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Noise cancelling Chiron Y-axis
I want to be able to run my Chiron during night-time, but my neighbours tries to sleep at that time of day. I have put a lot of effort into making the printer silent. The controller-fan and power-supply-fan now run slower and only when needed, I have put the printer on those damper feet found on Thingiverse, I have added rods to stabilize the gantry and I have switched to TMC2209 for X, Y and Z. I have made sure the TMCs are tuned for 24V and are using 'stealth chop' below 225 rpm (120 mm/s). The result is impressive compared to how noisy the printer was when I bought it.
One problem was not solved, when Y-axis moves at between 35 and 45 mm/s, the printer starts to loudly vibrate at 220 to 280 Hz. To mitigate that, I first tried to slow down printing, but then print quality was hurt by oozing. Now I have reverted back to my desired print speed, but limited Y-axis feed-rate in Marlin to 32 mm/s using M203 Y 32. It is quiet enough, but many movements are slowed down, affecting quality.
What can I do to stop or mute these vibrations?
ADDED 2021-03-30
I have no proper accelerometer, so I used a MPU6050 accelerometer and some code in an ESP8266. It samples roughly 400 times per second and gives a vibration-value that can be used to estimate the level of vibrations. It is not frequency-compensated, but gives a hint of what is happening. And it can be used to compare settings.
I also made a program based on an example in TMCStepper so I could run the stepper and see/change all settings. This program also relays the measurements from my accelerometer so I can make graphs.
To do this I removed the stepper from the chassis, as I need to be somewhat quiet when doing these tests. It looks like this:

This graph sums up my findings pretty well:

X-axis shows motor-speed in full steps per second, fsps. fsps corresponds to the frequency of the noises I want to conceal. 200 fsps = 1 revolution per second = 60 rpm. On Chiron Y-axis 60 rpm = 32 mm/s = F1920.
Y-axis is shown with the scale log10(accelerometer values).
Here are the TMC-settings I used during the tests, which are same/or close to what Marlin use for 24V Chiron:
(TPWMTHRS was set to 0 when I tested StealthChop)

What I read from this chart (and my many measurements):
TMC2209 is much quieter below 120 fsps.
StealthChop is fantastic at low speeds.
StealthChop shall ONLY be used at really low speeds in a 3D printer. If at all, since switching mode also is noisy.
SpreadCycle use 256 usteps/fstep. A4988 use 16 usteps/fstep. I think that is the reason for TMC to be more quiet at low speeds.
What I do not understand:
Why is TMC2209 seems to be more loud at higher speeds. It might make different vibrations that my makeshift accelerometer rates worse, of course. But can I have a defective TMC2209? Or are the BigTreeTech boards bad? Or have I got fake TMC2209 with worse performance?

Have you tried a concrete tile for garden with foam below it?
Check https://www.cnckitchen.com/blog/reduce-your-3d-printing-noise-with-a-concrete-paver
The same is on

Frequencies at 200+ Hz should not get to the neighbours, the walls and floor will absorb them. Lower frequencies are transmitted much more (see the video).
Try that, it's super cheap, and if not enough let us know for further help.

I noticed that my TMC drivers make a loud KLANK sound when switching from stealthchop to spreadcycle. The solution is to keep the in stealthchop at all time by butting the threshold really high (I set mine to 1000 mm/s). You may also look for resonance in your frame. If you’re using Klipper, you can use input Shaper with an accelerometer to lower ringing, it will improve your print ans make your printer quieter at the same time.

I have the same sharp sound when switching between the modes.

TMC2209 datasheet says: "Use a low transfer velocity to avoid a jerk at the switching point.". I have tested switching between the modes and I need to go very low for the switching to spreadCycle not to be annoying.

Since you have already invested in reducing the noise of you printer:

Move it away from the wall shared with your neighbor, or better a different room.

Reduce sound transmitted through the floor. Set the printer on some type of isolation table.  This can be from an elaborate marble table to some type of homemade setup.  You can put cushioning under the printer.  The heavier the furniture the better.

Add an acoustical barrier to the wall, from a blanket to shaped acoustical foam.

Invest in noise cancelling equipment.  Some are as low as $50.


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How to setup Marlin to use a moving bed (up-down)?
I am building a 3D printer from scratch, the bed will only move on Z and the head will stay at the top of the printer and move X and Y.
How do I modify the Marlin firmware to have the bed lower as it prints instead of lift like most printers.

You can control in Marlin what the direction of the stepper motor is, e.g. my Hypercube CoreXY printer (which has a similar setup like you described) has the following set (in the Marlin Configuration.h file) to ensure the platform raises when it has to decrease height:
// Invert the stepper direction. Change (or reverse the motor connector)
// if an axis goes the wrong way.
#define INVERT_Z_DIR true

Furthermore, it matters where the Z endstop is located, e.g. using a bed probe sensor or a min Z endstop, you need to home towards a decreasing height (in the direction of your probe/endstop):
// Direction of endstops when homing; 1=MAX, -1=MIN
#define Z_HOME_DIR -1

Don't forget to set a max Z height that falls within the printer volume, e.g.:
#define Z_MAX_POS 345

If the bed is heavy, you should also prevent the steppers to lose power when not being used, so at least set Z to false:
// Disables axis stepper immediately when it's not being used.
// WARNING: When motors turn off there is a chance of losing position accuracy!
#define DISABLE_Z false

This is very helpful, when I get things build this will really help me get my firmware set up correctly.

To understand normal commands from a basic printer slicer, all movement commands in g-code are written to be away from the base layer as positive. Note that technically a "lower the bed" printer does violate Orthonormal coordinates unless you either swap X and Y while retaining 0 in the front-left corner or put 0 in the front-right corner, going left for +X (e.g. inverting that motor axis too) and back for -Y.
Hardware
To invert the movement direction of an axis without rewriting the firmware there are two main ways, from mos invasive to easiest:

Mount the actuator "upside-down" as that flips the rotational normal vector.
use a left-hand-threaded rod and nut. This does not flip rotation but how rotation affects the bed.
alter the stepper cables by "crossing" one of the phases leads. The motor rotates reversed to its commands now.

Firmware
In Marlin, you can also just flip the direction of the motor via configuration.h by altering the line from false to true:
#define INVERT_Z_DIR true

source: Stack Exchange

license: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/

sort: votes


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Strange vertical lines on X-axis direction of parts
This one is turning out to be a real head-scratcher. I'm running a stock Creality CR-10S and there seems to be a single line approx 45° across the print on the X-axis direction.
I have attached images to better explain. Any help would be greatly appreciated.

This are probably wrong theories, so let's exclude them: Does this anyhow correlate with an infill pattern (here I think of "Infill overlap (%)" setting) or with the starting point of print for the outer wall (a Z-seam, you would need to observe during the print)?

Do you print Infill before walls? Can you print a copy of that item and abort that print mid-way, showing the infill together with the erroneous area? On the black item, the seams are on the upper or lower edge afaict.

Hi, thanks a lot for the reply. These parts are hollow, and infill for both are concentric. Does it have to do with belt tension or motor vibrations?

In your slicer check your z-seam overlap. Lines like that are what happens when a slicer is systematically trying to hide a seam while not adding a ton of time onto the print by adding in a bunch of additional time for travel.

This seemed to be the case, I was using matterhacker for slice and print. Didn't have this issue with Cura. Thanks a lot mate!

all_licenses: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/


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Issues with printing and removing filament residue
When I print at the end when it is done the prints are lighter than they should, and they are thin enough that I can scrape the bottom away.
My second problem is that my filament gets stuck on the support rods and stops the filament from coming through the extruder.
And the final problem I have is when the bottom of my prints get stuck and won't come off and I need to learn how to clean it.
(The bed can come off and my printer is an Ender 3 Pro)

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Frist thought is a non-properly leveled bed (too close). Light models and thin layers may suggest issues with movement or slicing parameters. I don't understand what is "support rods" that stop filament, but anyway it seems very strange... @castleprints did you went through good printer building and calibration tutorial? - I mean something like Creality Ender 3 assembly and pro build tips + Ender 3 V2 Easy Bed Leveling.

Sounds like nozzle is too close to your bed. 2. Please clarify 3. Never done that, but I saw people laying the bed with printed parts into cold/ice water. That may help removing the prints.

@jp_ thanks for your contribution and the edit, but please try to maintain capitalisation (see my further edit). You may also find this post to be useful, Useful things to check for when cleaning up posts

I think I know the answer to your first problem.
Check your flow rates and wall thicknesses in the slicer settings. And if messing with some of those settings doesn't fix the problem, it might have to do with your steps per mm which I posted an answer here.
The other two problems I'm not really sure about.
Just wanted to at least get one question cleared.


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Marlin v. Repetier G-code flavor
My TronXY X1 runs on Repetier firmware. My Ender 3 runs on Marlin firmware.
I found that apparently code in Marlin style does not always create good prints on a Repetier machine, under extruding in some key areas - but that might also be setting dependant.
Of course, simple fix in the slicer by setting it to the correct style, but:
What differences are in the style of the basic commands between Marlin and Repetier?

Does code in Repetier style produce good prints on Marlin firmware? If so then it might just be Repeiter has a bad g-code interpreter, which the slicer software is compensating for.

@user77232 actually some file work either way, but I have an old g-code file that works perfectly, and a new one where I tried Marlin Style that fails constantly - so I wondered if it was G-code style error.

The basics should be the same, are you sure about settings like steps per mm for both machines ( I'm not referring that they need to be the same value). There are a lot of other G-codes that are different, supported by one but not the other, etc., but these are not the standard ones.

@0scar I am sure that the machine settings are working - but it might very well be slicer settings totally off...


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Bed is leveled and not warped but still uneven printing?
I have the Creality CR-10S. I replaced the glass it originally came with as it was warped and I wasn't getting any material out on 2 of the sides.
I switched to a PEI sheet and got the same results after only a few prints.
I then switched to a mirror I had cut previously, and it worked for maybe 2 days. I scrapped a print off that warped, and then the leveling was off on that. My gantry is level, my beds aren't warped, I'm leveling it to allow a standard piece of paper to have friction by the head. It's either to close and no filament is extruded or it doesn't stick at all and drags filament everywhere. If I can get good extrusion on one side, it's horrible off on the other or all corners.
Note that I have checked my gantry and it is straight as well and my the bed. Not sure what issues I have left.

