Extruder stepper "clicking"

Hey everyone,

I was trying to load a new filament into my right extruder of my FFCP and encountered a problem. I had very little filament left on the old spool so I tried to unload it but got a strange issue where I couldn't pull the filament out and it started clicking/jamming. So I snipped the filament, hoping to just push it through with the next filament. Well, I pushed most of it through but not all--the new filament never started extruding out the bottom, and the motor started clicking again before all the old filament could be pushed through. It seems like the filament is just getting jammed inside there somehow and the motor is trying to feed it through but just slipping instead, making that noise.

I'm sure others have encountered similar problems--any ideas on what to do?

take it apart and clean the wheel enjoy getting to know your bot .

yep.

basically to change filament you need to first extrude/load a small amount and then immediately unload/remove.

What you've done is try to unload without first feeding some through. The plastic in the nozzle is larger than the hole the filament feeds through so won't pull back through and the gear has ground the filament and clogged itself.

Been there - done that :-)

Remove the fan, being careful not to lose the little plastic spacers. The gear itself has a small grubscrew you undo to remove the gear from the shaft.
Use a craft knife to clean the palstic out. And put it back together. Doesn't take long.
ANd remember to feed a little through before unloading and you shouldn't have any more problems.

Thanks all--I opened it up, heated the extruder to 230C, and pulled the extraneous filament piece by piece out of the extruder with tweezers. Working fine now.

grats and welcome to the fun

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Originally Posted by faross

take it apart and clean the wheel enjoy getting to know your bot .

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Clicking is not the filament feed gear slipping on the filament so no need to clean the gear... A stepper when overloaded will click like that, it means that the system is clogged up and the filament is being firmly grasped by the feed mechanism. The stepper can also click if the filament is being fed into the system faster than it can be melted.

I've also experienced the clicking when trying to load filament at 210C with a less than ideal filament tip. Always start with a good tip and I now load at 220.

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Originally Posted by blairmi2

I've also experienced the clicking when trying to load filament at 210C with a less than ideal filament tip. Always start with a good tip and I now load at 220.

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It is good to load at the temp that you are going to extrude at. The nozzle back pressure when it is close to the plate puts even more strain on the stepper. So it may load fine in free air, but could have skipping when extruding.