3D Printer Extruder

Well the extruder was a lesson in frustration and just how much my time is worth. My old son and I worked on a wooden version for hours and only were capable to get it to work marginally. It wouldn’t constantly extrude and often times would jam. I was at my wits end with the failures until the final straw, yanking the filament out with pliers because it was just that suck. I managed to crack the piece of wood I was using and at this point I looked up my alternatives. I decided to have an extruder printed. I had plenty of screws and bolts to make that work. So I chose the following:

Greg’s Wade reloaded

I used 3DHubs to find a location near me and submit the job. I managed to get find a hub just a couple of miles away and the operator was excellent. I can’t believe the level of service he provided. That night, about 1:30am he provided me an update that he had finished my print! He had the knowhow to correct the infil settings and product strong and exact parts. I picked it up the next day and it fit together wonderfully well! Thanks Ryan, this was awesome. His hub is located here: Global Tech Now. I highly recommend his services.

With all great news comes a problem, just the universe balancing things out. While testing the exturder, sitting on my workbench, I managed to drop it and break a wire to the thermistor. Now I have 2 on order, just in case I do this again.

Next step, figuring out the Z axis end stop and getting this ugly beast of a repstrap to print. Once calibrated my first print will be replacement parts for the extruder. This one piece has been a major hold up in the build and I don’t want to be here again. However, if it fails for some reason, I can go back to Ryan and get a replacement made quickly.