock fan on the hot end? Is it an all metal hot end or do you have the PTFE teflon all the way to the nozzle?
I had really bad heat reap starting out of the blue ...

[Bulldogr6]

A couple things come to mind, the plastic arm on the creality extruders is known to crack flex and fail which would cause under extrusion. Are you getting an audible clicking from the extruder is that what you mean by skipping? What happened to me one time was build up in-between the bowdin and back of the nozzle causing restriction. In my case it was the PTFE degrading from high temp filliment causing a gap. The OE pnumatic fitting can get sloppy and let molten filliment up on retractions and filliment removal. Preheat remove nozzle , bowden and fitting then jamb the tube right through the hot end to force it out the bottom.

Sent from my E6910 using Tapatalk

[KMDPB]

Mine doesnt have the plastic arm. And yes the audible clicking. I believe that is the problem I am running into. Did you replace the pneumatic fitting? Thanks

[KMDPB]

Ho, and for clogged nozzle, i just replace them ... I dont bother cleaning them anymore ... they are too cheap to spend the time cleaning them.

Also, do you have the stock fan on the hot end? Is it an all metal hot end or do you have the PTFE teflon all the way to the nozzle?
I had really bad heat reap starting out of the blue ...

I have stock fan and hot end. I'm thinking the ptfe tube might be pulling back out of the pneumatic coupler, I've read that those fittings are really crappy from the factory. Did you have to change yours? Thank you all for your advice

[Bulldogr6]

I switched to Capricorn tube with the better fittings.

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[KMDPB]

A worthy upgrade?

[Rainmaker]

Mine's not an Ender 3, but I've had this issue. Most of the time it's a clogged nozzle. Cold pull, or replace the nozzle.

And for Bowden tubing, I went with the Capricorn kit that came with new fittings.

[JonM]

The Capricorn tubing is a pretty much a must if you're going to print in anything but PLA. The temperatures needed to print something like PETG will destroy the stock PTFE tube.

[KMDPB]

Thanks guys I just ordered the capricorn kit. Makes sense cause The last thing I printed before the issue was petg, probably wont print petg again after I fix it, I really only do pla for lost pla casting.

[XEMON]

I swapped the hot end with an all metal and upgraded the fans to 50mm ... I don't regret it one bit ...
it's so consistent and no heat creep anymore

[AmericanPaintball]

I have 3 Ender 3's and have started to do a 1-2 week routine maintenance on mine just to be ahead of the issues that I was having. I seemed to after a while start to get under extrusion. Nozzle is some of it, but I heat up the end, remove the filament, remove the nozzle (careful it is very hot!) I then take off the tube, remove the fitting, push a piece of scrap tubing through a few times (all while still hot) to clean out any plastic in the hot end. I then put the fitting back on, put in a new nozzle, tighten it all the way down, then remove it about a turn. I trim off a bit of the bowden tube, using a tube cutter. Then I push the bowden tube down all the way until it stops at the nozzle. I then tighten the nozzle back down. This makes sure there is NO Gap between where the tube meets the nozzle. That is the spot the clog happens.

Every other time I do this repair, I also remove the cover and the rubber boot that covers the hot end, I tighten the allen screws in the bottom that is holding the assembly together. If this ever comes loose, and eventually it will, you will have such a huge mess of filament to try to clean out.

[KMDPB]

I am back in business, changed to capricon bowden tube and upgraded couplings, and changed the nozzle. Printing like a dream again thanks guys!