Something most don't know about stepper motors: Inside them is a spring-washer type pre-tensioner, it preloads the motor and keeps it from rattling if you shake it, guess what side it's usually on though? The bottom(bushing upwards when used in the z-axis like this), your gantry weight might be sufficient to deflect this spring and cause irregularities if things are heavy enough. You can tell by watching the coupler while giving it a little push down against. Your thrust bearing is probably fixing this. On mine I took the motor apart and relocated the spring to the top so it pushes downwards instead, resulting is a notably more stable Z-reference.
Genius! This is a great tip, it very noticeably reduced Z banding for me and it's so easy to test if your motor has a spring-washer configured this way. Thank you!!!
@@projectartichoke Awesome! I'm very glad to hear that random info was actually useful to someone else as well. (had notifications off, but better late than never.) I've actually never seen ANYONE cover this detail at all, and it's pretty easy to overlook or never know about.
@@moodberry Very late to reply, but you can check for it by literally pushing down on the shaft of a stepper that's pointed up, if it visibly deflects down into the motor and it's being used on a Z-drive for anything supporting weight.. then that basically means it can get forced down like a spring and cause uneven settling heights. Visually it looks just like a washer but has a 'ripple' indented into it, so it isn't flat.
I just want to concur with many countless other people with the production quality of this video and how much it helps. Thank you for your time as I know it was very time-consuming.
No, it's material dependent. Stainless steel, titanium, glass for instance aren't "self lubricating" no matter how they wear. Brass, copper, white metal alloys are, because unlike those, they shed flat plates that slide across each other. Same for plastics, nylon, ptfe, UHMW, POM/delrin contain internal lubricants that are only released with wear, some are even impregnated with oil, they all need an initial break in before this happens. PLA, ABS to name but two, do not.
@@m3chanist Wh "no" , what i say wrong? Of course worn material can be either a lubricant or an abrasive, both is possible. Besides very confused comment. There aren't "internal lubricants" in the plastics mentioned, it's purely low surface energy causing the material to be low friction, chemically induced property. PTFE PA etc are not impregnated with oil.
@SianaGearz I didn't say they were, I said they can be and are in a variety of engineering applications. I'm sorry for your confusion, read more carefully. What you said that was wrong was that material lost to wear acts as a kind of lubricant, as I pointed out, that is only jn some cases, that it is material specific, not a blanket catchall.
@@m3chanist they were talking about "Self lubricating" materials specifically mentioned in the video, not all materials. they were and still are correct.
I wanted to thank you here. You changed my print quality. With this training you gave. Everything changed for me. I was not at all satisfied with the quality of my print. But when I did what you said. The result I got was unbelievable. My print quality has improved so much that there is no difference with resin. I would love to have a place where I could show you the results. And see how the quality is. It looks like it was taken with bamboo printers. With this tutorial, you showed me that it is possible to get a good quality print. And it is not a wish. I am very sorry that I got to know your channel earlier. I wish I had seen this video earlier. thank you. Thank you generous man. Thank you for your great advice. Please continue your work and post more tutorials. No matter how much I thank you, I have thanked you little. Thank you, kind man. thank you❤❤❤❤❤❤🙏🙏🙏🙏🙏🙏🙏🙏🙏🙏🙏🙏thank you thank you
My printer is model Elegoo neptune4pro. The first time I bought it, it was of excellent quality. After a few months, the changes were applied to the print. I was disappointed. I searched everywhere. No one could help me. And they just confused me. Until I saw this video. It is not believable. But the quality of my printer is even better than the first days. All these events were for this tutorial. This video changed my printing. Thank you for this generous man. thank you
Just tried oldham couplers, and they completely fixed it. It did allow me to see that there is a slight inward slant of the lead screw, so I'll have to print motor brackets to help position it correctly. But even now, the prints come out perfect!
I love watching people fix things or put things together. When I tell you I have no idea what this is; nor do I actually need to know this info. It’s intriguing & the quality is *chef’s kiss* though 😂
The thrust bearing is important for another reason. The motor has a spring inside of it, allowing the axle to move up and down a little. By placing the thrust bearing between the coupler and the motor body, this freedom for the lead screw to move slightly down is eliminated, and it will unlikely to move up because of gravity, but if you really want to make sure you can go overboard and put a thrust bearing at the top of the printer as well to really constrain the lead screw Z motion.
Bro Im not that guy but Subbed! This was perfect! Literally every second. Simple enough but yet deep enough your dont dive off the cliff in detail you get lost on another subject. Owe you big for this one
Paused at the 3min mark to just say that the editing of this video is absolutely superb! 👌🏼 Informative and entertaining. Thanks to some of the new gen printers, I certainly dont miss the days of z-banding, gantry leveling, aluminum extrusions and roller wheels.