Maybe you did create a mesh in printer's EEPROM memory with a previous warped bed, and now still using these settings unconsiously?

Maybe you can post an image of a leveling print, e.g. this cross hair, you get a bonus to see if it prints in the center also!

Be sure that you have no previous bed meshes saved and automatically applied: use the commands M502, M500.
Once you have done that, try this technique:

It's about using a ruler to detect areas which are lower, and then use stickers below the glass to thicken those areas only, resulting in a much flatter surface.
If you don't want to use the blue tape (which will worsen the heat transfer, but not so much after all) you could use 0.3 mm silicone thermal tape, which is more heat conductive but it's also quite thicker than blue tape.
This other alternative consists of flattening the plate itself, but it's inevitably performed when cold, while the tape technique above can be performed at the desired temperature (since the warping may not be constant).

The downside is the extra layer of air between the heated bed and the glass. Doesn't this prevent effective heat transfer?

@0scar well it's tape not air, but surely there is something in between. I update the answer. It's a matter of priority.

If you insert tape, although very thin, it will create gaps on either side of the tape, air is a good insulator, hence my concerns. :-)

What should the mesh look like and how do I access them to see?

@0scar it is true but I think it won't matter. I found in YouTube cases where small squares of silicone thermal pads were used at corners and center. They left way bigger gaps and still it didn't matter much.


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What kind of thermal paste do I need for a heatbed thermistor?
I've got a new heatbed. The current heatbed has a screw in the middle of the bed with some kind of thermal paste (feels like silicone). Somebody on reddit said that it is very unlikely silicone, because the curing process of silicone corrodes the electronics. But what is it and should I use just normal CPU thermal paste?

There's a difference between the silicone you might use to seal around a bath, which sets, and silicone heat transfer compound, which stays fluid. An example of the latter is 860 Silicone Heat Transfer Compound. Does the CPU thermal paste you might use have a high enough operating temperature?

@ AndrewMorton i got this thermal paste (sorry this is german) it goes up to 240°C and is non electrically conductive. Seemed alright to me

I assume that from the mention of the screw in the bed that that is what physically holds the thermistor against the bed. Just be careful about where the diamond paste goes as it is an abrasive (e.g. you would not want it getting into bearings).

If you need it to hold the thermistor in place, there are thermally conductive electrically insulating potting compounds, such as Appli-Thane® 7300 Urethane that have a temperature range of -100 to 160 °C.
The newest CPU thermal pastes contain silver particles and will conduct electricity. So, it needs to stay away from leads and pads that don't want to be shorted

thanks that is good to know, my thermal paste says it is 'non electrically conductive' but i didn't knew before that was even something to look out for


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Ender 3 V2 Extruder getting hot
I'm still fairly new to 3D printing; got my Ender 3 V2 for Christmas last year. Recently the tension arm in the stock extruder snapped, so I bought and installed an all-aluminum replacement. My first successful(ish) print since installing it lasted two to three hours before I noticed the filament wasn't feeding. It had softened and clogged the lead-in to the Bowden tube just past the tooth gear. I figure the problem comes from (and what probably broke the original plastic) heat buildup; the new aluminum frame was VERY hot to the touch. I also noticed that the extruder motor was rather hot as well.
So you all know where I am: all I've printed with is PLA at 195 °C. Since changing extruders, I was getting over extrusion and dropped it to 185 °C and increased the retraction from 5 mm to 6.5 mm. The new one doesn't have (easily) adjustable tension, but the tension felt as strong as I had it on my old one, so I left it alone. I currently print within an enclosure, one of Creality's foil-lined ones since my printer is located in the garage (this is more for dust, but for longer prints I felt it was good to have since at the time it was getting very cold at night in the garage).
I don't think it's heat creep, since that meant it went all the way up the Bowden tube. My first guess is the ambient heat inside the enclosure. I am currently trying a new print with the top and side openings folded up to allow airflow. But I welcome more experienced suggestions and input.
Additional info
I think I was getting away with the low temperature (185 °C) because my printing enclosure held heat so well. I'm attempting to print outside the enclosure today to start removing variables to my problem, if it under-extrudes, I'll bump the temperature up again.
Please note that I replaced just the frame.
I wouldn't know how to adjust the voltage [of the Z-stepper] if indeed the [pre-set factory calibration is incorrect and causing the stepper to heat up]. The new tension arm is a bit tighter than I had it set on my old, but I can't imagine it's making enough resistance to overwork the motor without seeing other issues first.
I didn't see any signs of Heat Creep when I pulled out the filament. The only softening I saw was in the direct drive; it had been pushed into a conical shape that plugged the port into the Bowden just past the gears. I'm still leaning towards an issue with the direct drive (is that what it's called? still learning the terms). the aluminum was too hot to touch and I had to wait 10 minutes before I could safely depress the tensioner and pull the filament out. That or the motor is overheating trying to pull Filament through.
The motor driving the filament is on the opposite side of the Teflon tube, mounted to the vertical frame - it is not on the nozzle side of the Teflon tube.

185 is very low for printing PLA

@Seradhe: For printing PLA, you don't want an enclosure to hold heat well. As long as it's over 60°C or so, the PLA will continue to deform, ruining the accuracy of your print. It needs to cool quickly to below that temperature, and if the ambient temp is 40° instead of 20°C the cooling will be at half the rate (i.e. (60-40)/(60-20)).

You could still get heat creep with a Bowden tube.  It has different characteristics.  Instead of jamming up in the direct drive, the filament can melt too far upwards into the heat break where it can refreeze and jam.  The characteristic, if you can pull out the filament, is widened filament extending into the heat break.
See Air printing/jamming midway through raft creation
and
What are ways to avoid heat creep?
Adding fans to an enclosure improves the temperature control in the enclosure.

How close to the bed? Or. close to any heat source?

Ender 3 V2 has extruder located on one side of gantry (a vertical bar along which the X carriage travels). It is almost touching the Z axis vertical screw from inside of printer's space. You can see it here on the photo. The tube length is about 18 inches (I googled this, cannot measure it today). So this is a standard Bowden-type extruder, not a direct drive extruder. It travels up and down with the gantry, even at the bottom it is rather far from bed... but it is inspiring question indeed.

I added fans to my enclose, to run when needed.

I had this problem when I switched to the aluminum dual gear extruder. The spring was too strong and was crushing the filament out of its round shape into more of an oval profile as it fed into the Bowden tube. This caused excess friction in the Bowden tube, which stressed the extruder stepper motor and caused it to heat up, which transferred through to the aluminum dual drive. This in turn softened the filament in the drive and cause it to lose even more shape, increasing the friction in the tube and further stressing the stepper in a self-perpetuating cycle.
No print lasted more than a couple of hours before the filament jammed in the extruder and I was air printing. The solution was to remove the stronger yellow spring and replace it with the weaker bare metal spring that came with the stock extruder. It's not strong enough to distort the filament and problem solved.
If you are using the stock extruder then the source of friction maybe somewhere else in the filament feed chain.

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Answer created from octopus8's comments. If octopus8 wants to post their own answer, this wiki answer can be deleted.

185 °C is quite ok for several PLAs I have when printing slow.
Honestly, I couldn't believe that the heat can go up the heatsink and Bowden tube to make extruder frame hot. So maybe your extruder's stepper motor is just getting hot heats up all metal elements (or a combination of both)? Did you replace only frame or also the stepper motor? Maybe the voltage is too high? I think voltages might be not calibrated well in factory, because my Z stepper in Ender 3 V2 also is getting really hot since I bought the printer (so far I added radiator, but I plan to regulate this voltage).

The new tension arm is a bit tighter than I had it set on my old, but I can't imagine it's making enough resistance to overwork the motor without seeing other issues first.

I agree with your judgement. Regarding the voltage: first I am not sure if my copy of v4.2.2 mainboard has TMC2208 stepper drivers, or some older HR4988. I would need to determine that first, then find a valid formula for Vref. Actual voltage is tuned using potentiometer next to corner of stepper's small radiator. You can see here an example of this process. One problem is that Ender 3 V2 has the mainboard accessible from the bottom, so I would need something like garage pit to operate...
As you can see, it is important to not touch the screwdriver's metal bar, and anyhow include your body's capacity to this circuit, or you may break things. There are also ceramic screwdrivers - but I already bought two and still my best option is sculpted from 3mm filament. Plastic or ceramic tool will need you to measure voltage separately from turning potentiometer. So the idea of connecting voltmeter to small metal screwdriver is very handy, but you have to be careful to touch only plastic parts.

Answer taken from Seradhe's comment. If Seradhe posts their own answer, then this wiki answer can be deleted.

Sorry for the long delay, but I wanted to post a follow up to conclude this.
I printed outside of my enclosure with no problem. Best guess is that the sealed enclosure wasn't bleeding off heat very well, and the aluminum feeder (being aluminum) was just soaking up the heat non-stop. Fine for short prints but anything over three hours it would get hot enough to soften the filament. I'm currently printing housings for some extra PC fans I have and framing in a vent system to keep it from getting too hot in the future


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Does the Creality Ender 3 allow variable layer thickness?
I'm new to the 3D printing world but I've been using some of the 3D printers at my local library, and am now interested in purchasing my own! One thing that's important for my projects is being able to use variable layer thickness (for example, the first 50 layers are 0.3 mm, the next 50 are 0.1 mm, and the last 50 layers are 0.3 mm).
I know the Prusa printers can do this, but I've been trying to understand whether the Creality Ender 3 allows you to use variable layer thickness. Unfortunately, I can't seem to find this information online so I would like to ask here!

