Help! noob in over his head with new ("used") Tenlog TL-D3-pro setup :-(

[minneapolis-matt]

I'm not sure which is which in the photos, but if the limit switches/sensors are in the upper right of the second photo, it gives me a clean view of the connections. You have a couple useful tasks ahead.

Identify the working sensor wiring and swap it for the non-working connection. For this, you're really only looking for the steady LED at this point, as you don't want movement or want to keep things to a minimum. Swapping at the board will give you a better reference. If suddenly the good one goes bad, it's on the board, which is the more likely circumstance. That will be confirmed if the bad one goes good, obviously.

Examine the connectors as you remove them, perhaps tugging on the individual wires that enter each connector. If any single wire moves freely and/or comes out of the connector, that's a good/bad sign. Good that you found it and will fix it.

With everything connected in the usual manner, push on the socket for the bad sensor connection. If there's a cold solder joint on the board inside the socket, this may create the intermittent connection. It's an easy fix if you have a cold solder joint, but the labor in disconnecting everything isn't all that much fun.

You suggest that wires can have internal breaks, but it's been years since I've come across such a failure. Your printer would have to have been misused and many years older for that to be high on the list. I won't reject it outright, but it's less likely than a cold solder joint or a loose prong inside the connector.

Do you have a digital multimeter and/or a soldering iron? Either are pretty inexpensive if you buy cheap, but if you plan to be a 3D printer mechanic (plan for it), you'll want a decent DMM and a soldering iron with a couple different size tips in the 25-40 Watt range.

Thanks Fred!

I have both but hopefully in this case I won't need them.

The X1 sensor socket clearly is the culprit. It makes a loose and sloppy connection and one of the JST wire connections even came out with little provocation. I opted to try a very conservative fix of using 3 plastic shims to immobilize the JST connections within the plastic connector housings which has removed all of the apparent wiggliness from the socket. I'm looking for any opportunities to further insulate the internal connections from any external pulls on the cable bundles and then I'm going to close her up and see if i get all of the optical sensors to light up in the face of a bit of simulated jostling. If they pass that, I'll be overjoyed and proceed to trying to home the device, level the device, and await the arrival of the replacement extruder.

[fred_dot_u]

If you're getting a replacement extruder, which also means removing and replacing the nozzle assembly, don't hurry to level the bed, as you'll be doing it again, unless it's for the practice!

[minneapolis-matt]

If you're getting a replacement extruder, which also means removing and replacing the nozzle assembly, don't hurry to level the bed, as you'll be doing it again, unless it's for the practice!

It was for practice I suppose but also to make sure that mechanically the system was up to snuff. unless you think it is unlikely to reveal any weaknesses in the system.

[curious aardvark]

well done :-)

We did say it was most likely a loose connection some time back.
Sorry, i though you'd already checked the connections to the motherboard.

It's the difference in being in a workshop and trying to work out what's happened second hand.

Shims work great :-)

If you need to make sure a connection won't shift, a little blob of epoxy putty will do the job in a few minutes.

Sounds like things are at least going in the right direction anyway :-)

[minneapolis-matt]

Hallelujah!

Perhaps for the first time ever all 5 optical limit sensors on this printer were lit and stayed lit even in the face of some cable jostling! The three plastic toothpicks broken off as shims into the JST wire sockets seem to have stabilized the socket and the bumpy Swingline rubber finger glove I inverted, cut the tip off of, slit lengthwise, wrapped around the cables at the exit from the case and ziptied seem to have firmly prevented any further tugging from pulling on the internal cable connections from the outside. I might also stabilize the outside to prevent pushing in, even though that should be far less likely to stress the internal connections.

I know I am not out of the woods yet but I also don't believe that there is any reason for pessimism at this point. When I get my extruder it seems I should have reasonable odds of getting some good prints and finally obtain confidence that this printer will be a fine keeper!

