You have bought a new, probably the most affordable, Creality Ender-3 3D printer. Congratulations! Finally, you can print anything you want all day long. I mean... Before your hotend gets clogged... In this video I will show you how to install an upgrade, or rather a fix, for the hotend of the Creality Ender-3 3D printer. This fix is also for owners of Ender-3 Pro, Ender-3 V2, Ender-5 and similar 3D printers. The teeth of the pneumatic connector which holds this PTFE tube in place are digging into this tube during printing. The tube then doesn't hold well in the connector and it can happen that the end of the tube starts to move away from the nozzle. Filament can then start to settle in this gap, which can cause the nozzle to clog. To avoid this, we can use this separator. It works by locking a small piece of PTFE tube in place. This piece is then permanently pressed against the nozzle so there is no risk of filament settling there. The rest of the PTFE tube is normally locked in the pneumatic connector. I recommend you print a few more pieces in case one goes wrong. You might even find useful a couple of these replacements for the zip ties. Please see the links in the description below the video. If you prefer metal instead of plastic, then I don't understand why you're watching a video about a 3D printer... :D Anyway... Instead of a 3D printed separator, you can use a washer with an outer diameter of 7mm. But I'll tell you more about that later. Before you start the installation, don't forget to remove the filament from the printer and get a container where you will put the hot parts! First you need to remove the hotend cover. After taking it off, I recommend removing this zip tie for easier handling of the hotend. Then remove the silicone sock from the heat block and remove these two screws. After removing them, heat the hotend to around 260 degrees. Using an adjustable wrench and a 6 mm socket, carefully unscrew the nozzle. Then pull the PTFE tube out of the hotend. To release the tube, the connector lock must be removed and pressure applied to the connector. Finally, unscrew this connector as well. Now loosen this "worm" and pull the bottom of the hotend out of the heat sink. Do everything very carefully! The heat block is still very hot! Now you need to unscrew this heatbreak from the heat block. An adjustable wrench and ordinary pliers with a paper towel should be fine for this. The paper towel is used to protect the heatbreak from scratching. Let the hotend cool down and turn off the printer before continuing. Now remove the heat sink from the X-axis carriage. Remove the remaining zip ties and pull the entire PTFE tube out of the extruder. If you have everything disassembled like this and haven't seen a single magical smoke, you can congratulate yourself. You're halfway there. Now we can clean the heatbreak from the filament residue. The lighter and PTFE tube will do the job perfectly. The PTFE tube should be able to be pushed back and forth through the heatbreak. Baked on filament on the heatbreak can be removed with the lighter and a wire brush. Now it's time to install the separator. Before installing it, make sure that the filament can pass through it without a single problem! If necessary, slightly widen the inlet opening. Then slide the heatbreak all the way back into the heat sink and secure it with a worm. Push the PTFE tube through the heatbreak. Place the separator on top of the tube and push it into the heat sink together with the tube. Then secure it with the pneumatic connector. Tighten the pneumatic connector and then loosen it about half a turn. Then push the PTFE tube as hard as possible into the heat sink all the way to the end. Cut the part of the PTFE tube that is sticking out of the heatbreak with a scalpel. Be careful not to pull the PTFE tube out of the heatbreak! When using a different separator, the procedure is the same. Just make sure that the PTFE tube is pushed all the way into the heat sink during the entire process. After tightening the pneumatic connector, a piece of the PTFE tube should stick over the edge of the heatbreak. Approximately half a millimeter. This piece will ensure that no filament will pass by. If you chose to use a washer, you will have a very similar procedure. The washer needs to be inserted into the part of the heatsink where the heatbreak is inserted. Then the heatbreak needs to be pushed all the way in and secured with a worm. Now the tricky part. We will need to cut off a piece of PTFE tube that will remain in the heatbreak. Here is an example of the PTFE tube from the previous measurement. As you can see, the PTFE tube is too long for our needs. Therefore, we cannot use the same procedure as in the previous measurement. A different procedure is needed. I found the method using an M6 nut to be perhaps the simplest and most accurate. Screw the nut onto the thread of the heatbreak, align the two ends and then turn the nut half a turn. This will again give you a margin of about half a millimeter. For simplicity, I'll show you the cut on a small piece of PTFE tube. Again, you need to keep the PTFE tube from moving during the cut so that the cut is beautifully straight. If you have a sharp scalpel, you can lightly align the tube at the end. However, the result should look the same as with the previous method. Now it's time to put the hotend together. First we screw in the nozzle and loosen it half a turn. Then screw the heatbreak all the way in. Now loosen the worm and secure the heatsink with the screws. Tighten the screws one at a time so that both screws are screwed in the same depth. Finally, tighten the worm. If your hotend is assembled, heat it up to 260 degrees. Once heated, tighten the nozzle against the heatbreak. After tightening the nozzle, let the hotend cool down again. Now all we have to do is put everything back together. Put the silicone sock back on. Attach the hotend to the X-axis carriage. Fasten the hotend cover back on. Slide the PTFE tube back into the hotend and secure with the lock. Insert the PTFE tube back into the extruder and secure with the lock. Finally, connect the PTFE tube together with the wires leading to the hotend. If you have done everything correctly, the printer should print as before. However, there should be no nozzle clogging.