Variable layer height is a setting of the slicer, not an ability of the printer itself.
However, the printer must be able to print at such layer heights. Any FDM (Fused deposition modeling
) or FFF (fused filament fabrication) printer, which is the type you describe in the question, is able to print at 0.1 to 0.3 mm with at least a 0.4 mm nozzle diameter.
There is also notion of optimal layer heights. Optimal hight depend on full steps of Z motor correlated with a leadscrew type. It is especially important when microstepping for Z is disabled or when printer disconnects a Z motor during long printing of single layer, otherwise positioning may get imprecise. Prusa calculator helps to determine these values. For 8 mm/revolution lead of screw (standard T8 in Ender 3) the step for optimal heights would be 0.04 mm.

Thank for the reply 0scar (+1). So I can just incorporate the variable thickness feature from Prusa slicer onto my file, and use it on the Ender 3?

You can use PrusaSlicer for other printers than Prusa models/brands.

I added information of optimal layer height to the answer. It depends on stepper motor and leadscrew type. For my old printer I disabled Z microstepping, I use standard M8 thread there, so Z resolution is still more then satisfying. The holding torque is improved in this setup, and my two Z motors remain cold all the time. One day I will probably do the same for Ender.


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Y-axis limit switch adjustment is way off on new Ender 3 V2 causing motor grinding noise and system lockup
Just received my new Ender 3 v2. When using the Auto Home feature, the Y-axis motor drives the bed as far back as possible then the motor grinds for about 10-15 seconds. The Y-axis limit switch is not being depressed and the limit stop is about .5 inches away from the switch. The control unit locks at this point and must be power cycled to regain control. If I manually depress the limit switch then it appears to act normally.
Clearly either the limit switch is way out of adjustment or the bed is not positioned properly. Can this be fixed or should I send it back as defective?

DaveS, is it possible that your buildplate is too low now - and it is hitting the motor instead of moving bit further? I you would you like to follow some guidelines, please check these tutorials for many unique great tips in each of them: (1) Creality Ender 3 assembly and pro build tips, (2) Creality Ender-3 V2 assembly and pro build tips, (3) Ender 3 easy bed leveling - here including better positioning of the Z-stop.

Sounds defective.  My Ender 3v2 Y-limit switch is lower than the build plate and stops against the right rear y-axis wheel, not the build plate.

It is possible that the buildplate is too low, and cannot travel all way down  the Y axis, but is hitting into the Y motor enclosure.
If you have screwed the Z-stop to printer's vertical frame, shifting the endstop all the way down, there is even bigger chance for this. So one advice is to raise the Z-stop by about a width of wrench key included to the set. Ender 3 V2 has a bit taller glass plate comparing to previous model.
That is not my idea, I just repeat that after the author of "Tomb of 3D Printed Horrors" youtube tutorials. The author also presented quick method Ender 3 easy bed leveling, including fine tuning of the Z-stop position.
Please also note, that there are wires with thermistor taped below the bed with crackling tape (probably capton). So if you raise it too few, you will regularly hear scraping and crackling sounds. Therefore before builtplate leveling, I would advice first to check the initial height if it is already safe.

I was able to just bend the brass piece on the switch toward the front of the printer.  Be careful of course, breaking it would be very bad.  That worked for me.

I just replaced my Y-axis belt, I returned everything to its regular place and it started grinding. This was because the build plate is symmetrical but the wheels are a little lower on one side, so flipping around the build plate fixed this for me.


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What is the best way to build a closed loop continuous rotation servo for 3D printer?
So I was thinking of using a closed-loop motor in my 3D printer for better accuracy and high-speed printing without losing steps. I have analyzed options available including just tweaking stepper current and firmware changes to prevent step losses but I want to find the best way to do it with encoders. The problem is I need a pretty high resolution for a 3d printer and usually, high-resolution servo motors use potentiometers that are limited and not suitable for a 3d printer. I am thinking of building my own closed-loop continuous rotation servo using stepper/DC motors and encoders but I can't find any high-resolution encoder at a reasonable price. So is there any way to somehow use low-resolution encoders (like 36 pulse every full turn) or is there any encoder type that I can use for better accuracy at a reasonable price other than optical ones? Also is there any other solution for closed-loop systems at a reasonable price?
Note that I am aware that I may need to modify firmware or write my own code for motors and program them from scratch.
Note: You might consider this question Closed-loop stepper motors a possible duplicate but I have read that and my main problem is not being able to find any cheap high-resolution encoder for this purpose.

Also for some reason, I can't use products like BTT S42B closed-loop stepper drives, my only option is to build them myself.
TL;DR:
Is there any type of encoder with high resolution and cheap price for use in 3D printers? (I don't mean brand, I mean technology)

I am just asking for clarification: on one hand you say "I need a pretty high resolution for a 3d printer", and on the other you consider 36 "steps" per turn - while standard stepper motors make 200 steps (of 1.8 degree)?

@octopus8 The problem is exactly this. The cheap encoder pulses every 10 degrees that is so low. I had an idea in my head like a 1:100 gear reduction and attaching encoder to gearbox input part so the resolution will be 0.1 degrees. I am asking for solutions to this problem, including other encoder types and possibly any similar solution

Gears will have backlash, unless you can measure it you won't be gaining anything. And ironically to measure gear backlash will require an encoder ha. A high resolution encoder is your only option tbh.

What about stepper motors with attached planetary gearbox, like 3:1? Do they also have a backlash? Or maybe it is not really important, because achieved increase of resolution is still better?

If you're after accuracy, you're probably after quality as well. Since three to four axes need to work together in a printer, the delay of correcting a step will probably do more harm than good for print quality.
I still believe that proper drivers (e.g TMC5160) with proper steppers are a much easier way to prevent lost steps. I've had my CoreXY Direct Drive X-Axis up to 1200 mm/s at 20k mm/s^2 without lost steps.

You can use a magnetic position encoder.
AS5048B High Resolution Position Sensor
14-bit rotary position sensor with digital angle (interface) and PWM output
14 bit means 16k steps/rotation. With a stepper which does 200 steps/rotation and 16x microstepping, you will need only 11 bit, so you have plenty of extra accuracy you can use to filter noise.
You may use AS5600 Positioning Sensor instead, which is 12 bits, since you don't need to track each microsteps in a closed loop, 4x is enough.
AS5600 in PWM mode does up to 920 Hz, AS5048 1 kHz. I'm not sure in I2C mode but surely more. Of course you have to take into account delay between measuring the position and transmission of the position.

Very interesting stuff. Would it just need to glue a flat magnet to the motor's shaft? --> found it. There are even links of recommended magnet suppliers.

@octopus8 I bought both boards on Aliexpress and they come with a magnet already. I guess you just need to be careful with iron parts nearby, because if they are VERY close they may distort the field and cause nonlinearity issues.

Thanks for your answer. So I can do up to 1/64 microsteeping if it has 16k PPR. Which means 2.5 microns resolution without any error. Will this make any change in print quality compared to normal printers without an encoder?

Also, I don't have much information on encoders. So is it better to use absolute or incremental for this purpose?

No I would not step up to 64X, it's mechanically pointless because nothing in the 3D printer is accurate enough for that. 16X is plenty. Also, I guess you have not much experience with experimental measurement, but if you measure 1 mm with a ruler which has 1 mm ticks, your uncertainty will be 100%. You want the measurement tool to be much more accurate than whatever you measure. Also, those encoders have uncertainties of at least 2 bits, so 16X is already the max you can use to get meaningful data. For the rest you have to look it up, I never used them personally (yet).

The gearbox approach is solid, but it will be 100x slower, and you said you wanted speed.

It will be much slower, indeed. And probably less reliable. Trying to build reasonable speed of the whole reduction setup 100:1 it would mean rotating stepper motor by two orders of magnitude. So it will have much less torque, will be probably loosing steps, and may be even impossible to turn this fast. (Otherwise with 1:100 increase, but I won't consider the impact ;) ).  Though, all this is just a remark, not a complete answer how to build a solution :(


text:
Is it possible to get higher resolutions by using high resolution encoders and custom firmware?
So I was thinking about is it possible to reach higher resolutions with encoders and DC motors? I found a cheap high-resolution magnetic encoder that can be used along with a DC motor to access higher resolutions. The encoder has 8192 PPR meaning that it can measure up to 0.04 degrees if I have correctly calculated. So if for a stepper with 0.9 step angle and no micro-stepping with 20 tooth pulley and 2mm belt, the steps/mm is 10, it means every 9 degrees with this pulley and belt setup makes 1mm and so 0.04 degree makes 0.004mm movement that is about 4 microns. Is this correct and possible? If so, why don't big companies use this method?
Link to the encoder:
RLS RMB20 rotary magnetic encoder module

The mistake in your reasoning is assuming no microstepping. Most 3D printers use 16 microsteps, and in my experience with both cheap A4988 drivers and nice TMC2209 drivers, microstepping is quite accurate. As part of an answer to a question I asked, you can see a test print showing single-microstep features. My motors have 1.8° step angle, yielding 3200 steps per rotation at 16 microsteps, or 12.5 microns of linear movement per microstep. With 0.9° step angle you could get it down to half that, and you could probably halve it again going to 32 microsteps.
Even if you can't get it as good as your 4 microns with stepper motors though, at 12.5 micron positioning resolution you're already to the point where extrusion error is going to play a much bigger role in dimensional accuracy than toolhead positioning error does. Going past that with FDM requires high resolution extruder axis movement, closed-loop control with a precise filament diameter sensor, direct drive with minimal distance between the extruder gear and nozzle, etc.

So with TMC drivers, you can have 256 microstepping that equals 0.3 microns. But I don't think it has enough accuracy to move by 0.003 degrees. Won't the step losses make steppers unable to perform these accurate steps? If they don't, Then why don't manufacturers say 0.3-micron accuracy instead of 40 or 20? Is that all because of extrusion and filament errors?

@MahanLameie: I would be very surprised if at 256 microsteps you got consistent microstep size. This article shows there may be considerable error (the DRV8825, which has fallen out of use, is especially bad) but most are surprisingly good at just 16.

Note that [non-closed-loop] microstepping is inherently inaccurate under (variable) load, but most 3D printer designs are not actually under any load when the axis in question is at rest, only loaded by accelerating/decelerating the toolhead (thus ringing artifacts).

