E3D V4 All metal hotend

[Flateric]

Just to give an update, I've pulled mine off the machine, I can't reliably print PLA with it, even ABS jams if I try significant retracts with it.
A lot to like about it, but it's too unreliable for the bulk of the material I print with.

Hey poly, I noticed some issues at first with it as well and it ended up being the stainless portion was not perfectly aligned with the alu portion and created a minor little lip inside for things to catch and stall one.

Here's what I did to fix.

I took the nozzle offand the heater block.

Then I tightened the stainless into the aluminium after removing and cleaning it's threads. The purpose here is to get it to sit exactly where you want it to be for it's happy little life. Then I took a long drill bit the exact same diameter as the feed tube for the stainless (and aluminium) and ran this up through the stainless a few times on a drill to ensure that the path junction between the stainless and the aluminium portion were burr free and perfect smooth and aligned and met perfectly. I do not think they do this at the factory and the ever so slight edge catches the filament at the junction right at the thermal break and causes issues.

I never experienced the resistance that you mentioned with PLA or ABS. Try this out. I speculate that they manufacture the stainless and the aluminium seperately and ever so slight variances in the centering cause this little shoulder inside. After smoothing this edge out when you have things seated for your specific hotend I am betting you'll be golden.

Hope this helps.

I only discovered this because when I was tapping the threads for the PTF connector I ran the bit through to clean any possible shavings out that might have plugged the tip. Then I discovered the ever so slight edge I speak about and got it before my first use of the hotend.

[Broose]

I was going to make up some spacers, what length did you end up with?
I'm still having issues with mine, though I've only tried with PLA, my current theory is that if the PLA softens over the interface between the nozzle and the thermal break, it increases back pressure significantly which is causing the SeeMeCNC extruder to eat my filament.
I've verified by pushing through filament by hand that with PLA there is a significant starting pressure, the interesting thing is one the filament is moving you can extrude at totally rediculous speeds.

This likely wouldn't affect ABS because it doesn't soften like PLA.

The fan on the cooling fins needs to be on all the time. It's what keeps that area cool enough so filament only starts to heat up and melt when it reaches the nozzle. Fan must be on all the time on these E3D all metal hot ends.

I agree. It probably works OK without the shroud and no fan, but with the shroud on and the fan turned off, the top gets pretty hot. Mine plugged up today with ABS when I forgot to turn on the fan through the software. Its probably more difficult to get unplugged because its metal, not PTFE its stuck to. I finally got it working again, then hooked the shroud fan directly to the 12V supply so that won't happen again

[Polygonhell]

I agree. It probably works OK without the shroud and no fan, but with the shroud on and the fan turned off, the top gets pretty hot. Mine plugged up today with ABS when I forgot to turn on the fan through the software. Its probably more difficult to get unplugged because its metal, not PTFE its stuck to. I finally got it working again, then hooked the shroud fan directly to the 12V supply so that won't happen again

I use the extruder fan control in repetier, basically the fan runs from the point you turn the extruder on until the extruder is turned off and below 50C, so I know the fan was running.
On many of the prints I also had a 200mm fan cooling the print, I have placed a thermocouple at the bottom of the heatsink while jammed, it's at 30C, it's not a cooling issue.
Many people seem to print fine with theirs, there are a few people on the reprap forums having similar issues to me, so it's probably manufacturing variance. I'll ping Sanjay this week, and I'll try running a drill though the assembled body.
As of roght now It's useless to me I can't print PLA and I even have jams with ABS.

There is a lot to like about the Hotend, specifically, it has a very short melt zone, and it stops dripping plastic very quickly, which bodes well for a Bowden set up.

[Broose]

I use the extruder fan control in repetier, basically the fan runs from the point you turn the extruder on until the extruder is turned off and below 50C, so I know the fan was running.

I was playing with a new extruder and using the print control panel. I forgot to turn on the fan there. When you turn on the hot end from the print control panel should the fan come on automatically as you described? It didn't for me.

[Polygonhell]

I use the extruder fan control in repetier, basically the fan runs from the point you turn the extruder on until the extruder is turned off and below 50C, so I know the fan was running.

I was playing with a new extruder and using the print control panel. I forgot to turn on the fan there. When you turn on the hot end from the print control panel should the fan come on automatically as you described? It didn't for me.

Only if you use the extruder fan output, it's set up for the extruder2 output in my repetier build.
The normal fan output is on the primary fan output.

[Eaglezsoar]

Flateric wrote "I only discovered this because when I was tapping the threads for the PTF connector I ran the bit through to clean any possible shavings out that might have plugged the tip. Then I discovered the ever so slight edge I speak about and got it before my first use of the hotend." What size tap did you use to create the threads for the PTF connector? I would be terrified to hand tap a brand new hotend.