[minneapolis-matt]

Wow!Doorbell just rang. My extruder has arrived 3 days early. and both extruder LEDs are lit up at last. If only I had more time today to play with the thing! At this point there's really nothing to hold me back from thoroughly troubleshooting this better-late-than-never TL-D3 Pro.

[minneapolis-matt]

The bundled video showed levelling with the bed at room temperature which doesn't make intuitive sense to me but...whatever manufacturer knows best in general I am sure. However, when they showed the loosening of the first hex nut to allow adjustment of the 2nd extruder Z-axis height for leveling the graphic and demonstrators movement showed one complete turn and the text simply said "Rotate counterclockwise to loosen fixed screw of nozzle kit 2" which I did and I noticed it felt finger tight at that point so I assumed time to move on. Well, the next step involved inserting a clumsy spanner into a darkened narrow slot and groping for a nut to turn until the nozzle was the at the appropriate height. The nozzle responded to large amounts of turns of the nut very slowly and the wrench kept catching the rats nest of unseen wires lazily draped in front of it on its way back into position on the unseen adjustment nut. Abruptly the nut lost all resistance and seemed to become impossible to find. a flashlight in the slot appeared to reveal it had come completely off of its threads. The nozzle had only covered about half of the required distance to the paper. At this point in my confusion I did something stupid. Speculating that the "fixed screw" adjustment might not have been perfect I experimentally gave it a slight further loosening. An unseen spring was released sending the nozzle crashing with some violence into the paper and the glass underneath.Miraculously, the glass seems to have escaped damage from my stupidity but I had no luck getting the nut rethreaded through the narrow slot and finally had to resort to removing the extruder case which turned out to be perilous owing to the awful clearances and fragile components and connections inside as well as a very tight case fit. I've finally re-threaded the nut and reassembled the extruder (taking the liberty to rebundle and re-route the wires out of the way of the slot) and hopefully completed the leveling but I wanted to add this post for anybody thinking of buying a tenlog TL-D3 pro in case it will help them see how to avoid this particular leveling hassle.

[curious aardvark]

Sheesh talk about highs and lows.

the bumpy Swingline rubber finger glove I inverted, cut the tip off of, slit lengthwise, wrapped around the cables at the exit from the case and ziptied seem to have firmly prevented any further tugging from pulling on the internal cable connections from the outside

That right there earns you the 'bodger Gold Award for Innovation' :-)

But the head levelling. That's back to the luck.

It sounds like the z-axis end stop might have been too high. Ideally you want the bed - if it has them - with levelling nuts screwed up pretty tight and the z-axis endstop, set as low as you can get away with, so that there is absolutely minimal head adjustment needed.

[minneapolis-matt]

Sheesh talk about highs and lows.

It sounds like the z-axis end stop might have been too high. Ideally you want the bed - if it has them - with levelling nuts screwed up pretty tight and the z-axis endstop, set as low as you can get away with, so that there is absolutely minimal head adjustment needed.

I'm not sure the TL-D3 Pro has a way to raise or lower the bed other than through loosening and tightening the corner springs. The Z-axis end stop can be moved up or down through software but only at roughly 1 cm jumps. If there is another way it's not all obvious.

When I finally got things properly levelled The springs were only 4 to 5 turns tighter than loose enough to self loosen so that is unfortunate.

[minneapolis-matt]

Before I try to tackle any multi-material prints I think I need to get both extruders to be well behaved. I am already reasonably happy with the output of the E1 right extruder (loaded with white PLA atm) although so far I have only printed a calibration cube, and a min version of the "all-in-one" torture print although I'm only vaguely aware of how I might use either to troubleshoot the printer.Could any experienced 3d print operators help me definitively ID the issue most likely failing my E2 extruder output? The results I'm seeing could be interpreted by a newbie trying to apply the troubleshooting guides in more than one mutually exclusive way. I am hoping the pictures will be good enough to narrow things down for some of you generously wise print gurus. Thank you so much for any advice!