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I began maintenance on Koth this morning, starting with removing the toolhead. I have a replacement TAP that uses an optical sensor instead of a microswitch. After removing the old TAP, I found its rail was mostly seized with filament debris. The switch was still operable, but barely. Additionally, the X rail on the gantry was gouged, and the carriage was excessive debris in it as well. All of this is strange as things were fine and lubricated recently.

I then took the extruder apart and found some rather severe damage on the rear motor plate. The failed bearing allows the axle to shift against the stepper, drilling a hole in its face.

Its obviously been overheating, and its failed pretty badly. Looking over my config, I had the current set at 1 amp, so I’m going to drop that down and maybe put a sensor on it to track its temp. I also found some damage on the blower housing where the power cable for the heater core runs through.

The screw that hold the housing in place seems to be limiting damage, but I may been to add some insulation here.

On a positive note, the copper brush I use to clean the hotend is working really well. I just need to shift the brush a couple mm to cover the entire face.

So I have ordered up a new X rail that should be here this weekend. I’m unfortunately kind of stuck until then.