[Broose]

Only if you use the extruder fan output, it's set up for the extruder2 output in my repetier build.
The normal fan output is on the primary fan output.

Ah- I had it running on the primary fan- thanks.

[Flateric]

Flateric wrote "I only discovered this because when I was tapping the threads for the PTF connector I ran the bit through to clean any possible shavings out that might have plugged the tip. Then I discovered the ever so slight edge I speak about and got it before my first use of the hotend." What size tap did you use to create the threads for the PTF connector? I would be terrified to hand tap a brand new hotend.

I will check on the tap specs for ya.

I put the hotend in my lathe during the tapping process and hand feed the tap into it with my tailstock to ensure it will be straight.

Although I would have done it by hand if need be, I have many many years of work under my belt, especially working aluminium.

[Broose]

I will check on the tap specs for ya.

I put the hotend in my lathe during the tapping process and hand feed the tap into it with my tailstock to ensure it will be straight.

Although I would have done it by hand if need be, I have many many years of work under my belt, especially working aluminium.

Did you turn a flat first? I noticed with mine that there is a large fillet going into the hole at the top. I suppose the o-ring on the PTC connector would help it seat if you left the taper going into the hole.

[Flateric]

I did not leave a taper. Since the PTF connection is essentially taped inside of it. I was much more concerned with the gap between the bottom of the PTF connectors threads and the bottom of the hole in the cold side of the hotend. I wanted to be sure that when fully threaded into the coldside it did not leave any gap or expansion possibilities between the two and offered a stright smooth transistion from PTF connector to e3d coldside housing.

This is why I ran the bit through after completion, luckily I ran it through both ends and caught the edge on the hotside to thermal break that would have otherwise caused similar issues like polygonhell is having.

I have had zero problems with this hotend, ABS, PLA, flexible rubber. All work good with no issues of jamming (other than one time when I thought I had ABS loaded but had pla. It was however not so bad to clean out.

Hope that you guys get it figured out and that this helps you atleast somewhat. This is the perfect hotend IMO. Flawless for me now anyways.

[SanjayM]

Hi All,

Sanjay from E3D here.

It's really awesome to see our part riding on a delta-bot, and as far as I can see the first delta bots running E3D hotends were you guys.

Glad you are all having a good time with the hotend (mostly - in a good conversation with PolygonHell, he is getting a replacement part). I will keep this thread in my "to check" folder - so if you have any questions, suggestions or whatever I will find them. If there is anything you want to see from us at E3D then let me know.

Just so you know, we are about to put out a fully integrated bowden system for the hotend, with the top of the hotend tapped for a push-fit coupler, complete with PTFE tubing and two couplers to get you up and running. The next steps are for water cooled and multi-nozzle hotends. I have solid designs already in the early prototyping stage for these concepts and hope to get stuff on sale at the end of summer. A lot of effort is being put into optimising for bowden systems with regards to weight and compactness while still maintaining ultra-high performance.

Cheers
Sanjay

[elqisqeyano]

Hi All,

Sanjay from E3D here.

It's really awesome to see our part riding on a delta-bot, and as far as I can see the first delta bots running E3D hotends were you guys.

Glad you are all having a good time with the hotend (mostly - in a good conversation with PolygonHell, he is getting a replacement part). I will keep this thread in my "to check" folder - so if you have any questions, suggestions or whatever I will find them. If there is anything you want to see from us at E3D then let me know.

Just so you know, we are about to put out a fully integrated bowden system for the hotend, with the top of the hotend tapped for a push-fit coupler, complete with PTFE tubing and two couplers to get you up and running. The next steps are for water cooled and multi-nozzle hotends. I have solid designs already in the early prototyping stage for these concepts and hope to get stuff on sale at the end of summer. A lot of effort is being put into optimising for bowden systems with regards to weight and compactness while still maintaining ultra-high performance.

Cheers
Sanjay

Hey Sanjay from E3D. Great product. Here is my Rostock Max set up with your E3D hot end and Xnaron's magnetic arm set up, zero lash operation. E3D hot end head taped with ceramic tape and kapton tape to keep some heat off my prints as I print mostly with ABS plus and High impact. So far this hot end is by far thee best I've had to work with.

Thanks

[elqisqeyano]

Hi All,

Sanjay from E3D here.

It's really awesome to see our part riding on a delta-bot, and as far as I can see the first delta bots running E3D hotends were you guys.

Glad you are all having a good time with the hotend (mostly - in a good conversation with PolygonHell, he is getting a replacement part). I will keep this thread in my "to check" folder - so if you have any questions, suggestions or whatever I will find them. If there is anything you want to see from us at E3D then let me know.

