X tower homing problem[Solved]

[2minutedrill]

Been away from my Rostock Max v2 printer for a couple of weeks and upgraded to mattercontrol 1.6.1 couple days ago. Unit was running fine for the past few months-which I purchased from Matterhackers and have not done any upgrades to it yet. My abs prints were not sticking to the heated bed(no problem before) so I calibrated. One thing I noticed was that the X tower on a home command will raise to the stop switch, do its initialize, and park a few millimeters from the end stops(like the other towers) however, sometimes, more often then not, it will lower itself about another 10mm lower than the others. if i home towers again right away(either from Mattercontrol or printer panel same results) sometimes it wont even raise to the endstop but lower the carriage even farther down the tower. It will continue down after each home for 2-3 times, then home to the correct position.

I have not done any real troubleshooting just yet (other then verfiying endstops with M119), hoping for a easy fix. Thanks in advance!

[rurwin]

It sounds like a sticky switch to me.

[2minutedrill]

thanks, i'll do exhaustive tests on them.

[2minutedrill]

unfortunately the switches all pass will zero fails, they all indicate "open" or "close" as they should doing 30 cycles each. During additional homing procedures, I noticed the Y tower exhibits the same problem as the X tower(but not nearly as often), but never saw the 2 do it together. Of course when i try a calibration, if a tower doesn't home correctly the head will crash into the print bed. Almost seems software related but its too sporadic and hardware loves to be glitchy like this. I'll take any additional input. Thx

[mhackney]

I know you haven't done anything else, but the symptoms you describe - switches function properly but odd homing behavior - can be a symptom of having the steppers or endstops connected to the wrong place on the RAMBo. When you press the X switch and do an M119 do you see an "X endstop triggered" message? If not, then you know. If so, then make sure that the stepper is connected correctly by jogging. Worth checking.

[2minutedrill]

Thanks mhackney! Ya, switches act correctly during M119 test and steppers are on correct towers. we built this in April or so and has hundred or more hours of good printing. The only thing new ( I just found out) is my son tried to us the Rostock on his own and didn't home the machine properly after its been off and a re-connect thru Mattercontrol. I think he had a head crash but he says that the printer would only print "in the air". Would mis-tighten belts cause an erratic behavior?

[mhackney]

It sounds like something mechanical then. Loose belts can cause odd behaviors. Check carriage wheels for looseness too. Do you have a gcode file from a few months ago that you can test print just to make sure nothing in your slicer changed?

[2minutedrill]

Just I'll just have to go through the printer. :>( but I'll check your suggestions first. Thanks for the help!!

[geneb]

Can't hurt to re-set the Z height either.

g.

[2minutedrill]

Thanks g. , but I tried that several times and because a tower won't home correctly then it starts a print(actually a tower Cal), it will sometimes crash the printhead right into the bed (I guess because its not zeroing out proper).

[2minutedrill]

I'm pretty sure I finally got it fixed. A retension of the tower belts seemed to have set things right. Been able to calibrate and print. Several tower homes and no errors.

So mhackney wins with the loose belts theory, but thanks to all who helped.

[Skateirie]

I'm pretty sure I finally got it fixed. A retention of the tower belts seemed to have set things right. Been able to calibrate and print. Several tower homes and no errors.

So mhackney wins with the loose belts theory, but thanks to all who helped.

2minutedrill. I am having the same problems you described. I can not get my machine to home properly. I thought it might be the end stops so I bought new ones. All of them pass the M119 test. I have been trying to find a good explanation of how to properly tension my belts but I can not find it. At first I was sure that they were to lose now I am not sure if I over tightened them or if they are still to lose.


When I try to set the z height, everything on the machine moves correctly. Then when I hit the home button it flies up to the top very quickly, normally it will hit two of the end stops and back off, there is always one that will not click correctly. Right now it is the Y tower. How did you fix this?