Good printer, suboptimal support  

Re: Good printer, suboptimal support

I will ignore the rant and instead ask:

What did happen when you switched your extruder fan for the hotend fan?

Re: Good printer, suboptimal support

nothing.

Re: Good printer, suboptimal support

Patrick, I appreciate your help, don't get me wrong. But someone from Prusa should take care about it, not an external person. (unless you are working for Prusa)

Yesterday I wrote an official registered mail in which I requested the correction of the defects within the 6-months warranty and gave them 30 days to comply.
In the meanwhile I'm repairing my other printer.

Re: Good printer, suboptimal support

This wasnt a rant Patrick. Very valid concern. The diversion to the [email protected] thing has got to change- I'm sure they get a million question/presales emails and to have a support issue get thrown in a bin like that isnt right. I was told the same thing and hoped a scenario like this guy is having wouldnt happen.

Paid customers should have a tech support email and get some kind of priority.

Re: Good printer, suboptimal support

Yeah, but the thing is that when you buy the kit, you only get support via the forum.

When you purchase the pre-built printer, you are entitled to email support as well as the forum. I suppose the Live Chat should tell kit purchasers to post here rather than to send in an email which then gets put in the queue to be dealt with "whenever".

Of course this does lead to issues when parts break - as they always will - but consumables are not covered under warranty. Now that leads on to just what are consumables...

For me, almost all parts of this printer are "consumable" and I have a stock of spares which include bearings fans nozzles, PTFE, extruder, PEI, stepper motors etc. It really is the only sensible option - things will only fail when you want to print something. And I have found that having spare parts instantly available means I very rarely have to use them (except for the fans, which I tend to replace every couple of months).

Peter

EDIT: We still don't know whether Daniel's issue is a fan, connector or RAMBo issue. In order to get him up and running quickly, he could respond to Patrik's question and maybe even post some pictures if necessary. Unfortunately "nothing" is simply not an answer.

Re: Good printer, suboptimal support

Oh I agree on all fronts but that dang e-mail. It forewarns a long wait "info@..." 🙂 I bought a factory built and still got filed under "info@" Hehe Thankfully I worked through it but at some point they will owe me some gummis dammit.

Re: Good printer, suboptimal support

There is nothing more frustrating than having to email to "info@" when you know the person you want to send the email to.

There have been many occasions I have wanted to get through to Josef, Jakub, Michal, Ondrej, Monika, Greyson etc and the response has eventually come from someone else and that person may not be fully aware of the whole picture.

But Josef does seem to believe that his systems work, so I have to trust him on that.

Peter

Re: Good printer, suboptimal support

Don't say I'm not patient, others would have been kicking doors swearing and flaming by now...

There you go, both videos.

and because we all like watching videos, you'll get an extra today showing the extruder fan not working. This issue is new, just noticed. I'm guessing swapping the fans has to do something with it.

I don't want no support, I only claim my right to the legal warranty. Making 2 videos, waiting more than a week is just not accepptable.
Another example: I claimed warrany on a product bought from banggod and they replied me within 24 hours with an acceptable answer, not wanting another videos or whatnot.

Unfortunately my last step with the registered mail meant I have to wait another 30 days, after that it's going to be a long process. I'll keep you all posted.

Re: Good printer, suboptimal support

Daniel

Thank you.

You have to select the fan speed and then press the knob to set that speed.

Can you please connect both fans to the correct RAMBo pins and retry.

If the part fan still does not operate, then connect the extruder fan to the part fan output. Please then let us know if the extruder fan works.

That will tell us if there is an issue with the part fan.

Peter

Re: Good printer, suboptimal support

Peter,

sure, it's my lunch break anyways:

Re: Good printer, suboptimal support

Daniel

Thanks. OK, your part fan is not working; but we still need to confirm that it is a fan fault.

You connected the part fan to the extruder fan connector on the RAMBo, but without the extruder being at 50+ degrees, it was not powered. What I would like to know is if you connect the extruder fan to the part fan connector on the RAMBo, and turn on the part fan from the LCD, does the extruder fan run?