Just so you know, we are about to put out a fully integrated bowden system for the hotend, with the top of the hotend tapped for a push-fit coupler, complete with PTFE tubing and two couplers to get you up and running. The next steps are for water cooled and multi-nozzle hotends. I have solid designs already in the early prototyping stage for these concepts and hope to get stuff on sale at the end of summer. A lot of effort is being put into optimising for bowden systems with regards to weight and compactness while still maintaining ultra-high performance.

Cheers
Sanjay

Reserve me one of the water cooled and multi nozzle hot ends. Both ready for bowden set up. I look forward to this.

[cpunches]

Hey Sanjay,
I ordered the bowden adapter and the hotend and look forward to adding them to my Rostock thanks.


I now return you to your regularly scheduled thread..

Hi All,

Sanjay from E3D here.

It's really awesome to see our part riding on a delta-bot, and as far as I can see the first delta bots running E3D hotends were you guys.

Glad you are all having a good time with the hotend (mostly - in a good conversation with PolygonHell, he is getting a replacement part). I will keep this thread in my "to check" folder - so if you have any questions, suggestions or whatever I will find them. If there is anything you want to see from us at E3D then let me know.

Just so you know, we are about to put out a fully integrated bowden system for the hotend, with the top of the hotend tapped for a push-fit coupler, complete with PTFE tubing and two couplers to get you up and running. The next steps are for water cooled and multi-nozzle hotends. I have solid designs already in the early prototyping stage for these concepts and hope to get stuff on sale at the end of summer. A lot of effort is being put into optimising for bowden systems with regards to weight and compactness while still maintaining ultra-high performance.

Cheers
Sanjay

[Broose]

Are there any tricks to printing PLA with the E3d hot end? I've been printing ABS flawlessly with it for the last month, and decided to try PLA for the first time today and plugged the stainless heat break tube 3 times. I've been playing with temps between 190 and 217 and I am having trouble not plugging it. I got one good part out and love the way that it looks. Is anybody besides Flateric (with his mirror-polished internals and no active fan cooling) running PLA without incident?

[SanjayM]

elqisqeyano
Glad you like it, love your setup with the hotend on standoffs to maximise usable Z-Height. Clever!

Getting a lot of interest in water cooled and multi-nozzle. Going to expedite development on the water cooled jobs - they have real benefits for bowden users and more and more users are going bowden with the advent of delta bots.
Multi-nozzle is something that is a logical extension of water cooling - i don't think a tightly integrated 3-4 nozzle hotend is really feasible in a direct system, you may as well use 3-4 separate hotends. Using water cooling lets us get a bunch of high-performance nozzles in a tightly packed space for a low weight.

Brooose
Sorry to hear you aren't getting on with PLA perfectly. The hotend has been designed from the ground up with PLA in mind - if it's not working then something isn't right. Are you running your fan on full and constantly from 12v? Is the fan pointed at the heatsink properly? (Airflow to the bottom fin of the heatsink is important)

[Broose]

Brooose
Sorry to hear you aren't getting on with PLA perfectly. The hotend has been designed from the ground up with PLA in mind - if it's not working then something isn't right. Are you running your fan on full and constantly from 12v? Is the fan pointed at the heatsink properly? (Airflow to the bottom fin of the heatsink is important)

I do have the fan on 12V at all times. Should the fan shroud sit at all below the lowest fin or adjacent to it? I currently have it centered between the top and bottom fins.

[dbarrans]

Sanjay, have you tried putting rounded edges on the cooling fins, more like the leading edge of the wing on an airplane? It seems like that would allow more airflow with less turbulence getting in the way, and allow more cooling with less noise.

Also, I noticed the STL file for the fan shroud blocks airflow over part of the fins because the inner air passage is cylindrical. I wonder if opening it up into a box shape would allow more airflow over the critical bottom fins.

- dan

[Eaglezsoar]

Hi All,

Sanjay from E3D here.

It's really awesome to see our part riding on a delta-bot, and as far as I can see the first delta bots running E3D hotends were you guys.

Glad you are all having a good time with the hotend (mostly - in a good conversation with PolygonHell, he is getting a replacement part). I will keep this thread in my "to check" folder - so if you have any questions, suggestions or whatever I will find them. If there is anything you want to see from us at E3D then let me know.

Just so you know, we are about to put out a fully integrated bowden system for the hotend, with the top of the hotend tapped for a push-fit coupler, complete with PTFE tubing and two couplers to get you up and running. The next steps are for water cooled and multi-nozzle hotends. I have solid designs already in the early prototyping stage for these concepts and hope to get stuff on sale at the end of summer. A lot of effort is being put into optimising for bowden systems with regards to weight and compactness while still maintaining ultra-high performance.