Anyway, the reason manufacturers don't advertise what you'd get with 256 microsteps is probably a mix of (1) they don't configure the firmware that way, (2) the low-end microcontrollers they use can't handle stepping at that rate (note: this is also a reason for them not to use servos with high resolution encoders), (3) they haven't designed for or tested for accuracy at that scale, and (4) their competitors haven't either so there's no race to embellish the truth about their capabilities.

So if I use encoders that have a suitable resolution, can I get a 256 microstepping resolution without any step loss and low torque problems that you mentioned? Also is there any point in doing that? Will I get better results if I have accurate 256 microstepping and 0.3-micron resolution?

@MahanLameie: As I said in the answer, the limiting factor for print quality is going to be extrusion accuracy. Getting positioning accuracy a few microns better is not that useful when your extrusion widths have errors of many tens of microns. If you've overcome that, I would expect a closed-loop control system positioning to give better results. This could be your encoder servo setup, or stepper motors with a stepper driver that uses feedback from the magnetic fields in the motor to correct for sub-step displacement due to load.

Yeah, the extrusion accuracy will make it useless. But at least it will be good for preventing step losses and layer shiftings.

@MahanLameie: Yes, preventing step loss/layer shift is probably the main practical advantage of closed-loop control for FDM printers at this time. FYI there are companies selling stepper motors with integrated closed-loop control that are driven via the same step pulse interfaces normal drivers take, that can be used as "drop-in replacements" with exiting printers.


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Identify 3D scan technolgoy
I'm curious what is the technology category for this 3D scanner device:

Does the device fit into any technology category listed by Wikipedia?
Could it be structured light approach?

That's not Structured light, it is a camera. The camera makes a series of photos - one with each flash. Then, the photos are stitched to create a 3D model using a code that is similar to one I was shown in an informatics class in my uni once:

the software identifies structures that are identical.
By tracking the difference between the pictures, distances away from the camera between the different photos are estimated. As a result, several passes in different angles give us a complete 3D scan.
Motion of the scanner probably is included in the metadata, allowing to calculate the angles more precisely.

So, it's Photogrammetry.

I didn't expect Photogrammetry!

High quality Photogrammetry requires lots of images. So, the camera should be taking a large series of photos, right?

Photo and video it seems. Each flash is a reference picture for the video.

Just as a possibility, could the device be combining Photogrammetry with some other approaches to increase quality?


text:
Are Fusion 360 drawings sufficient to design and enforce tolerance in a hole of a solid?
I uploaded a 3D object for this project to Fusion 360 and printed it out straightforward:

Yet its middle hole is too small for the stepper motor (Nema 17 Stepper-M) I am using so I wanted to increase its tolerance before reprinting it.
So, I followed the tutorial by Tyler Beck of Tech who lead me to drawings:

I was wondering if doing a drawing (sketch in Fusion 360) was sufficient to expect the shaft of the step motor to go through?
Here are the gear and the shaft before I add the drawing constraints:

When you say "its middle hole is too small for the step motor" are you talking about fractions of a millimeter or several percent smaller?

Is this a Fusion problem or a problem with your printer. I would expect the latter to be the culprit.

@agarza fractions of millimeter, I would say one millimeter max. I will upload a photo soon.

are you sure that that is not a print error?

A digital caliper is a very useful tool to use with 3d printing. Sometimes when printing, smaller features like holes don't come out exactly the size you need, and the caliper will let you measure what change is needed in the drawing. Or you can just guess at the needed change and print another one at the new size and if that doesn't fit you will have a better guess for the next iteration.

Besides offsetting the clearances you want into models, you can and should also calibrate your printer to compensate for included holes - because often inner holes are solved to be smaller than actually designed out of necessity.
However, the option can also be used to fix problems that stem from the slicing and printing itself, and thus offers to fix some problems that are endemic to your setup or where you can't easily fix the model by setting an offset to create the wanted clearances in it.
In Ultimaker Cura, the option for this fix is called Hole horizontal expansion since 4.6 in April 2020, which only affects internal perimeters as I know from testing.
SuperSlicer, a PrusaSlicer branch offers hole_XY_compensation, though I can't quite pinpoint the time when it was added. I guesstimate sometime before October 2020.
PrusaSlicer offers XY size compensation, which does affect outer perimeters. A hole-only is requested almost since that option was available the first time. An attempt to implement a hole-only compensation again appears to be worked on since mid-2020. It seems that in the beginning of March some implementation has been tested.
The first work for such a function was tried by Slic3r before PrusaSlicer was started on, using an Arc-compensation formula in at latest 2009, but the function proved to be overcompensating. As Prusa-Slicer is a fork of Slic3r, some of this work might remain in the code.

This seems like a tolerance press fit problem and similar to what you will find if you try the same using normal machining operations on a lathe or milling machine.
I print 3 mm clearance fit holes on my Prusa MK3S, meant to fit on 3.00 mm (measured with a digital caliper) stainless steel shafts. The printed parts are from Fusion 360 models, with 3 mm holes by design, converted to STL and then sliced and printed with 0.2 mm layer height. The holes are very close to 3.0 mm and out by 0.05-0.1 mm.
The solution was to make adjustments in Fusion. I left the model with the hole size as 3 mm but then use the Offset Face command on the inside of the extruded hole to make it slightly larger with the required tolerance.

In my case, an offset of 0.05 provided a nice press fit, and 0.1 offset allowed the shaft to closely fit in the hole but loose enough to rotate.
I suggest you create a simple model with a number of holes designed to be the same size and then use different Offset Face numbers to dial in what you need. That way you get to learn what to expect from your printer and its accuracy.


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Cura messes up my print. How can I make it print what I see in Blender?
I'm using Cura and it removes my holes and deletes sections of the print and disconnects parts. In Blender it looks as it should be, as I designed it. I know there are a few mishaps inside (not manifold) but is there a way to fill in everything on the inside. I only care about the externally facing faces. This is extremely infuriating I hope someone can tell me how to force Cura to print what is originally seen in the .stl.

These are photos of how it should look.
Now these next photos are how Cura previews it. Not only does it fill in the holes (no, fill holes isn't enabled) it adds huge gaps in the side and bottom of the print as can be seen.

How can I force Cura to print what I see in blender in the original .stl?
I am exporting in Blender to .stl and opening that in Cura.

I was able to fix it partially by fixing normals in Blender but there is still this:

It's common for modeling software to flip normals, causing what you describe. You said,

I only care about the externally facing faces.

But are you sure they are truly externally facing? Turn on normals in Blender and ensure that all the arrows/pointers are external.
Another problem that can generate the results you're seeing are self-intersecting surfaces, non-manifold edges, and a couple others that are explained in a 3dhubs article. Correcting those problems involve a bit more examination and trouble shooting.
The slicing software prefers to have clean, well defined triangular surfaces in order to create a print file. When something is amiss, you get results you've presented.
With the STL in hand, I opened it in Meshmixer (free) and immediately was given a clue.

The zebra-stripes are reversed normals.
Here's another error point, difficult to see clearly in flat 2D image, but panning and zooming and orbiting and all those 3D manipulating things shows there's nothing there:

The other end of this not-joined area shows a bit better:

After selecting all I could find/locate, I did the reverse normals and here's a slightly improved result:

Unfortunately, the other borked up portions prevented meshmixer from performing a suitable auto-repair, completely destroying the model in the process.
Those joint corners and any other colored lines have to be addressed individually.

[alt]+[N] -> Recalculate Normals Outside

There are several problems at work here:

Internal Geometry & unjoined parts

Missing Surfaces

Generally inverted surfaces: every surface is inside out!

Fixing it!
Step 1: add missing surfaces.
Select the vertices around the hole that has no bottom surface and then pres F to create a surface. Use several steps, making roughly triangle surfaces. For example: select the red marked vertices, then F and then the next set.

Step 2: Internal Geometry
Let's now hunt for purely internal surfaces. Select them and delete them with Del, and select Delete Face.
Step 3: Superflous surface geometry
Some areas have remnants from areas where you worked. Merge those vertices to prevent new artifacts from cropping up. Select the vertices, M and then collapse for each circle, like the red one. Some might need to be collapsed at a specific vertex to prevent surfaces from getting ripped or intersecting badly - in the lower picture the green circled one.

Step 4: Normals
Last but not least: Alt+N and then Recalculate Outside

Export to look for other errors...
Everything should look much better now: The "checkered" areas are gaps are gaps in the walls... which stem from bad geometry in the big walls I selected in the lower picture.

So, I select one of these areas - then change to vertex mode, deselect the vertex I don't want the face to connect to (red) but the ones that should define the edge instead (green) and then press F to make a new face. Then I select the old one and delete it.

DONE!

Thank you so much! I already fixed it with 3D builder but this will be very helpful for me later if 3D builder fails in the future and for others looks for solutions to similar problems! Thanks for taking the time to do this, much appreciated!

Rhino gives the following output for MeshRepair

Mesh has 3 degenerate faces. (a face that's actually a line or a point)
Mesh has 42 non manifold edges. (a line where 3 or more faces meet, possibly caused by degenerate faces)
Mesh has 6 duplicate faces. (faces that share the same coordinates)
Mesh has 148 naked edges (edges that have only one face)

All of these things are indicators that it might be difficult to distinguish inside from outside.

I have encountered these problems after changing a model a lot during it's lifetime (adding/removing stuff). Since there are 200 errors and it's a relatively simple model, I advice you to fix these kind of problems by starting with a new clean model, using some of the coordinates of the old model as reference.
Also: be sure to check out blender's 3d printing wiki, they seem to have quite some tools similar to rhino's meshrepair

Okay, so like suggested I put it into 3D Builder (A free Windows 3D modeling program). I imported it as an stl, then exported it as an stl and imported that stl into Cura. And lo and behold all problems were gone! If you are having a similar issue give that a try! The 3D Builder program and similar ones are designed to export for the sole purpose of 3D printing so it automatically fixes these issues! If this doesn't work try editing yours in edit mode (Blender) a bit so it makes it easier for 3D Builder to fix it.


