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Hexagon Hot End?

Discussion in 'Mods and Upgrades' started by Red Submarine, Mar 20, 2014.

  1. Red Submarine

    Red Submarine Active Member

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    Has anyone had any experience with this extruder piece? I saw it on reprapdiscount and it seems like a decent deal at only $50 (compared to the average $80 price for an E3D). Any input is appreciated, thanks.
     
  2. Printed Solid

    Printed Solid Volunteer Admin
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    They actually sent me one in 1.75 and one in 3. I haven't had a chance to try it out yet though, but I am planning on mounting it to the robo when I have a few minutes.
     
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  3. Red Submarine

    Red Submarine Active Member

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    I ended up ordering one last Friday and got it on Tuesday. I too haven't had the time to install it, but when I do I'll write a review on here.
     
  4. tesseract

    tesseract Moderator
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    Am I missing something what piece are you talking about??? NO image no link??
     
  5. Red Submarine

    Red Submarine Active Member

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  6. mark tomlinson

    mark tomlinson ༼ つ ◕_ ◕ ༽つ
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    Looks almost identical to the E3D so likely will work just about as well.
     
  7. reprapdiscount

    reprapdiscount New Member

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    the hexagon hotend is different than the E3D. It's smaller, lighter and the construction is totally different, who has both will know what i mean
     
  8. 1d1

    1d1 Active Member

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    Well, I've received one, installed it and tried it for one print. All good for the most part. It is indeed smaller and lighter than the e3d and when tested at a sustained, indicated temp of 260, the entire heatsink was cool enough to touch. I suspect there will be very very few, if any, problems with thermal creep and early softening of filament on its way to the nozzle. It came nicely packaged, assembled as to the nozzle, heater block and heatsink but without the thermistor or heater installed. Both of those are wired nicely and have enough length to easily deal with installation. One complaint: the thermistor hole is just barely sufficient to hold the thermistor. It could stand to be a little deeper.

    As far as mounting on the ROBO, it is a mixed bag. It comes with a nicely machined, aluminum groove mount holder which would need to be modified a bit to fit our extruder carriage. Going the straight way and mounting as the J head already does puts a portion of the heat sink inside the plastic carriage. Since the heatsink never gets very warm at all, there doesn't seem to be a problem in that regard. This is how I did it since it seemed easier than cutting the aluminum mount to fit. It comes with a 50mm fan but no mount. As I was switching from an e3d to try this hot end out, I used the already calibrated heater, thermistor and fan from the e3d on the Hexagon. Saved a bit of wiring, too. For the fan, I just removed the e3d mount (which doesn't fit the Hexagon) and screwed the 40mm fan directly to the carriage with one of the two hot end mounting bolts. It is aimed perfectly and there is enough room that the x end stop didn't need to be changed. The final mod needed to be done was cutting about a half inch off of the z stabilizer to get the the carriage low enough for the shortened unit. That stabilizer is the beefed up one from Tesseract's design. Once I had that set up, it was just a matter of setting the z height. The whole thing is lower than stock, but the process is not significantly different than the usual calibration.

    Aside from the size difference there are two other notable differences immediately apparent: 1) at the top, the filament guide is a screwed in brass insert for a very precise feed point. It lines up perfectly on my set up and seems to be just right. 2) the space between the heater block and heatsink is much greater than on the e3d. I don't know if that is why there is less thermal creep, but it can't hurt.

    Finally, it printed beautifully at 255C with the latest clear Colorfabb XT ( a new formulation per tech support @ Colorfabb). From the very first attempt. As of this moment, it seems better than the e3d, but time and prolonged use will have to answer that. Once I got the e3d going, it worked well, too. Lately though, I have been experiencing a lot of clogging, cleaning and clogging again. Maybe it is filaments, but I am hopeful the Hexagon will work better. I still like the looks of the Pico, but if I can live with the Hexagon, the price point is, well, half. I like that too.