EXCELLENT video my guy! I have 2 Ender 3’s and I have dual lead screws on both of them along with direct drives! You have explained what I have been having trouble and have noticed! I have noticed the screws are really not lined up properly, and it’s just a few mm if that. And that really makes a difference. The trouble with belts is that they are like chains on a bike or motorcycle. You can only tighten them so much until you’ve stretched them all you can and have to replace them. So belts (in my opinion) are not on option for me. Any way great video, subscribed!
Great advice ! I solved the leadscrew issues by, THROWING THEM AWAY and replacing them with a belted Z mod. Z hopping is MEGA accurate now and my supports just snap clean off. Next thing I will do is install linear rails because those POM wheels are a huge problem aswell....
The most critical thing with leadscrew alignment is that the bearings and nut are all in *exactly* the same relative position to the linear axis the screw is driving. The screw being straight is irrelevant if the top & bottom bearings are at different distances from (or laterally to) the linear slide! That is probably why the top bearing caused problems - the opposite end was not in line with the nut, so it was causing lateral force on the nut near the ends of the travel. It applies to the industrial machine tools I work on, and equally to 3D printers or any small CNC.
The #1 most thorough set of tests/results and solution options on YT. My issues are around z-binding (mainly), with no discernible pattern in the layers. It's been a total pain to trace down and I'm pretty sure it's a combination of the anti-backlash nut and sub-standard linear bearings, but good luck trying to find a set of well made bearings that are any better than what Creality uses. Again - really good video and I've subbed.
Do you have the new reality, V3 or did you create it yourself? I’m thinking about ditching the lead screw and going for the Z belt solution or an XY core printer
Thrust, stock coupler, oldham, fixed at top with bearing that allows slight x y movements, i get almost no banding now!!! Did all this in the last year! Good vid!
Did you have to print new motor mounts before you put the thrust bearings on and when you install the oldham couplers, you don’t need the old POM couplers (I have a CR 10 smart and I think that’s what they are) that are under the gantry anymore, correct? Thank you.
@treyduval5399 i didnt have to but the ender 3 had bad mounts so i did The oldham coupler will attach to the threaded pom attachment to the gantry I also put anti backlash nuts which was a long attachment with a spring
I literally fought a gantry level problem for a whole weekend, settled on using my Angle Cube, then 3 days later I found that you did the EXACT same thing.
Note that brass oldham couples like the ones you showed aren't supposed to work well under compression, when an oldham coupler that responds well to compression is installed the lead screw isn't constrained laterally at the X axis, in those cases constraining at the top _is_ a good idea because otherwise the lead screw is underconstrained. There are bearing-based oldham-style couplers like the "wobble wings" and the suchlike that are designed to work under compression, also bear in mind that thrust bearing are great but can introduce vertical motion in the lead screw if they are not perfectly perpendicular to the axis of the lead screw, which can be tough to ensure
good video, AND, funny, I built my Prusa I3 almost entirely by myself. my Z threads are old-fashioned M5 threads and yes, they are loose at the top AND go back and forth (not extreme!) and that's why I ended up here, I still have to see what I can do about it BUT I'm in no hurry, the printer works well enough so it will get better with time! Healthy and Friendly Greetings from the Netherlands everyone! Rob
i have a og cr10 and found pretty much the same thing. the things that helped the most was oldham connector that was filed(mine did not slide smooth) and lubed and getting rid of the top guide. plum coupler didnt change anything for me and antibacklash made things worse. i got new leadscrews after the oldham and i so disernable improvements. only other thing that helped along the way was replaceing the stock extruder with a direct drive and a mains bed heater with insolation. going to give the motor mounts a try because why not.
Bent lead screw itself wont deflect in travel at any noticeable rate, extremely small effect (a2 + b2 = c2). Most Z issues are simply binding from being out of square, the rest are bad PID tuning (temps jumping around) and bed bounce/vibration, mostly just on bed slingers. BUT if you have dual Z motors and there tied together with a belt and not in phase, it's better to simply unplug one if that gantry holds up when turned off. If you need both, loosen one coupler and activate the motors then level your gantry and tighten it up. That will put them in phase so that there not constantly trying to fight each other paying a back and forth tug of war. The last one, a loose carriage. The POM nuts work just fine and can be "loose" as gravity will do the job of keeping them in place, maybe if you need to print while its on it's side.. idk. The thrust bearing would compensate for bad/cheap bearings in the factor motors, but you can get nearly the same effect of the oldham with nylon washers and only tightening the brass nut so that there's no play, allowing to the stock cheap brass nut to move around in the x/y AND also wobble to play along with a bent lead screw.
