E3D Hotend questions

If I were to try to install this hot end:

http://e3d-online.com/E3D-HotEnds/E3D-DirectFeed-HotEnds/E3D-V5-1.75mm-Direct-All-Metal-HotEnd

What other things will be necessary?

Change of code?
Screws?
Other parts?
Any help would be appreciated!

 

joecho, hopefully I'll be able to tell you soon. My E3D should be here today. Not sure what comes with it other than the hotend itself. I know that the one that's sold through filastruder comes with other stuff that you'll need. Just not sure if the one that comes from them direct has the same stuff.

 

All you have to do is wire everything up, Nothing else changes.

 

One thing I don't think may be clear to everyone buying this nozzle. You will need to clip and solder some wires. You'll want some heat shrink tube, a good soldering iron and the emotional fortitude to disassemble your printer.

It's also a bit of a bear to get the old nozzle out and resolder everything, especially without removing the Z carriage. On mine, the motor and end stop wires were not long enough to remove the carriage without dismounting. I was tempted to create a connector for quick change hot end action but decided it wasn't worth it at this point.

On the upside, the the E3D does "just work" once you've got it wired up and tightened the nozzle.

 

Hrm. I should still have some Anderson powerpoles around. That would work great though it may be too big to fit around the hotend/extruder. Using a terminal block with terminal connectors on the wires may be preferable since it's more resistant to vibration. Hrm.

 

The PID values will need to be changed as it will heat up much faster than the stock hot end. If you're ok with overshoot then you don't need to do anything about it, but to get back to a critically damped system it's best to run the autotune and adjust the PID gain values.

Autotune: http://www.soliwiki.com/PID_tuning

I mean you are going to reflash your firmware to raise the 230C max right? Otherwise whats the point of the E3D? So while you're doing that adjust the PID values and get a nice heat curve going.

 

Mike, I didn't have to change my PID values at all and I don't seen any real overshoot. I was prepared to change them but did not need to.

In any case, everyone should change parameter storage to EEPROM so they don't keep having to reflash the firmware anyway.

 

I guess mine might have been reading funny because my thermistor was damaged. Though it will still most likely be different so an auto-tune doesn't hurt. YMMV