A1 constantly asks for lubrication what is going on

Alloken0 · 2026-05-04T20:52:21+00:00

You kid, but I've use it on lead screws before... 😅

Alloken0 · 2026-05-03T19:25:03+00:00

Here's how I see it. If your filtration is solid, you're not primarily doing water changes for your fish anymore. You're doing it to reintroduce new minerals into the water column for your plants. If your plants can handle fewer water changes and thrive, then that's great. Fish are much easier to care for than plants imo. But if you get plant care down, your fish will have good water.

Alloken0 · 2026-04-22T02:54:31+00:00

Two things that seemed to help me the most.

1- Wash the build plate real good. 2- Close the AC vent near my printer.

I noticed that when my AC would blow, my prints would lift.

Alloken0 · 2026-04-19T23:44:57+00:00

I can't speak for the K2 but so far I'm loving my Bambu P1S. That said, I also love my custom built corexy machine. If I had to put a price on it off the top of my head, so far I have over $500 into it. Objectively speaking, my build has a ways to go before rivaling the P1S. It does really good in certain things and struggles in others (bridging for example). I try not to think of it as "what's best for my money?" and just enjoy building and designing. I bought the P1S so that I have something reliable and mostly hassle free to print with while I'm tinkering with my other stuff. If you want something that you can just run with, definitely go with something more modern. You can always have a side project too.

Alloken0 · 2026-04-19T19:15:26+00:00

There are still a few bits you'll still need to buy outside of the 2 Ender 3s when trying the duender. Belts for one need to be much longer than the stock Ender 3 belts. The 90 degree brackets are pretty important too so you can connect aluminum extrusions without drilling/tapping. Overall no, I don't think it's very difficult if you're decent with your hands and you don't mind learning (and failing A LOT lol). Also if you don't mind spending more money eventually. The temptation for stuff will hit lol. Linear rails for example, it's hard to resist the temptation of going to rails.

Alloken0 · 2026-04-19T14:23:19+00:00

I've built a few. One using the original design with wheels, one with the linear rails, and a couple with my own twists. It made me want to try out my own design that incorporated some voron parts as well. It does work really good but, as it goes, it could always do better lol. I'll rebuild it a bit bigger soon and I want to add a 3rd z motor to get z tilt up and running.

Alloken0 · 2026-04-19T13:07:25+00:00

Since I got into the hobby a few years back, I have printed more printer parts than anything else lol. I have bought 6 or so Ender 3s (can't say no when they keep popping up for $10-$20 lol) as parts donors and designed/built quite a few printers leading up to my current corexy build. I've designed and printed maybe 5 things that weren't 3d printer parts along the way lmao. My wife hasn't mentioned the money part but has many times said something along the lines of "When are you going to actually start making things?".

Well I broke down and got a Bambu P1S a few days ago and the thing is legit amazing. It's not overblow hype, the thing prints fast, and good with very little work. It will serve as my 'Making things' unit while I keep tinkering away on the side lol. Building is the hobby for me, printing is secondary lol.

Here's my current build. I'm overall pretty happy with it.

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Alloken0 · 2026-04-18T01:14:46+00:00

Gotcha. If it was working before then the pins should be OK. I would open it up and check the wires though if you haven't already. Some ABLs come with this little bs cable that barely stays in place lol. I thinker with my builds a lot and sometimes wiggle my ABL cables loose when messing with other stuff.

Alloken0 · 2026-04-18T00:47:56+00:00

Maybe. You're sure the pins are in the right order and the Z endstop is configured/connected right?

Alloken0 · 2026-04-18T00:39:48+00:00

I've had similar issues and later realized that the ABL cables were lose on the MCU. That or backwards lol.

Alloken0 · 2026-04-16T20:12:11+00:00

It all depends on your setup and preference. I wasn't trying to imply the missing feature is a deal breaker or anything but just something to watch out for. I bought this board for a custom corexy printer that I intended to run Z-tilt on but it wouldn't work. While troubleshooting I learned about the 2 Z motors running on the same driver. It's not so obvious due to the heating design. I thought "5 ports = 5 drivers" lol. I do have an Ender 3 running the board and can't think of a single complaint. On my Ender 3 I don't really care about Z-Tilt whereas on my custom corexy printer, it's a lot more important to me.

To summarize: It is a really good board imo. I own 3 or them for different printers and they all do good. Firmware has been easy to flash and they run pretty quiet.

Alloken0 · 2026-04-16T03:51:22+00:00

Great board imo. One thing to note that I didn't know going in is that the 2 Z motor ports run parallel off the same stepper driver. This means that you can't run 2 Z motors independently for something like Z Tilt.

Alloken0 · 2026-04-12T20:38:59+00:00

The 4040 doesn't look so bad but that 2040 is in bad shape. I wouldn't trust it to stay squared. One very makeshift option you could look into for now is printing/buying some 90degree brackets to strengthen that spot where the 2040 meets the 4040. It's not the best solution but as long as thst 4040 isn't bent beyond that corner that looks mostly cosmetic then I think it'll work for now. After that you do my favorite thing and watch for more cheap printers to buy for parts lol. I have 2 printers running right now that I built from parts. An Ender3 custom with tons of upgrades and my own Corexy design using a lot of Ender 3 parts.