    A big thanks to Printed Solid for making this possible as well. His help and support on this forum as well as to me personally is invaluable.
     
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  9. 1d1

    1d1 Active Member

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    A couple of notations... Do not forget to re-tighten the nozzle and heat sink after it has been heated up to a goodly temp. You will get your first leak/clog otherwise. After about an hour into a long long print.
    2) The cooling fan was running full blast when I touch tested the heat sink. Things would be different without that fan. Don't forget that one either.
    3) Sorry about the earlier duplication. Operator cache error.
    Finally, cleaning and boring the Hexagon is essentially the same as the e3d. Oh yes, and changing filaments wasn't so clean the 2nd time so I had to undo the filament tension screws but I can live with that for now.
     
  10. Red Submarine

    Red Submarine Active Member

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    Hi 1d1, could you snap a pic of your fan setup with the hexagon? When I direct mount the hexagon hot end, I have a hard time mounting the fan without it hanging too low.
     
  11. 1d1

    1d1 Active Member

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    Here you go - hope it helps.... 20140403_183623.jpg

    As per the thread, the printer is working beautifully fours hours into a 10 hour nylon print. My best nylon thingy yet!
     
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  12. reprapdiscount

    reprapdiscount New Member

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    @1d1
    thanks for the feedback. Could some one drop me a drawing of the Robo3D grove mount holder, so i could modify few holders to suit Robo3D extruder. The grove mount delivered with hexagon is 100% compatible with Brian's, www.hotends.com/index.php?route=product/product&product_id=81
    i did it like that because i have many customers purchasing only those grove mounts since they fit to most of the hotends on the market.

    The brass screw on the top of the hexagon is designed in case some one decides to use the Hexagon as a bowden, so the customer does not need purchase another hotend. The brass part can be unscrewed and replaced with a pushfit.
     
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  13. Printed Solid

    Printed Solid Volunteer Admin
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    Clever. I was wondering what that brass screw was for!
     
  14. reprapdiscount

    reprapdiscount New Member

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    I've just seen this one: http://www.printedsolid.com/robodual/ nice job. I will send you a kit pushfits, different sizes and ptfe tubes with various diameters, it would be great if you could try to do same using hexagon:)
     
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  15. Printed Solid

    Printed Solid Volunteer Admin
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    I can't take any credit for that. That beautiful design is all Mike Kelly's handiwork. I just posted it for him.
    Here is the link to the Robo files. http://www.thingiverse.com/thing:69794
     
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  16. reprapdiscount

    reprapdiscount New Member

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    Oh yes, i just saw it, doesn't matter, than i will send 2 kits :) and you can forward one to him as well
     
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  17. Red Submarine

    Red Submarine Active Member

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    I see, you used the E3D fan, which is not the 50mm supplied fan. When I installed the Hexagon as you did the fan that comes with the kit is too big to hang from where you mounted it, it hangs lower than the hot end does.

    I guess I just need a smaller fan.
     
  18. reprapdiscount

    reprapdiscount New Member

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    While reading this, I think it may be a good idea if i would add in future 1x fan 40x40 and 1x 20x20 :D
     
  19. 1d1

    1d1 Active Member

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    Next morning update: failure @ hour 6 or so. An eensy bump in the nylon apparently knocked the y axis way off plane. I do not blame the Hexagon at all. Today I will try another print and see if the Hex is still flowing effectively.
    I may have to print this part in pieces so if I lose any one of them, I don't waste the whole thing. Sigh. It was pretty much exactly what I needed until that point. Still my most successful large nylon piece attempt.
    @Elvira - glad you liked the feedback - and that you follow this forum! Yes, a 40mm fan is pretty easy to mount as I did it. I'm sure that clever people here will find much more elegant solutions than that, but it works great. Good job on the Hexagon!
     
  20. reprapdiscount

    reprapdiscount New Member

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    2 people like this.

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