Ender 3 - Uneven Extrusion problem!!

Hi All!

First post in this community, hoping you can help me with an issue. I've been 3D printing for close to 10 years, but new(ish) to creality. I have a creality Ender 3, which has been printing great for about a year, but the last few months has got worse, and now the extrusion consistency is all over the place. I feel like its under extruding, like the stepper gear doesn't have the traction to extrude. I used to hear the "clicking" of the stepper motor failing and losing its grip, which is less now I've tweaked a few screws on the extruder mounts. But the prints are just appalling, see below example.

Any ideas to help with the hardware? I've tried to use "upgraded" metal extruder housings but these make the issue worse. I'm considering replacing the stepper? Upping the temp to around 230C helps slightly, but the below pic is an example of this. This is only PLA so shouldn't be this challenging.. At the start of the print, I was putting some extra pressure on the filament material into the extruder, and this is the cleanest part of the print, but then gets quickly worse. It seems extra force on the filament into the extruder hot end helps... HALP!

A few stats: Printing PLA at 35mm/s, 210C, 0.2mm layer height, 80C bed temp.

Thanks guys and gals!

Attachment 14361

Have you calibrated the extrusion multiplier? I had a lot of issues with a monoprice delta mini until I did this. It involves measuring the section of filament coming out of the extruder (not the hot end) and comparing it to what the printer says it sent out.