Ezra Harris

Author: ezradharris

  • Changing the LCD Configuration in Marlin

    When updating my firmware on my 3D Printer (the ender 3), I recently ran into an issue when using a modified version of Jyers marlin. I realized that the screen configuration was of another type of LCD. So when I tried to flash it, the LCD screen would appear blank. After a lot of googling, I found a blog post by Crosslink describing how he is changing his Ender 3 V2‘s printer LCD to a smaller and older version of the screen. The LCD on the newer Ender 3 V2‘s are vertical, and the LCD I have is horizontal, for example, in the image below:

    screen comparison

    In crosslink’s tutorial on how he changed out his screen, he showed how to change his marlin firmware to accept the different style screen. You had to enable the screen type to be #define CR10_STOCKDISPLAY instead of using the #define DWIN_CREALITY_LCD, which was the setting to allow the config for the Ender 3 V2’s display. Then you need to change a setting required to flash the firmware.

    And after that, I compiled the code in Visual Studio Code (with the PlatformIO plugin installed) and was able to successfully flash it onto my 3D Printer. There are more tweaks to the firmware I need to make for all of my hardware to work. But a huge thanks to Crosslink for his post! (Link to it here) he goes in-depth on why he switched to the older display and explains the process in great detail. He also has a Youtube video on it here:

    crosslink youtube video/tutorial

    Learn how i changed my screen’s boot screen here: blog.ezraharris.com/customizing-my-3d-printer-boot-screen/

  • Pros and Cons of an Ender 3 3D Printer

    One of the most popular 3D printers on the market is a Creality printer called the Ender 3. I have owned an Ender 3 for the past two years, and here are my thoughts on the pros and cons of owning one:

    Pros:

    • It’s cheap: this is a typical 3D printer because it’s cheap, only $200, which, compared to its competitors, like Prusa and Makerbot’s printers, is an accessible price for beginners just entering the 3D printing space.
    • Great for beginners: With the cheapness and the ability for it to be taken apart quickly and put back together. It does come disassembled. It’s a great learning experience for newer beginners just coming into 3D printing. Since it’s a popular printer, there are hundreds of guides and tutorials on almost any topic about this printer.
    • Upgradability: Since its popularity, many 3rd party brands have offered upgrades to this printer. For example, the BL touch, which in my opinion, is one of the best upgrades that this printer needs, the BL touch auto levels the bed, so there is no need to fine-tune the hotbed manually anymore, which is a hassle. Even Creality offers their own upgrades, they offer an upgraded silent stepper board that improves the sound, and they also sell a CR Touch (their version of the BL touch).

    Cons:

    • Cheap Quality: since this is cheap and straight from China, the parts and pieces are not of the best quality, and I found myself upgrading almost every single aspect of this printer to make it better, and after upgrading all of the small things like a new motherboard and a BL touch, adds up over time. I’ve spent at least an additional $200 on upgrades for my printer.
    • The Noise: Buying a new motherboard was a HUGE change from the printer’s noise when printing. It is rather loud with the standard motherboard. Which for some isn’t an issue as you can move it into another room or buy an enclosure for it. But even with the motors making almost no noise, there is still the fan’s noise, specifically the extruder fan and the power supply fan. Both are pretty loud, which you can also upgrade with Noctua’s silent series fans.

    Final Thoughts:

    Should you buy the Ender 3 in 2022? No, but I believe that if you are set on buying a cheaper printer, I would save money and go for the Creality Ender 3 pro, or the Creality Ender 3 V2, or the Ender 3 max. which has all of the base upgrades you need at a slightly higher price. I would also recommend the Prusa i3 MK3s+ edition if you want the more expensive 3D printers, since it has a vast community, and the owner is based in the Czech Republic and is seemingly going for quality rather than cheap and quick parts. Unlike what Creality3D produces. I also wrote about how I upgraded my Ender 3 with many upgrades here

    Products mentioned in this post:

    Prusa i3 MK3s+

    Creality Ender 3

    Ender 3 pro

    Ender 3 max

    Ender 3 V2

    BL touch

    CR Touch

    Ender 3 Silent Motherboard Upgrade 4.2.7

  • First Successful Print On My New Printer!

    Yesterday I finally got a successful print-off on my new printer, the cr-10 s5, after many weeks of troubleshooting and learning how this printer works. I realized that the problem was that I had made these mistakes which led to clicking on the extruder motor. I got a print to successfully finish and not have any issues.

    • I didn’t disable retraction / lower the settings since the Bondtech DDX combined with the SE mosquito head didn’t need retraction or barely needed it.
    • Set the temperatures too hot for my specific hotend, I set them to be 220-240, but I needed to lower it to 200 at least with PLA.
    • Used PLA with this hotend. In general, PLA isn’t bad for this hotend, but I needed to change a lot of settings to get it not to clog due to the hotend being longer than the stock Creality hotend I’m used to.
    • The extruder fan was not properly connected to the mainboard more about that here: https://blog.ezraharris.com/extruder-and-blower-fan-issues-on-my-new-3d-printer/

    Mostly my mistakes had to do with the settings I had put into Cura not taking into account the DDX configuration or the new hotend that I hadn’t dealt with before.

  • Reversed Fan Wiring For my Creality 3D Printer

    When I purchased my 3d printer, I bought it from a previous owner who was in the middle of upgrading the hotend and the extruder configuration and had not thoroughly tested it. After looking at the fan configuration, I noticed that the extruder fan had not been on when the printer turned on. Instead, the part cooling fan was constantly on, which was odd since my smaller printer, the ender-3 has the extruder fan on all of the time and the par cooling fan only when needed during prints. This became an issue for the performance of my prints.

    I asked about this in a 3D printing discord community I am in, and I got a response saying this was not normal for my printer and the wires must have been mixed up when hooking it up to the motherboard. This was an issue. The previous owner installed a power kill switch to the extruder motor and fans and had rerouted the power to it. If I wanted to swap the fan plugs, it wouldn’t be as easy as unplugging the cable and plugging it into the correct connector again. So I checked the voltages of the fans instead to see if it would be as easy as cutting and swapping the connectors from the extruder, and luckily yes, they were the same amount of voltage and amps. So I felt somewhat safe cutting and resoldering the connectors.

    As that was my first experience ever soldering anything together, I was nervous. Still, luckily, after applying (admittedly too much solder) to the wires, I wrapped it in electrical tape, and it worked! After about half an hour, I had both fans working, including changing the speeds.

    for reference photo of a blower fan (aka a part cooling fan):

    image from pinshape.com fan on left being the part cooling fan

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