In the filament extrusion process, there is a fundamental step that is crucial to get right before you consider any variables or parameters, and that step is ensuring that you have a clean extruder. The truth to this is most evident when changing between extrusion materials, but in fact, cleaning the various parts of your extruder is an important maintenance step even if you are only working with a single polymer. As an example, after long periods of extrusion, plastic can build up on the flights and cause inconsistent metering, which manifests itself as variations in filament diameter.
We put together a short video covering all the basic steps involved in cleaning your extruder, aimed at novices just receiving their machines but potentially of use to more veteran users as well. The video begins with running purge compound through the machine, continues to removing and cleaning the screw and nozzle, and also shows how to clean the barrel. Check out the video below and follow along as Filabot team member Jack details the process! As always, feel free to comment with any further questions!
Watch Video Below on How to Clean your Filabot Extruders
Steps to cleaning your Filabot extruder:
- Intro + Purge: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RZYmCMCF6YE&t=0s
- Post Purge + Screw Removal: https://youtu.be/RZYmCMCF6YE?t=47
- Cleaning the Screw: https://youtu.be/RZYmCMCF6YE?t=108
- Cleaning the Screw with Copper Gauze: https://youtu.be/RZYmCMCF6YE?t=200
- Finished Clean Screw: https://youtu.be/RZYmCMCF6YE?t=251
- Cleaning the Barrel: https://youtu.be/RZYmCMCF6YE?t=263
- Cleaning the Nozzle: https://youtu.be/RZYmCMCF6YE?t=362