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Able to compile, but not upload
The board is BTT SKR v1.1.
I know the board is connected with COM3. I get the Avrdude 500 timeout.
I am using VS Code, and am close, but need to know exactly what changes to make in config/adv.

I have made some progress by loading the Marlin 2.0 folder AFTER I put the configs in the right place. It almost worked.
I now get an error - binary operator expected before "(".

I have both the BTT SKR PRO v1.1 and the BTT SKR mini v1.1 (it is unclear which is meant by the OP), and for both you do not upload over the USB, you compile the software into a firmware.bin file which you place onto the microSD card. Once you power the board, the new firmware file will be installed onto your board.

It is the 1.1, not the pro. I got the right config but now get a new error.
It won't compile because it can't find the amd64 library.


text:
Prusa MK3 heatbed shorted: replace just Einsy or heatbed too?
Prusa MK3 heatbed power cable shorted out (on the Einsy side) and it looks like I need to replace the Einsy. Should I replace the heatbed too? I don’t know electronics well and am worried I will just fry a new Einsy.
Heatbed end:

Crispy at RAMBo end:

Crispy at RAMBo end:

Larger images can be found here.

There should be no need to replace the heat bed.  It wasn't subjected to any unusual loads.
If the bed isn't heating, there could be one of sever problems, but I would start with the fuse.  If the fuse had time to do its job, it would have blown and protected the circuitry.  In your picture, the fuse is the blue component with "15" stamped on top.  There are also two fuses with "5" stamped on top.  One of these may be blown.  If so, replace it and try again.
If the fuses are all good, and everything except the heat bed works, you have probably blown the FET that switches the heat bed power.  If you aren't handy with circuit board repair, you may choose to get an new Einsy controller and then try to repair your old one.  These repairs aren't usually hard because the FETs are fairly large components.

I don't think that the heated bed would be damaged if the connecting wire shorted out. The heatbeb is basically one large resistor. It has a couple of surface mount LEDs that lights up red when the bed is powered for heating, but there should not be other sensitive components on the board.
The greater concern I have from your attached photos, is the cause of the 'short'. Unless there was fraying or other loose wires that could have bridged the terminals, your problem might have been a loose connection that created resistance at the interface layer which then caused that specific connection to heat up. The voltage is not high enough to cause sparks across the gap.
The additional heat and electrical instability might have fried your Einsy. You don't mention if the printer starts when you power it up, but I assume that you are considering replacing parts because the printer is not working.
If you have access to a multimeter you can just measure the resistance across the wires of the heatbed. If it is broken you will see an open connection on the multimeter, but if you see Ohms in the 1-100 Ohm range (don't know the specific resistance of a disconnected heatbed), it means the board should be OK.

You do not need to replace the heated bed. However, you should replace the damaged fork connector. What happened here is that the connector did not make a proper connection with the terminal block (perhaps due to the screw working itself loose) and heated up. There is no reason to suspect anything else is damaged, but the connector itself is clearly damaged. If you do not replace the connector, it may again make a poor connection and heat up.
Replacing the entire Einsy board is not strictly necessary. The only damaged component is the terminal block. You should consider soldering the wires from the heated bed directly to the Einsy, bypassing the terminals entirely. This is arguably a better solution since a soldered connection is more reliable than one using a terminal block. You can simply solder the wires on the back of the board.


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How do I add an emergency stop button over Micro USB?
I have an Ender 3. I want to add an emergency stop button. Ideally it’ll plug in to the printer’s micro USB port and run the M112. I use default firmware and don’t plan to change it thanks.

The most effective way to effectuate an emergency stop is to pull the plug or turn the printer off. An alternative is a software stop using a print server program like e.g. OctoPrint.
Indeed M112 is capable of stopping the printer:

M112 is the fastest way to shut down the machine using a host, but it may need to wait for a space to open up in the command queue. Enable EMERGENCY_PARSER for an instantaneous M112 command.

In order to use emergency stop functionality, you need a firmware capable of doing an emergency stop by having this enabled in the Configuration_adv.h printer configuration file, otherwise it will have to await the queue to be emptied first. I doubt if this is standard enabled in your default firmware (the Marlin default is disabled).
From Marlin's Configuration_adv.h:
/**
 * Emergency Command Parser
 *
 * Add a low-level parser to intercept certain commands as they
 * enter the serial receive buffer, so they cannot be blocked.
 * Currently handles M108, M112, M410, M876
 * NOTE: Not yet implemented for all platforms.
 */
//#define EMERGENCY_PARSER

Please note that this might not be implemented; it has not been implemented for all platforms.
An earlier question "Can G-code scripts be run automatically on inserting an SD card when using Marlin Firmware?" has an answer that hints to changing the sources on SD card insertion. In your case the USB needs to be monitored, and it a signal is detected the printer stopped.
So, since:

I use default firmware and don’t plan to change it

without modification of your firmware it is not possible to do what you want. But, there are perfectly viable options mentioned and available to do what you want (executing an emergency stop). Alternatively you could even use a (n Arduino powered) relay to cut the power based on the signal you want to send.

What about prolonging one of power cables (a ground preferably) to the front panel, and mount there a bueatiful red, normally connected, emergency button on this wire? Then you press it and power is momentarily detached.

Easiest way would probably be shorting 5V to ground with your button. How good your board will handle that depends on the board though.

I just thought of breaking a ground wire incoming from power supply to the board. So after button press, the powering circuit gets open and there is no power provided to the board. Reboot-like.


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TMC2100 stepper motor drivers not detected on SKR 1.4 turbo with RepRap firmware
I've upgraded my board to SKR1.4 turbo with RepRap firmware. Heated bed and heated nozzle work, but motors do not move.
OctoPrint reports them as 'no-driver-detected'.
Send: M122
...
Recv: Driver 0: position 67347, no-driver-detected
Recv: Driver 1: position 67347, no-driver-detected
Recv: Driver 2: position 67347, no-driver-detected
Recv: Driver 3: position 0, no-driver-detected
...

I tried to figure out what is wrong, but did not find good documentation for this combination of hardware.
This is how I setup the drivers.

I removed all four jumpers from the board below each driver (MS0, MS1, MS2, RST).
Plugged each driver to the board making sure that the corresponding pins match (GND to GND etc.)
Checked voltage between ground pin of the board and VREF pin of the driver. The voltage was 1.365 V (same for each driver). This is a bit higher than some guides suggest, but the drivers worked perfectly with the old board.

Some guides suggest modifying driver timings if the motors do not move, but I was unable to find the right timings for my drivers. What could be wrong in my setup?

TMC2100s do not feature UART or SPI communication, so you won't get any results from M122. You'll want to set microstepping with the jumpers. VREF sounds reasonable.

@towe Thank you for explaining this strange message! Googling it gives nothing. I realised, that I relied on this message when trying different RepRap configurations. When I have time, I will try them once more with some basic movement commands instead.

As @towe mentioned, 'no-driver-detected' messages in Octoprint log are harmless if you have TMC2100 motors. After experimenting with RepRap settings I found the correct configuration that works with my hardware. Here is the relevant part of the configuration.
; Drives
M569 P0 S1                                     ; physical drive 0 goes forwards
M569 P1 S1                                     ; physical drive 1 goes forwards
M569 P2 S1                                     ; physical drive 2 goes forwards
M569 P3 S0                                     ; physical drive 3 goes backwards
M584 X0 Y1 Z2 E3                               ; set drive mapping
M350 X16 Y16 Z16 E16 I1                        ; configure microstepping with interpolation
M92 X100.00 Y100.00 Z100.00 E100.00            ; set steps per mm
M566 X1200.00 Y1200.00 Z1200.00 E300.00        ; set maximum instantaneous speed changes (mm/min)
M203 X48000.00 Y48000.00 Z48000.00 E1500.00    ; set maximum speeds (mm/min)
M201 X1500.00 Y1500.00 Z1500.00 E1000.00       ; set accelerations (mm/s^2)
M906 X1000 Y1000 Z1000 E800 I30                ; set motor currents (mA) and motor idle factor in per cent
M84 S30                                        ; Set idle timeout


text:
RAMPS 1.6 VCC and 5 V jumper issues
This is a bizarre issue.
Everything was working fine until a month ago. I upgraded to RAMPS 1.6 after my 1.4 board decided it wanted to go to the big chip in the sky. I ordered a kit to replace the 1.4 and the 2560. Everything was working fine. I notice my prints are quite a bit better. I then do a complete overhaul of the printer. New rods, bearings, belts, and a new Y-axis motor. Another test print and it honestly is the best print I have ever done.
What the heck, I'll add auto bed leveling. I install the BLTouch. Plug it in and no power (in my defense, I forgot about the VCC to 5 V jumper). So I find the new location of the jumper location and per every diagram I found, it is the two pins closest to the E0 motor connection. No problem. I power down, put the jumper on and...
I released the magic smoke from the 2560.
So I order another 2560. I check all the connections, connectors, pinouts, crimps, and do a full assessment. Everything looks good, everything is crimped correctly, the wires are in the right positions, so I turn it on and nothing happens. Good, I unplug it and put the jumper across VCC to 5 V and...
The magic smoke monster appears again.
Fine, I order another 2 boards. While I am at it, I order another RAMPS 1.6. New boards arrive and I swap out the 2560, this time I use another new 1.6 board and 2560. The only wires I connect are the power wires on the ramps board.
I turn the power on without the jumper. I measure voltage on VCC as 4.95 V. I confirm the 5 V pin has 0 V. I plug a jumper on VCC to 5 V again and...
Another magic smoke monster...
So I am thinking that it is a manufacturing issue. The only constant through the whole thing is that the 2560 boards have been from the same manufacturer. I know that this can be done as there are posts about it. I am seeking the forums opinion however. I do have 2 different 2560 boards coming.
I should also add that I dug out a spare 1.4 board, and that is working fine with the BLTouch and a new 2560 board installed albeit very slowly though.

Stop ordering obsolete tech and get a SKR 1.4. Are you sure your BLTouch wiring is correct? Might be a short on the 5V rail to ground.

