Leaving filament loaded in the printer

Hi guys,

Here's another newbie question. Should I leave the filament loaded in the printer after I am done printing for the day or should I unload it? I read someplace that leaving filament loaded may lead to clogging or jamming. On the other hand I read that removing filament all the time could leave residue on the inside of the head (from stringing filament) that could lead to clogging/jamming.

Are they any best practices or tips that could be thrown my way?
I also bought some extruder cleaning filament from printed solid. Besides cleaning between different types of materials should I clean after so my hours of printing?

 

New guy here too (but growing fast!)
I leave my filament in all the time.
My reason is I don't like messing with something that was working last time I used it.
That being said, I also print every day. If I were to go away for a weekend or if I'm too busy to print for more than a couple of days I would definately remove the filament spool and seal it in an air tight bag or box with some desicant in it.

This is a relatively new decision for me. I recently hit the end of a roll of Hatchbox Black that was very brittle and my prints were starting to show "Warts" (my term). I asked around and it seems my filament has become "wet". Filaments absorb moisture from the air and become "yukie" (again, my term) to print with. They can be salvaged by heating in an oven or food drier for a few hours but I've not gone down that road yet.

Now, when I remove a roll to store it (changing colors for an example) I clip off the filament leaving about a foot of filament in the extruder.

When I'm ready to change the roll out I heat up the extruder to about 210c or more wait a little bit then push to extrude a bit to be sure it's nice and soft. I then pull out the filament from the top.

New filament goes in (if I'm going to actually print right away) and if all goes in well, I push by hand a generous amount of filament to clear out the old color.

I then raise the extruder up high enough to get to the nozzle. I take a thick rag and carefully wipe off the OUTSIDE of the nozzle really well. Some use of a brass toothbrush can be helpful here.

I learned this by printing glow in the dark right after printing black. I had clean the inside but neglected to clean the outside and small droplets of black spoiled a print or two until I did the outside cleaning of the HOT nozzle.

Just my notes on my journey, hope they help.

 

I don't have a Robo any more, but on my current printer I'll run a short (100mm) section of that cleaning filament thru the hotend whenever I change filament spools and then prime the hotend with the new filament. Doesn't matter if it's the same material or not.

 

The best way to leave concerns about leaving filament in the printer behind is to switch over to PETG and never worry about moisture ruining your filament again.

 

Some filaments like woodfill you want to not leave it in. So just be mindful of some of the exotic fills that could gum the heck out of your hotend if you don't remove it.

 

Thats all I use..well try to, I keep acquiring PLA somehow for free lol I just had a friend give me 4 rolls ( he sold his 3d printer didn't like it )