MakerGear Forum

This has been happening with remarkable regularity recently. Halfway through a print, the printer suddenly freezes with the extruder nozzle just sitting in one place creating a tiny puddle of plastic on the object, and it just hangs there, forever. It's happened 7 times so far, and I'm getting a little frustrated with the wasted plastic and print time. I'm using pronterface.exe and I'm hooked up through the USB cord and I'm pretty sure the USB connection is reliable (Not touching it and it's out of the way). Power supply seems to be working as intended as the nozzle and bed temperature remains stable and I'm assuming the LED on the board is blinking like normal(I'll have to pay attention next time it happens)? I've gone away from the computer thinking that something I'm doing might be causing it, but it still seems to randomly freeze at some random time into the print. Any ideas or any known causes for this behavior? My computer's not frozen or "acting up" somehow as far as I'm aware - computer seems to be 100% functional after the M2 freezes.

I'm currently printing ABS at 235 degrees C on a 100 degree C heatbed. It kind of seems like this started happening when I changed over to 235 degree C on the nozzle, up from 210, though that might just be coincidence.

I've had the printer running for about 2 months so far, and it worked without issue for the first month. It seems like it's been having this issue for the last 2 weeks or so.

I saw that happen whenever there was an interruption in the signal through the USB. Once because of a power surge, and once because I connected an ipad to the computer to charge it while a job was going.

If you're going to use the USB, don't plug anything in or remove anything while it is running a job. (Or, to be safe, run lengthy jobs from the SD card.)

So a power line surge could be causing this? Would a UPS help prevent that?

I'm pretty sure, as far as I'm aware, that I'm not plugging/unplugging anything.

you really need to get off using usb. usb can be ok but if there is any background process that the computer decides is important the signal can be slowed or stopped. its just the risk you take when using usb. some people will run usb and never have a problem and some will do it all the time. my mac never has an issue but my pc will stall like that once in a while. use and sd card or get a raspberry pi and run octoprint.

Just spec'd the extruder driver chip and the presumed heater bed driver chip.

MCU temp = 100 degrees.
Extruder driver chip temp = 132 degrees F.
Heatbed driver chip temp = 151 degrees F.

Doesn't seem particularly alarming, just thought board temp might be freezing one of the chips or something.

no this has nothing to do with your printer. its just your pc interrupting the usb then the buffer runs out and everything just stops.

Print from SD card as a test. If problem goes away you have your answer.

Switched to cura and cura seems to maintain a far more reliable connection than pronterface. Cura has never dropped on me once.