@allen476 I had the same problem when I started with printers and limit switches, so the main problem is the voltage sensing, so if the sensing is set to 0V but you have 5V will appear that smoke, if the sensing is set to 5V but you have 0V the smoke will appear. All my sensors are set to 0V to avoid short cuircuits. Remember the board has + and - sensing as option while wiring. :) Good look, I will change also to 1.6 one of my printers, has a better look and heat sinks.

@towe I checked the servo pins and in fact it is shorted between +  and -. I wonder if I could just pick up 5v from the vcc pin only since I just want to power the bltouch.

I encountered a warning in the RepRap wiki regarding the same issue and checked my RAMPS 1.6 and found out I had the same issue.
In order to address the matter I de-soldered the J5 connectors and scratched the left side of +5 V pin as well as the bottom left corner of ps-on pin in order to disconnect the +5 V pin and rail from ground. I kept scratching lightly and checked whether the short was gone with a multi-meter in continuity mode until the beeping stopped.
I used the photo provided by RepRap showing where the short usually occurs along with the pads diagram file R6.PcbDoc from the GitHub repo which I opened using Altium's online viewer link as I didn't have it installed on my machine.

I hope anyone reading this finds it useful.


text:
Can OctoPrint web interface be turned off during a print?
Can I turn off the web interface (i.e. shutting down my computer) during a print? The Raspberry is online still.
Am I correct to say that G-code has already been uploaded via WiFi to my OctoPi, and so turning off my computer now (web interface) will not disrupt the print?

Assuming the OctoPrint server is running on your Raspberry Pi, which is the usual "OctoPi" setup, then yes, once you have uploaded the G-code to OctoPrint, you no longer need to leave the web interface open.
For example, one could upload code from their desktop running the slicing software to OctoPrint, walk to the printer to turn it on, then use a different device (a phone, for example) to connect OctoPrint to the printer and begin the print. At no point does the device accessing the web interface matter. The Raspberry Pi is in control of the printer, not the device that started the print.

thx 0scar you are the best


text:
What are some good safety tips for a 3D printing beginner?
I have just bought my own 3D printer. However, I am now reading that there may be some safety risks to 3D printing. I will be taking some precautions, such as buying an enclosed 3D printer (the FlashForge Adventurer 3), using PLA instead of ABS, and putting my 3D printer in my garage. However, I am still concerned about the possible risks. What are some other good safety tips and best practices when 3D printing? Am I doing enough, or should I do more? What have other users of 3D printers done to mitigate potential safety issues? Please let me know.

You'll want to narrow down your question, as broad spectrum requests are not supported in SE.

They are usuallly at the beginning of the user manual.

Starts on page 3: https://www.e3printable.no/upload_dir/shop/Flashforge/Adventurer-3/Adventurer3-User-Guide.pdf

Are you talking about personal safety, like burns from touching the hot end or getting your fingers pinched, or hoping to prevent/mitigate your printer bursting into flames?

@Caleb I am wondering about the potential for toxic fumes or ultra-fine particles being released.

@fred_dot_u I am wondering whether my planned 3D printer setup will be safe. My current plan is to take my 3D printer outside to print, so that it would be printing in an open-air environment.

I have another, related question: from what I've heard, it is best to put a 3D printer in a well-ventilated environment. I am planning to use my 3D printer outside. Can anyone confirm that this is a well-ventilated area? I would assume it is, since it would be out in an open-air environment.

outside is very much an open-air environment, mitigating all the usual ventilation and inhalation related concerns. It does add another concern, in that moving the device will require a bed leveling prior to use.

Technically, you should never leave your printer running unattended. Printer fires are rare, but it can happen, especially with cheap printers with poor quality control. Personally, I would just make sure that there is a fire alarm near by, so you'd be alerted if there was a fire.
Also, the fumes concern is valid in the sense that you don't want to sleep in the same room as your 3D printer. The following article points out that if you are spending time in the same room without proper ventilation you'd benefit from potentially using an enclosure with a HEPA filter. Also, the article points out that using PLA may be a safer choice than other materials such as ABS or Polycarbonate when it comes to harmful particles: https://3dinsider.com/3d-printer-fumes/

Welcome to 3D Printing SE and thank you for your contribution. It would be appreciated if you could summarize the article in case the link ever goes dead. This way others that have a similar question can at least get the gist of the article.

Check where the moving cables (especially for the heaters) are bending. The bending radiuses should be as wide as possible and connections or soldering points should never see any direct force from movement. Add a strain reliev if there are any such connenctions to prevent them from failing over time and possibly melting down.

There are several ways to be injured with a 3D printer.  The biggest threats come from the printer running under normal conditions.  The uncommon, exceptional, and difficult to quantify threats come from fire and fumes.
For fire, consider the 3D printer to be like any other 400W heating appliance in your house, with the advantage compared to, say, a television in that you can inspect most of the failure points.
Check the feed points where the power connects to the power supply, main board, and the power lines to the bed heater and hot-end heater cartridge.  After a few hours of printing, these should still not be hot.
There is always the possibility of a thermistor failure and thermal run-away.  Most good control firmware should detect this possibility and fail with an error.  If you are using custom firmware, you might want to check that this is included.
For fumes, the evidence is real that fumes are produced.  It is less clear the nature and dosage of their effects.  If the fumes bother you, don't breath them.  If you are concerned, consider an enclosure with an activated carbon filter.
For the more immediate threats, you need to always take care when working with the printer.  The hot end can burn you quickly.  The heated bed can burn you more slowly.  Gears, belts, and moving parts cause pinching hazards, and blood blisters can be raised easily.
Glass beds may have sharp edges, and can break to create thousands of sharp edges.
In conclusion, remember that stamped sheet metal parts, present on some printers, can bear burrs and sharp edges, inviting you to leave bloody finger prints.
A 3D printer, like many things, is dangerous in many ways.  I've experienced the common threats, and have avoided the less common ones.
Be careful, but in my view a personal 3D printer is by far safer than any metalworking machine.  I have been more injured by a drill press, and welding fumes are more noxious then filament out-gassing.

Install an overhead vent, like those you would have above your stove, to direct fumes and micro-filaments away from the area. You could alternatively use a box fan with a thin air filter attached to it, but the idea is to draw those fumes away from the room.

Assuming you are using PLA filament, it is plant-based and very safe. The reason some 3D printers have enclosures is becasue it helps keep some materials warm, its not for safety and especially not for fumes. You could run the thing in your bedroom 24/7 and I guarantee you would be plenty safe.

ABS is actually pretty toxic when heated. The encloure has a double function in that case.

I guess it would help a little then, I'm just saying PLA is very safe and most likely the only thing he/she will be printing, and it's not necessarily what the enclosures are designed for.

PLA may also contain additions we are not aware of. I believe especially cheap and undocumented. Where is colour came from? I can often smell the difference, though obviously I cannot say what is a chemical reason. I would not use the cheap one as food safe, for example.

@octopus No, it is definitely not food safe. Yes you're right it could have something slightly toxic in it, but if no one has figured out that it's unsafe in the many years we have been using it, it should be pretty safe.


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Can I make this extruder work by changing motor?
I have a Flex3Drive remote-direct-drive extruder I bought for my Ender 3 (with the original extruder motor), and I'm pretty happy with it except for abysmal retraction performance due to the 40:1 reduction, which requires the motor to turn about 480° to retract just 1 mm. This is minimally workable for PLA and rigid materials where I can get by with just 1 mm of retraction, but it takes just as long to retract 1 mm as the original bowden extruder did to retract 6 mm, defeating a lot of the appeal of a direct drive. For TPU I haven't been able to make it workable at all. By the time I retract 3 mm or so, which seems necessary to avoid stringing, the hotend has already melted and/or deposited a blob on the print. Failure to print TPU also defeats much of the point of a direct drive.
I'm running retraction at 8 mm/s, 500 mm/s² acceleration, which is already higher than the manufacturer of the extruder recommends, and about the fastest I've been able to get it to work. Based on this calculator and 8.9 mH motor inductance, that seems roughly expected. I have TMC 2209 steppers and tried playing with current but it doesn't seem to make much difference.
Otherwise, I love this extruder, and want to make it work. Is there a way I can salvage it by changing out the motor for something that can do higher RPMs and accelerate just as fast or faster?

In general I would use https://github.com/rcarlyle/StepperSim which takes into account more parameters.
You can play with voltage and current to see which combination gives you the best results for your motor.
Or you can change to a TMC driver with higher voltage (35-50 V) to keep torque at much higher speeds and push the current motor more.
Since the torque you require is likely not so high, you can increase the speed of your stepper motor with 3D printed herringbone gears, for example 4:1. They don't need to be super accurate, backlash is totally fine considering the ridiculous 40:1 reduction.

Yeah, adding a gear on the motor end of the flex shaft seems like it should be doable, just replacing the existing 3D printed linkage there, but I suppose I'll have to do at least some custom design. Do you know any good designs I might look at as an example or to customize?

Maybe this, but with the shafe configuration for the input and output reversed? https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:3641458 The main adaptation seems like it'd be making the output shaft of the motor fit what was intended to be the output of the gearbox. The new output can just be merged directly with the existing 3D printed part that goes to the flex shaft.

