1 error and another problem
So to give a brief background, I got and assembled my kit back in July and I’ve been using my MK3S to print a lot of lithophanes these days, so it’s making a lot of large circular motions and printing and for long periods at a time (usually about a day and 16 hours for a print).
Recently (within the last few weeks) I’ve been plagued with the following problems:
Err: MINITEMP BED: this one is super frustrating since a print can’t recover from it, so you can imagine the frustration of losing a day+ long print I’m sure. And I really have no clue what’s causing it; I’ve checked and reattached the heatbed wires to the board as the manual recommended, they don’t look damaged or crimped or anything, it shouldn’t be getting hit by any weird drafts of air, and it’s not hitting anything behind it. I’m not sure what could be causing it to glitch out at this point aside from it just being bad? But as this is still a pretty new machine, I’m not sure how that can be unless it was a defective part originally?
My second problem is that recently (within the last few prints) its been making a sorta weird light buzzing, almost like a scratching or grinding even (well not like a harsh noise, but for lack of better term) noise when it prints and makes these circular motions. It seems absent on simple x and y movements though, like when I ran the first layer calibration it was fine. So I’m not sure what’s causing this now or if it’s related to that minitemp bed problem somehow, I’ve greased the bearings and rods so it shouldn’t be catching or anything on there. Belts are tensioned as much as I feel comfortable doing, even though that belt status thing says they’re almost too loose (X is 270, Y is 274), but they both feel pretty well tensioned to me and don’t skip or wave or anything while moving.
Any advice/suggestions appreciated! Thanks.
RE: 1 error and another problem
As Y bearings wear, they start making more noise. Try rotating the bed: move the bed mid stroke, press side to side at the front for play. If it moves, look for bed rotation, bearings are getting loose. This lets the entire platter rattle more, thus is noisier. Diagonal moves seem to provoke more noise, too. That said, there are many things that can buzz: from the LCD to plastic frame, sheet to the alignment screws, Einsy case, power supply, etc.
Belt tension status display means nothing for actual tension. It is reporting currents needed to move the axes. 270 is normal for Prusa bearings/rods.
For MINTEMP, there are also stories of the Einsy drivers over heating with certain firmware versions. Room temp is another variable, we are leaving summer so temps are dropping. Printer wants 20c - and will not work reliably below 15c (several threads on this).
RE: 1 error and another problem
Hmm I live somewhere warm and the temperature in my house never leaves 26.6c until next month, and even then never falls below 21c so I don’t think the surrounding temperature has anything to do with it. But you make another good point, I haven’t updated the firmware since I got the unit (it’s on 3.7.1-2266 that came with it), so maybe it’s time to update that and hope it helps.
I tried moving the y bed side to side but wasn’t feeling any play. I know I greased the bearings not too long ago, but I don’t think I put on too much since I had 2 prints totaling some 48 hours almost inbetween that time and those came out fine. This new noise is only a bit of a concern since it seems to be a new one, I know the printer makes noises but in general it seems to have gotten louder as time went on, especially with the movements. Maybe I need new bearings? When I was greasing them before they all seemed to have their balls still and were still moving fine as far as I can tell, but I’m no expert at machinery either. I have been thinking of those vesconite ones since ideally, I’d really prefer to have to go through that nightmare of disassembling to replace bearings as little as possible lol.
RE: 1 error and another problem
Well knocking on wood here, I updated the driver and slicer and things seem to be working fine now, printing quietly 😑
So lesson learned here is update drivers ASAP? That or don’t use different versions of prusaslicer with an old firmware on the machine? Either that or it was some utterly random glitch that got resolved with a night’s rest in the off position.
Thanks again for suggesting to update the firmware, never knew it could potentially make that big of a difference.