Kapton tape is really kapton film with adhesive. This stuff is thin. Because it's thin it likes to twist, ball up, not go where you want it, and generally be a pain in any sensitive part of your anatomy you want to name.
I got the wires taped up. Moderate profanity was used. One large problem was that I was doing this without disassembling the extruder. Had I taken it apart it would have been much easier. But I went the lazy way.
I'm not sure that the part is good on one of the printers. It's still doing some temperature fluctuations but that's also happening when there's some really odd airflow patterns from the part fan.
OK. Let me explain that one.
There's two fans on the extruder - the hot end fan and the part fan. They both do what the names say - the cool different parts of the process. The hot end fan isn't nearly as powerful as the part fan and keeps things constant for the heater. The part fan is a tricky beast since it's trying to cool the molten plastic without cooling it too much. There's a shroud that fits the end of the fan and tries its best to direct the air where it should go.
When I had the shelf accident I think that the part fan on one printer took enough of a hit that the bearings went wonky. It certainly rattles when it's running.
The extruder fan is on the left. There's a hole in the extruder body to let the air in.
The part fan is on the right. The R3 upgrade put it at that angle. There's discussion whether the angle of the fan causes extra stress on the fan bearings or not.
The wires that I taped are those red ones. The tape is orange. The red wires are the nice, thick heater wires. The thermistor wires (the tiny ones) aren't seen here. But they're blue. And tiny.
I'm not replacing the fan yet for these reasons.
- It seems to be working;
- There's an upgrade planned in the near-ish future;
- Replacing it is a pain in the sensitive part of the anatomy (at the moment at least).
The reason replacing it is a pain is 85% the part itself and 15% me. After I do what I should have done when I last upgraded it then the split will be 95%/5%. Here's the problem. The fan is a generic notebook fan. Which is great, they're easy enough to find. But the wires are far too short for use in the printer. So that's on us.
Some people solder them. This is actually a replacement fan and I went the lazy way (go figure) of unsoldering the wires from the old fan and soldering them directly to the new fan. A little bit of futzy work but it's been fine. Going forward I was thinking I would solder them in the wire run instead.
The second printer is different. The previous owner put a connector on the wires. That way when you replace the fan you put a connector on the new fan and it's easy enough to replace it. Brilliant! I even got those same connectors. That way I would have both in the same configuration.
I didn't put the connector on when the printer was nicely in pieces. I was going to do it but went "Eh" and didn't. Now I'm paying the price for it. If I could replace it that easily I would do so. I have plenty of spares. It's more of a chore to do it now when the wires are bundled up.
Enough technical talk!
I did do some printing but that large print that failed kind of burned me out for a bit. That's another reason the printers are idle. I needed a break. I really enjoy printing but it was wearing on me to have them going all the time. I did do a test print on each one and that's how I know what's going on with the thermistors. But for now I'm letting them be idle.
On a better note I have the temporary camera stands printed and assembled. The next/last step is connecting them to the print servers and setting them up for monitoring and time lapse videos. Of course there's more steps than that but it's the general idea.
There's ALWAYS something to do when you have one of these things. Image it with two...
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