Head disassembly

#1

hello all,

i recently acquired a zim for a very nice price. i got a couple of decent prints off of it, then foolishly wandered off to lunch one day while it attempted a five hour print. when i got home it thought it was finished, but had only gotten maybe 60% of the way through the print and then must have spent something like two hours jamming filament into the cold end of the extruder.

so, now, i guess i have to take the thing apart. zeepro has been kind enough to leave behind instructions for this but fail to mention the removal of the pushfit connector. i assume it’s screwed in, but i can’t budge it with a pair of pliers using what i’d think would be a reasonable amount of force. i’d rather not strip any thread that may exist in the plastic top of the head assembly.

strangely with the fan shroud off and my trusty flashlight i don’t see the mass of green pla that i expected would be jammed in amongst the fins of the heat sink, but if the condition of the filament at the lower stepper is any indication i guess the stepper wound up chewing a nice chunk out of it. anyway, i do see little bit of green in there where there ought not be any.

so, any advice on extracting that connector?

thanks.

#2

Hi~ I have taken apart the assembly prob way more than 10 times, could you provide some pictures of what you see and what you want to take out, i might be able to help. it is hard to visualize with words for me.

#3

i refer to the push fit connector where the teflon tube bearing the filament enters the head. in step 6 of the zeepro tutorial it shows a finger pushing down on it to release the tubing, but in step 15 it’s not there. just wondering how it was removed.

#4

@mtbf0, you’ll need a 10mm wrench for those. Don’t use pliers. Disconnect the teflon filament tubes by pressing down on the plastic flange and pulling up on the tube. Then, cut the filament if it’s still loaded in the extruder with about 2" sticking out of the top. Place your wrench over the top of the connector, find as much angle as you can possibly get and twist it out of there. The fitting is threaded through the plastic into an aluminum body, so you need not worry about stripping the plastic. The worst thing that can happen here is that you strip the fitting itself. Good Luck!