That's a good option indeed, it only extends the length of the motor, which is usually not an issue

While the following doesn't conclusively prove changing the motor would work, I think the answer is yes! And I achieved the desired result via a different method, so I consider the problem solved.
Instead of changing the motor, I designed a 1:4 step-up planetary gearbox to put on top of the extruder motor, yielding a 10:1 net reduction instead of the original 40:1. This works, even without much attention to part strength or backlash in the gearbox (thanks to the subsequent 40:1 reduction), yielding the desired sub-50ms retractions with PLA. This seems to establish that the rotational rate or acceleration of the flex shaft is not a limiting factor.
One thing I noticed after adding my gearbox is that, even after scaling up the extruder speed and acceleration to 4x the values I was using without the gearbox, the stepper motor did not make the sharp "chirp"/"squeal" sound on retractions that I got before. This seemed odd, because it should be the same speed/acceleration for the output shaft and slightly higher load than before. So I think there may be something other than just exceeding the stepper's capabilities going on with the original configuration.
The manufacturer's recommended (provided STL files) coupling of the motor to the flex shaft is this long rigid coupler and guide cap:

That looks like a suspiciously long lever on the motor output shaft. And while the cap retains the flex cable sheath fairly rigidly, it can't be perfectly aligned with the motor shaft, and there's room for the flex shaft to move slightly side to side inside the sheath. So, my guess is that spinning the flex shaft at high speeds with it directly coupled to the motor like this put some serious lateral forces on the motor output shaft, interfering with the motor's performance and likely leading to long-term damage if not corrected.
The gearbox I added avoids extending the motor shaft at all (the planetary gear carrier slides fully over the D-shaft) and the small amount of backlash in the gears themselves allows the flex shaft positioning to be imprecise with (apparently) no serious ill effects. And if it does cause unwanted wear, well these are printed parts that are easily replaceable.
As for the 40:1 reduction in the extruder itself, after working with all of this to get it printing well, I don't think it's necessarily a wrong design. The flex shaft can handle the speeds needed just fine, and the 40:1 reduction keeps torque from the extruder gear off of it while extruding. The Zesty Nimble (which some call a clone of this design) used 30:1 instead of 40:1, and has dropped to 20:1 in their latest iteration, probably for reasons related to my troubles with the 40:1. But I think the gearbox at the motor side is actually a rather nice solution that preserves all of the potentially good properties of the high reduction and none of the bad ones. It does make the setup more complicated to manufacture and install though.

I wonder how they picked that huge reduction.

@FarO: I wouldn't assume it's a bad choice for the reduction after the flex shaft. Being high reduction should prevent wear on the shaft and error due to twisting of the shaft. But failing to step up before it seems bad. I also have some other ideas I'll add in a bit.

@FarO: I added a lot more now.

That long lever on the carriage side is a weak point: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qvY_dChxj0E

@FarO: Thanks for the link. I'm not too worried about that because I can justprint a new cap if needed. The Orbiter does look very attractive (and addresses the slow retraction issue) though.

I was considering buying a Fl3xdrive but had this exact fear, that the speed (rotation) required for retractions was too much.
I stumbled upon this post while looking for a project for a step-up gearbox. I found a Nema 17 Gearbox "Pulleybox" Mod for Extruder on Thingiverse, should be enough to do what you did with your design, I guess.

Isn't this running in the opposite direction (reduction)?

No, it is a 1:3.5 step-up pulley.

I've looked at the pictures twice now and clearly the small pulley is on the motor and the large one on the output, making it a reduction.


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Cannot configure Marlin 2/0.X bugfix on Ender 5 pro, 4.2.7 board with BLTouch 3.1
I am new to 3D printing and recently purchased a Ender 5 Pro. I came and the 8 bit 1.15 board was broken (couldn't run extruder). I upgraded to a 32 bit Creality 4.2.7 and also purchased a BLtouch 3.1 bed leveling probe.
I downloaded the stock firmware from Creality for the Ender 5 Pro and it seemed to work fine. I was having problems leveling the bed (it is high in the center) so that is why I bought the BLTouch. The 4.2.7 has a dedicated plug for the BLTouch, but, I cannot find any firmware to make it work properly. I, after a lot of head scratching, was able to get Marlin 2.0 edited with MS Visual Studio adding code for the BLTouch. Now when I try to home, the bed moves down, the probe moves to the back right position (like regular Z-Stop homing), then goes to the center of bed, the BLTouch cycles 2 times, but, the bed never comes up! It just stays where it is/was. The LCD says, "STOPPED" and then "Home Z". I seem to be the only one with a BLTouch 3.1 attached to a 4.2.7 board on the Ender 5 Pro. Any help appreciated.

When you say you "added code" for the BLTouch, what do you mean? Normally, adding a BLTouch just involves uncommenting the relevant setting in Marlin, not adding anything.

Your correct, My Bad. I modified some of the Marlin statements in the Configuration.h file to produce a compiled .bin file that made my UNOFFICIAL combination of parts work correctly together. No actual code additions or subtractions just configuration tweaks.  I'm working on a list that will show all the changes I made to to this file to get my setup working. Thanks for the catch.

Did you ever get this figured out? Last night I flashed my Ender 5 Pro to use Marlin 2.0.x and I am having the same exact experience. I used the Marlin Firmware Service to get my bin file autocompiled for me and I beleive it is correct (I don't think my knowledge level is up to par yet to compile my own code). I ended up going back to the stock Ender 5 Pro firmware from Creality to get the machine working again....

@BillMiller - Use diff to easily produce a diff file of the config changes that you made. If possible, please post it here as an answer.


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Options for removing failed prints
So basically I've been having a problem with my Micro+.
It will not level / calibrate itself and I can't fix it. The reason I'm here is that I've been using Cura, and somehow it destroyed my bed. (See image)

I would like to know how to get it off, as I tried freezing, scraping and sandpaper

To clarify some things:

The material is PLA,
bed is made of plastic.

My build plate surface got destroyed after trying to use Cura, which sliced wrong and engraved the print into my bed.

Can you give us a little more on "somehow it destroyed my bed"?

I was using cura and my slicer settings were way off. It basically engraved the print into the bed.

What material was that? You might have a chance if it was ABS. If it PLA or PETG, you're probably SOL...

To be honest, you destroyed the surface yourself (please, this is not meant as an offending comment). Any slicer will instruct what you have set it to do, so, you either have set incorrect settings in the slicer, or you have not properly zeroed the Z-axis, or you have a mechanical issue with the Z-axis. This cannot solely be a slicer problem.

Once a time, it was the same with me, I sanded the surface well and continued for a while without any problems. The only problem was the sand pattern that was always visible in the bottom of models and finally I upgraded the bed to PEI sheet.

If you have tried every trick to remove the print, you probably need to replace the build surface. If the PLA is "engraved" into the build surface, your surface is damaged anyways, just replace the surface, or remove the top surface and buy a sheet of glass, preferably borosilicate.

Thanks 0scar but the issue has been resolved. Needed some intense scraping and sanding, but I managed to clean the bed and applied some masking tape to it so this wont happen in the future.

Print a filled square 2 layers thick over the whole surface of the bed and then peel off when it's still warm, so that it may take away also the previous deposits.

You can try putting it in the oven at 100 °C and then peeling it off. At that temperature it's soft as cheese.

My bed would also be as soft as cheese. I want to upgrade to a glass sheet, but M3D has these little clips for the premade bed that would block it. Only option is to break off those clips

Too bad man. :( I also had a plastic sheet as print bed before and occasionally have PLA stuck to it. (Bronzefil sticks like crazy!) I switched to a magnetic bed that you can bend. That has the best of 2 worlds: perfect stickability and easy removability. I love it and it's worth the price!


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Why does OpenSCAD fail to cut holes in polygon sides that are exactly the width of the wall?
I'm trying to make a frame for a lithograph that I plan to 3D print for my wife for Mother's Day.  I typically will have my differences be exactly the right size (rather than oversizing it for the sake of the preview) because it gives me a good feel for how accurate my math is (particularly when I'm accounting for the horizontal margin created by the compressed filament coming out of the nozzle).
In this case, however, it came back to bite me.  I debugged this issue for quite a while assuming I had miscalculated something or that I had confused my order of rotations somehow.
Eventually, I oversized my cutout and sure enough, the holes appeared correctly.  After poking at it, I realized I only need 0.000005 mm on either side of my cutout for it to render correctly!
I've created a minimal reproducible example of my issue here:
outerRadius = 100;
height = 40;

wallWidth = 2;

innerRadius = outerRadius - wallWidth / sin(60);
apothem = innerRadius * cos(180 / 6);

// change this to 0 and see what happens!!
holeSizeCorrection = 0.00001;

module holes() {
    for (face = [0:5]) {
        rotate([0, 0, face * 60 + 30])
            translate([apothem - holeSizeCorrection / 2, 0, height / 2])
                rotate([0, 90, 0])
                    cylinder(h = wallWidth + holeSizeCorrection, r = height / 4, $fn = 4);
    }
}

color("orange") difference() {
    $fn = 6;

    cylinder(h = height, r = outerRadius);

    translate([0, 0, -height/4]) // because if it's exactly right, you can't see inside
        cylinder(h = height * 2, r = innerRadius);

    color("blue") holes();
}

When the holes I'm trying to cut in the polygon are exactly the width of the wall, it renders the preview correctly but the rendered output is incorrect.  To verify that the shape was correct, I moved the holes out of the difference and it looks like this:

The preview (aside from the strange exact cut issue that usually happens) is correct as well.  But, when I render it, it looks like this:

But, if I have the hole shape stick out 0.000005 mm on either side, it renders just fine!

Now that I know to look for this kind of thing, it'll probably save me debugging time in the future. :)  But, it would be nice to know if I've done something wrong as well.

We are not a general 3D design place. What makes this relevant to 3D printing?

@Trish, I plan to 3D print this shape.  Also, I assumed there's an openscad tag for a reason (for better or worse).  I think OpenScad is a relatively popular CAD for folks interested in 3D printing.  When I searched for "stackexchange openscad", 3dprinting was the first 3 results.  This is all just to answer your question . . . not to argue that it belongs here . . . I think you have a valid meta question for a beta 3d printing stack exchange.  My personal belief is that this community will likely end up discussing modeling tools as much as slicing tools (if not more).

The tag is there for that reason, but the policy is also, that with questions about 3D design, you should tell how or why your question relates to 3D printing and is not just a modeling question. We had to do that because people started to ask questions without relation to 3D printing and treating us as a general 3D modeling SE. Please [edit] your question to include that it is to be a printed project.

@Trish, I added background information to the question so that it'll be more obvious how my issue (precision in my shapes) is associated to 3d printing (being confident that my calculations are correct with regard to nozzle size).