Peter

Re: Good printer, suboptimal support

Peter

ignoring the previous multimeter video and my posts where you can see and read that the board is not giving out 12V at all , I did however upload a brand new video:

Oh, and forgot to film where I turn on the fan to 255 so both fans should spinning. Either you believe me or I'll just upload another video... tomorrow as it is. I don't have more time for this today.

(Wow, this is the 5th video. I'm going to tag, name and monetize them, I just might get the money for a new Rambo board.)

Re: Good printer, suboptimal support

OK, excellent, thank you

So neither fan is working when they should be. The fuse must be good as extruder heater and fans are protected by the same fuse.

Therefore the only conclusion is that the RAMBo is faulty; however, I think I see a fan LED lit (the extruder fan is LED3 and the part fan is LED8). The LEDs are both driven in parallel with the fans.

What are the chances of both fans failing at the same time? Rather remote, but it can happen. Do you have and spare fans you could connect to test with?

Peter

Re: Good printer, suboptimal support

Also try to meassure directly on the board.

I takes broken cables out of the guess work

Re: Good printer, suboptimal support

This wasnt a rant Patrick. Very valid concern. The diversion to the [email protected] thing has got to change- I'm sure they get a million question/presales emails and to have a support issue get thrown in a bin like that isnt right. I was told the same thing and hoped a scenario like this guy is having wouldnt happen.

Paid customers should have a tech support email and get some kind of priority.

I just cant understand where the communication has failed, I've got rapid and good support even at 01.00 in the night through the chat, responses through email etc. I hope Daniel has been unlucky, sounds like a fried rambo board to me. Although I'm not a warranty expert so I'm not sure what happens when its a self assembled kit, there is always a risk that the user himself slips and drives the screwdriver into the board damaging it for example. Although I've gotten a lot of goodwill from PR so I would be very surprised if they didn't help you with a new / replacement board.

The lack of answers is bothering of course, although I know that they are overloaded atm due to the Multi Color release, overwhelming numbers of orders for printers and at the same time issues with power outage as well as the Paypal story which ofc takes time from customer service.

Hang in there Daniel!

Re: Good printer, suboptimal support

Also try to meassure directly on the board.

I takes broken cables out of the guess work

Personally I managed to rip out the cable from one of the connectors, had to re-terminate it. They can be pretty fragile and you tend to want to pull the cables and not the terminals when you unplug. I would for sure suspect a bad cable or connector if its not the fan itself. But I guess that Daniel has measured on the actual pins on the board already.

Re: Good printer, suboptimal support

there is always a risk that the user himself slips and drives the screwdriver into the board damaging it

Ain't that the truth!

I was removing a well stuck down part from a Mk1 and used possibly a little much too force. The rear left bulldog clip (holding the glass sheet to the bed) decided to remove itself; It made a very poor attempt to fly, and landed slap bang inside the box holding the RAMBo (the box on the Mk1 had an open top). After it had shorted (and blown) a few of the processor pins, I managed to power off; it was way too late, the damage was done and a new RAMBo was ordered.

Thing is though, at least one of Daniel's fan LEDs appears to be lit, which would to me indicate either a cable or fan problem.

Peter

Re: Good printer, suboptimal support

*Want to see another video when Daniel measures the pins on the board itself*

Re: Good printer, suboptimal support

Patrik

There is no point in that; I have reviewed all his videos.

In V1, no fan is turned on - this is where he uses the DMM which shows 0V, because the fan is turned off.
In V2, the part fan is turned on; its LED is on but the fan is not working
In V3, the extruder fan is turned on, its LED is on, but the fan is not working
In V4, ditto V2
In V5, ditto V3.

Both LEDs are switch on at some point in the videos, but neither fan is working. The LEDs are wired to the same +ve as the fans and the same MOSFET (?) 0V output. Therefore there must be a voltage across the pins on the board and therefore, either the fans and/or cables are faulty.

The next step is to try out a known working fan on an output that is indicated on by its LED.

Peter