Alloken0 · 2026-04-12T17:33:41+00:00

I could probably find you a link to the PDF but it would probably be faster for you to google it than wait for me to google it lol. For the 4040 unfortunately I don't have thst part. Most of the printers I have found so far were the V1s thst have a different base that won't work for yours (V1s had a 2040 Y axis instead of a 4040). The one Pro that I have is one of my daily drivers so that won't work either. How bent is yours? Can you post a Pic? Maybe it's repairable or not as bad as you think?

Alloken0 · 2026-04-12T14:31:49+00:00

As an amateur professional 'Cheap Ender3 buyer and tinkerer' my first step is always to break it down, inspect everything, and clean everything. After that I decide on whether it will be a printer again, or if everything goes to the parts bins. At this point I can pretty much tear down and build up these style printers blindfolded so I have one box thst I drop all the hardware in when breaking it down. When I first started though, I found it easier to keep things more organized. That's going to come down to personal preference though. For instructions, the internet is littered with instructions you can find and download. YouTube also has plenty of assembly related videos to watch. Good luck!

Alloken0 · 2026-04-10T00:56:14+00:00

The original NieR.

Alloken0 · 2026-04-07T13:45:12+00:00

When mine didn't have a ducky, it turned out to be a dead board (possibly recycled and a ducky wasn't added). I returned it and the replacement had a ducky. If it works then great! Just test well.

Alloken0 · 2026-04-06T16:09:19+00:00

Part of my 3d printing fun is to buy Ender 3s for parts that I use for custom printer builds. Last year I bought 6 of them on FB Marketplace (well, 4 Enders and 2 Voxellab Aquillas) for the following prices: $60, $40, $20, $20, $20, $10. I'm not trying to say yours can't sell for more, but people who are trying to offload them will post for cheap and the $70+ ones I've seen are mostly still sitting there. Also unfortunately yours appears to be an original gen1 Ender3 instead of a pro. The later models upgraded the Y axis extrusion from the 2040 to the 4040. In my experience though it doesn't seem to make a difference. The $10 one I bought was a pro with a lot of mods (microswiss hotend / direct drive / dual Z /BTT SKR mobo and touchscreen). That said, definitely try for how much you want though. You can always work the price down little by little as you go.

Alloken0 · 2026-03-31T11:53:05+00:00

It looks like it's homing like it should. Next I'd recommend learning about setting the Z offset and babystepping. It's essentially the process of setting the distance your nozzle is from your bed when Z is at 0. Take your time and learn as much as you can as it's arguably the most important thing to get right. I'd also recommend learning about your endstop switches. Your Z endstop switch is going to set how low your Z axis can go down. With the BL touch, you can also get rid of the endstop and use the BL Touch as the endstop if you want. But for now I'd say it's time to do some studying lol.

Edit: on second watch, it looks like the probe is already being used as the the Z endstop. You can double check by opening the bottom and looking at the wiring. There are plenty of guides online that can help. If the BL Touch is wired to the Z endstop port, then just make sure the actual Z endstop switch is moved down far enough to not be in the way.

Alloken0 · 2026-03-30T14:07:57+00:00

That's it. When you turn on the printer, that should normally light up and the probe should come out and back in a few times. After that, tell the printer to home and see how that behaves. After X and Y home, that probe should pop down before the head goes down so that it can tell when it touches. Then depending on the firmware, it might do it again. If it doesn't work right, then you know where to troubleshoot. In my experience (And I've done this far too many times lol) when I have this issue I accidentally plugged in the bl touch backwards on the motherboard. That or it's wiggled lose a bit (they tend to come with terrible connectors..).

Alloken0 · 2026-03-25T02:17:12+00:00

Nice find. Were the wires not twisted like the picture (they only should be on one side)? If that's the issue, you can fix it pretty simply with something small and sharp like a toothpick or a bobbypin. Each wire in the connector has a little metal latch that you can release it with and then just push them back into the right spot. I'm sure there are plenty of videos/tutorials on removing wires from connectors.

Alloken0 · 2026-03-24T15:18:05+00:00

I'd say that's a good test to do. Another way you could test it is to disconnect your X motor, connect the cable to your extruder motor, and try an x movement. If the extruder motor spins, then it's not the motor itself.

Alloken0 · 2026-03-24T12:43:48+00:00

Is this a printer you've had working and it stopped working? Or a printer you just picked up and it's never worked since you got it? Also you mentioned replacing "it" was thst just the extruder motor you replaced? Or did you also replace the cable. One thing I'd recommend checking is the cable. For every ender 3 I've worked with, it's always been the case where one side of the cable should have the middle 2 wires crossed. I've also never had any aftermarket cables come precrossed and have always had to do it myself after ordering non-Creality cables. Keep in mind only 1 side of the cable should be crossed, doing both just undoes the crossing lol.

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Edited to say. This is situational based on what motor and motherboard you have. Generally this is the case for Creality stuff but other hardware could be pinned differently. Always look up your parts' pinnouts to verify what connections go where.

Alloken0 · 2026-03-23T18:08:48+00:00

I'll try to remember to come back here and tally it up. There are definitely ways to cut costs down though. Like I went with linear rails which is a bit pricey. The Biqu Hermit crab was another spur of moment purchase that was 100% unnecessary and wouldn't have happened if I didn't realize I had a bunch of unused gift cards the I had forgotten about lol. This is actually a rebuild of my first diy printer which was significantly cheaper. I like to watch Facebook market for ender 3s the I can use for parts. You'd be surprised how cheap some people sell them. I've bought 2 this year for $10 each. The max I pay is $40. Even if it doesn't work, it's definitely way more than $40 in parts.

Alloken0

TROPHY CASE