Cheers
Sanjay

Hi Sanjay,
Any plans to put an order tracking system on your website so people that order can see the expected date of shipment?
I ordered mine on May 10 and am still waiting for a message saying it has been shipped, and there is no way to know.

Carl Little AKA Eaglezsoar

[Broose]

elqisqeyano

Brooose
Sorry to hear you aren't getting on with PLA perfectly. The hotend has been designed from the ground up with PLA in mind - if it's not working then something isn't right. Are you running your fan on full and constantly from 12v? Is the fan pointed at the heatsink properly? (Airflow to the bottom fin of the heatsink is important)

I am now successfully printing PLA with the E3d hotend. The head was not plugging, but the extrusion force was much higher with PLA vs. ABS, which had been working fine with the EZstruder (direct drive bowden extruder). The PLA extrusion force was too much and caused the EZStruder to stall frequently. I reinstalled my 5.1:1 geared head direct drive extruder and it is having no issues with stalling. I had previously tried the EZStruder with a J-head and PLA without issues.

Is anyone else successfully printing PLA with the EZStruder and E3d?

[Eaglezsoar]

elqisqeyano

Brooose
Sorry to hear you aren't getting on with PLA perfectly. The hotend has been designed from the ground up with PLA in mind - if it's not working then something isn't right. Are you running your fan on full and constantly from 12v? Is the fan pointed at the heatsink properly? (Airflow to the bottom fin of the heatsink is important)

I am now successfully printing PLA with the E3d hotend. The head was not plugging, but the extrusion force was much higher with PLA vs. ABS, which had been working fine with the EZstruder (direct drive bowden extruder). The PLA extrusion force was too much and caused the EZStruder to stall frequently. I reinstalled my 5.1:1 geared head direct drive extruder and it is having no issues with stalling. I had previously tried the EZStruder with a J-head and PLA without issues.

Is anyone else successfully printing PLA with the EZStruder and E3d?

Is it possible the motor you have on the EZStruder has insufficient torque? I like to use a 5.5 Kg-Cm motor on an extruder. Did you try to adjust the digipot to increase current?
I have a 5.1:1 motor, do you know of a Thingiverse item that I could use to turn it into a Bowden extruder? It has the Makergear type sleeve gear on it. (like they use on their plastruders)

[Broose]

Is it possible the motor you have on the EZStruder has insufficient torque? I like to use a 5.5 Kg-Cm motor on an extruder. Did you try to adjust the digipot to increase current?
I have a 5.1:1 motor, do you know of a Thingiverse item that I could use to turn it into a Bowden extruder? It has the Makergear type sleeve gear on it. (like they use on their plastruders)

I am using the Wantai 42BYGHW811 that was on Steve's extruder. Looks like its holding torque is rated at 4.8 Kg-Cm. I cranked the digipot up to 240 and still had problems. I think the driver actually hit thermal cutoff because I was hearing some weird noises after a while. I do have a Kysan motor which is rated 5.5kg-Cm that I haven't tried yet.

I made up a bowden extruder with this: http://www.thingiverse.com/thing:38281. I had an aluminum block (although a printed block would work well also) from a QUBD extruder and substituted the Push to fit coupler for the barrel and hot end. Its actually quite similar to the Berrybot extruder. I picked up an MK8 drive gear on ebay and had to bore it out to 8mm to fit on the particular gearmotor I am using. I also had to make a backplate that mounted on the end of the gearmotor to give it the same hole pattern as the stepper.

[SanjayM]

dbarrans
It's possible, but it's also going to be massively expensive to do many curved tool passes. It would double the price of that part, for not much gain in flow. The latest versions use much thinner fins and more of them, increasing airflow, cooling and reducing weight while keeping the price the same.

Eaglezsoar
Yes. As soon as we can. Which will be in about 4 weeks time once we have shipped the next massive pile of preorders! Things are crazy here.

Broose
Glad to hear you are back up and running! Good job troubleshooting/problem solving there.

elqisqeyano
Water cooling multi-nozzle design is near finalised, and has turned out much simpler and more compact than expected using some "duh" engineering that came to me in a flash of light. Accelerating development on this product. Want beta units in the wild by the end of the month. Testers will be wanted.

Sanjay

[Eaglezsoar]

I have just recieved my second E3D and the heater cartridge (6mm diameter) won't fit into the E3D. I measured
the cartridge and it does measure 6mm. I guess my only recourse is to enlarge the hole in the E3D but I question
the quality control. They are trying to make up for a huge backlog of orders and I think some are slipping through
that are out of tolerance. Apparently no one bothered to see if the cartridge would fit in the hole.

[geneb]

It may be that the the heater cart was made out of spec as well.

I'd just take some fine grit sandpaper to the heater cart body to make it fit instead of over-boring the hot end.

g.