A related question: https://3dprinting.stackexchange.com/questions/9794

This is the well known https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Z-fighting   To solve this problem in OpenSCAD I use an eps=0.001 global variable and make my cutouts like translate([0,0,-eps])cylinder(r=Radius,h=Height+2*eps).   I also use eps to create an overlap/interference if I have a problem with multiple surfaces.

openSCAD simply allows having surface solutions that result in a wall of 0 thickness. The walls appear to clip in those areas and can at times be seen from both sides, like in your example:

A 0 thickness wall is also exportable into an STL as a set of triangles spun up by vertices that are in each other's plane but have inverted normal vectors for the two sides - which means that the construct exists for the computer - and I have used this in 3D designs for a hologram-effect, even if it does not result in a physically possible property set.
An example of that effect is this cube (made in blender), that has the back wall purple, all others are grey - and the internal wall is at the same X-value as the back wall. You see the grey wall clipping despite the normal of it pointing to +X while the normal of the purple wall is into -X.

By having your cookie-cutter extrude not just to but through the back wall, you force a solution that disallows the 0-surface solution and thus solves the problem of creating those artifact walls.
Note that the 0-surface wall persists in the slicer preview:

But rest assured: almost all slicers ignore walls that are too thin to be printed, and a 0 thickness wall especially is ignored:


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What does the velocity profile of the motors look like when they change direction?
The stepper motors usually have a constant acceleration profile (trapezoidal profile) of an even jerk limit profile (S-curve profile). In linear motion, it seems possible to conserve proportion between x and y speed as shown

My confusion starts when the direction of motion changed so the proportion of speed must change too.
That impossible to join two velocity profiles except we decrease the speed of both axis down to zero then start ramping up with a new profile which means the 3D printer will stop and move for every G-Code segment that apparently not true.
So my question is how does the firmware deal with these problems joining velocity profile?

Different firmware deals with this differently. Are you asking about a specific flavor of firmware or brand of printer?

@Davo just for general idea will be okay. My inspection start from marlin then grbr I still don’t quite understand how it deal with this.I just found some research that suggests to bend the corner with Bezier curve.

The answer depends on the kinematics model in use. In Marlin there are at least:
Classic jerk
The "jerk", in units of mm/s not the expected mm/s³, is actually a "maximum instantaneous change" in velocity. Without any jerk (set to 0), your analysis would be correct, and all changes in direction would require slowing down to 0 velocity. However, with jerk, it's only necessary to slow down enough to make the necessary instantaneous change in velocity components less than the jerk limit. For a very slight change in direction (e.g. going around a curve approximated by line segments) this amounts to no slowdown at all. However, in this naive model, arbitrarily many bounded instantaneous velocity changes can happen in an arbitrarily small amount of time, essentially requiring unbounded acceleration capability and leading to missed steps/layer shifts.
Junction deviation
At each junction between segments where direction changes, the acceleration profile is executed as if the motion were cutting the corner in an arc, deviating from the exact corner by a distance of the configured junction deviation parameter. The actual step path still follows the sharp corner.
Others
I'm not really familiar with S-curve acceleration, but as I understand it it's a more advanced model fitting smooth curves to the travel path so that velocity can vary continuously, with bounded acceleration, rather than having jump discontinuities.
Klipper firmware also has a model very close to junction deviation, which its documentation explains clearly.

I mainly focused on jerk limit or constant acceleration profile. I still don't get how to make acceleration constant or jerk constant around the corner. Could you please explain more on that.

They're not constant. The model has acceleration bounded by the configured limit except as points of discontinuity, where the acceleration is formally infinite and the second-and-higher-order part of the velocity is bounded by the (misnamed) "jerk" limit.

If accelleration is infinite so jerk is infinit too isn't it?


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Cura code for run-out sensor Ender 3 V2
New to the 3D printing world. I'm in need of some advice.  Is it possible to add code to Cura for the run-out sensor? I've had no luck narrowing the commands or anything that speaks to it. I was able to get the BLTouch working correctly.

I just recently started 3D printing, but I believe that the run-out sensor is tied to the firmware of the printer. Maybe someone more experienced can give some additional details.

I guess I need to go ahead and try to compile the firmware needed. Thanks for the reply.


text:
Which material should I use to print a mounting adapter for the y-carriage?
I have purchased a replacement bed for my 3D printer. I wish to have it mounted on a single linear rail.
Currently I am unable to drill properly into aluminum (due to problems with my drill).
Therefore, I'd like to print and use an adapter piece/plate to fasten the Y-carriage to the linear rail block. The bed has a thermal insulation foam so the area around the bottom of the Y-carriage plate/bed assembly doesn't seem to go over 60 °C.
My question is:

Which material should I use for this adapter piece, and why? (I have access to PLA, PETG and ABS.)
Should I use threaded inserts or fasten the Y-carriage with nuts?

Please see the image below to have an idea as to what I mean by an adapter.

What is a heated insert? Are you talking about something like this?

Yes I am @Rykara

Borrow a drill from someone else. Printing a mounting plate like that would be a terrible idea due to the limited stiffness of plastic, especially at above ambient temperatures.

Any thermoplastic is a bad choice to carry a heated bed. For an unheated bed, monolithic (cast, not printed) acrylic plate of sufficient thickness can be used.
To get the needed stiffness and temperature resistance, steel plate of about 2+mm is the best choice, followed by aluminium of a higher thickness. The latter can be sawed with woodworking equipment, if done slowly.


text:
New Ender 3 power supply turns on but the controller board does not
I just got an Ender 3 a day or two ago and was really excited being that it was my first 3D printer.
I got to work putting it together with little issue. I go to turn it on and the power supply starts up just fine (the fan on, the internal light on) but the mainboard fan isn't running and the screen isn't turning on. I wait a few minutes thinking that it needed to boot up but nothing. I tried reconnecting the red and black power cables and still nothing.
I'm not set up for tearing the thing apart and checking every socket with a voltmeter or something. I've checked the voltage switch and have it set for 115 V for North America. I remember now that when I was moving the bed and it lurched (because the wheels were too tight) the screen might have lit up.
I'm worried that the board might be fried. I don't feel like taking this thing apart and sending it back.

Please don't take this wrong, but these printers are cheap, mass produced printers, it is highly possible (see this recent question) that it is dead on arrival. If you want to tinker, which you better not do since you have warrantees in place, your only option it to look at all connections to the controller board and measure.

Good point, back to china it goes.

I prefer to check basic power connections with multimeter. But indeed if you are not in an emergency, it would be better to send it back. The wires may come loose, I mean on the main board.


text:
How to identify, use, and replace the Copperhead Bowden coupler?
After attempting to remove my Bowden tube for maintenance I have managed to break the coupler used to secure the Bowden tube in my Slice Engineering Copperhead heat sink. I'm having significant trouble identifying the proper name of and source for a replacement coupler. I've located others which seem to be similar in design but not the same size. I'm finding conflicting name and type information and am unsure which is correct. It's a small black plastic coupler with a blue ring clip used to secure it.
To prevent future issue I also would like to know the proper procedure for use... i.e. the methods for securing and removing the Bowden tube without damage.

Would you  add a Photo please

It's an embedded Bowden collet. Also called a Bowden clip which is a much more vague and overloeaded term.
E3D (UK) and MicroSwiss (US) have their own branded versions but they're likely not made in house, they're prbably reselling what they buy in.
Youtubers appear to pronounce this Bowden collect which does not help.


text:
3D Printed Lead Screw
I want to build a mini CNC machine and need some lead screws. I was wondering I can simply 3D print some. There are a few 3D models out there but I want to know if printing it in PLA+ has enough strength for a small CNC. Is it possible?

Expanding on some previous comments which are probably enough to warrant an answer:
What Trish said is completely right. Leadscrews are readily available parts and any dimensional errors in the leadscrews will be reflected in the output of your CNC machine unless you have some sort of compensation for them. Moreover, if the material is not highly rigid, the dimensions are subject to change over time, so any compensation would have to be ongoing manual adjustment or closed-loop rather than a one-time calibration. "PLA+" is an especially bad choice because it usually means PLA that's been modified with additives to make it less brittle, deforming under stress instead of holding its shape until it breaks catastrophically. CNC Kitchen's video on PLA+ elaborates on this.
With that said, if you don't need a high level of precision, or if you're in a situation where you're unable to obtain manufactured components, I think 3D printed leadscrews would work ok if you print them in the XY plane rather than along the Z axis. While nozzle width and discrete layers produce a sort of "stairstep" quantization of printed threads in the Z direction, that doesn't happen with the threads in the XY plane; the nozzle width limits feature resolution (oscillations per unit length) but the positioning of the threads is quantized only to the X and Y (micro)step size, which is typically on the order of 10 microns. Moreover, the strength and rigidity of the part printed in this direction can be very high, due to the offset-layered zigzag structure.
Back to accuracy of the part, though, it's important to note that whatever flaws your printer might have in XY positioning accuracy will be reflected in the resulting leadscrew. This includes non-linear effects such as belt paths being slightly trapezoidal instead of having perfectly colinear points of attachment to the carriage. In general, when manufacturing parts that will affect the accuracy of the resulting machine, you want to use processes that amplify the precision your tooling was manufactured with rather than processes that reproduce or amplify its flaws.

Is it possible? Yes. Is it advisable? No
Lead screws need to be smooth and have little to no stretch and there can be a lot of tension on them. However, 3D prints are quite rough by the way they are made and super weak on tension forces - and not have a good compression withstanding either.
a 3D printed leadscrew is therefore not adviseable, especially since ready-made leadscrews and fitting nuts are cheap in the shape of nuts and threaded rods for the crudest setup.

Moreover, the OP's suggestion of "PLA+" would be worse than normal PLA, since the additives make the PLA less rigid. This is a good thing if you're worried about brittleness, but a very bad thing if you want stability of dimensional accuracy.

With that said, if you don't need a high level of precision, I think 3D printed lead screws would work if you print them in the XY plane rather than along the Z axis. Once you get to 8-10 mm diameter, threaded rods printed in this orientation are surprisingly strong.

@R..GitHubSTOPHELPINGICE then you still have the issue of steps and roughness, unless you build a composite part from several prints.