Thanks for this video. Just ordered an oldham for my Ender 3v2 since i've had some issue with prints. After buying an orbiter 2 and setting everything right i klipper knew it was not the cause of it since it was even before new extruder and i've checked the wheels multiple times and it didn't make sense it was the X and Y since the print had lines all around and in a consistand thickness as if it squished and it would be at random it would. So hope this fixes it and maybe one day i'll upgrade to something like a RatRig
In my opinion & experience as long as we let the top end hang free and allow the linear rod to hold its position. Best is increase to 10mm rod or use linear guide the Z. I use a PLA printed z Lead nut and it really zero down the blacklash. Sometimes some parts of the machine need NOT be metal to cut out vibrations and noise. Part of your printed band seems like uneven extrusions not totally z-band. I am not sure about converting to belt to stop my blame on the Z-Leadscrew bend. Anyone tested can share your views too. Bear in mind Z is the least movement axis among all bed slingers. Thanks for making this well presented video ❤
Thank you for sharing! Good idea about the thrust bearings, something I haven't tried. I recently just installed a dual Z axis stepper motor kit, the box says it's from Creality, but I'm not sure if it's authentic. Anyway, the kit I bought came with anti-backlash lead screw nuts aluminum mounts for both stepper motors. I still had to put a shim for the originally located stepper motor, but no for the other side, I'm guessing the gantry bracket for the original spot wasn't drilled properly or bent at the correct spot. When I was aligning the lead screws with the stepper motors, I left all the mounting screws and lead screw nut loose first, and also moved the X axis gantry all the way down for better alignment, I even removed the printer head so I could go as low as possible. I didn't know about the top mount could cause issues. When I installed mine, I moved the X axis gantry all the way up possible, so that the top mounts are aligned the best way possible before I tightened them in place. I might leave mine in for now, as I don't see any Z banding issues with my prints.
Thats all fine and dandy but some Z Banding, wobble, whatever can also be caused by the wheels on the x gantry riding on the frame if they are not perfectly round. They can cause z banding, I've tested this extensitivly with my original ender 3 that didnt have duel z screws. After disabling my Z motors in the printer screen, you raise the gantry up and down with two fingers and if there is any resistance as the wheels go up and down you have an issue with a flat spot on the wheels. The issue can be very slight so you have to really get a good feel for how the wheels feel against the frame. This can happen more then not when the printer has been sitting for extended periods of time not being used, the tight wheels will deform over time against the Z extrusion frame. This can even happen when putting the printer together if care is not taken when mounting the X gantry and the wheels are grouged when fitted onto the z extrusion frame. Lead screews can be a problem but could also be other issues.
I cured my Z banding by revisiting the math of how many rotations or steps needed for x number of millimeters. Mine was off by just a fraction but, the accumulation was dramatic and contributing to Z-Banding.
You see your problem isn't the lead screw at all. Mine is bend but there is no sign of wobble on the print. I have done all "bad" practices. Fully tightened the POM lead screw thing to the frame while you are supposed to leave it untightened. I added a bearing at the top which is supposedly really bad but I need it to stop the lead screw from vibrating with my high acceleration. The problem instead is Creality leaving the screws too loose from the factory. Specifically the ones holding the Z Gantry so technically the X gantry. There are several screws that you can tighten to lock the parts with the V wheels. Essentially you have to first make sure your X gantry is level then fully tighten the eccentric nuts so that the inner wheels are jamming the outer wheels. Then tighten the brackets while making sure it stays level. After that you can untighten the eccentric nuts again and check for play. If you have done it correctly your X axis doesn't want to wobble anymore it will want to naturally be straight. After that you can tighten the eccentric nuts to the correct spec so slightly touching but its really not required as the outer V wheels will do all the work. What that does it prevent jamming on the lead screw as your X axis will always be level. I think you are putting way too much thought into it while for the Ender 3 v2 Neo (my printer) there really isn't much to it. From the factory there was 0 banding. I replaced the brass with POM because it promised better accuracy and it indeed only has 0.05mm difference between moving up and down. As long as you move the same direction its 100% accurate. Only when going up then down vs only going up does the 0.05mm come into play. Also my printer needs 398.94 steps per mm instead of 400 for the Z.
You can throw 1000 dollars into precision ball screws, but your extruder is the limiting factor. Uneven extrusion is the cause of the artifacts that are non-rhythmic. A leadscrew will always give a rhythmic artifact pattern.
@@MaxyMeanderings Those are some fantastic choices! As far as linear rails I was reading KevinAKASam's (belted Z mod creator) documentation for the belted z and he advised against it. Reason being is the POM wheels allow you to tighten the concentric nut and create friction, where as the linear rails have 0 friction. Problem is with only 1 stepper holding the entire X gantry, the X gantry will fall once the printer is turned off if the Z axis has linear rails. Having that friction from the POM wheels ends up helping the single stepper hold the gantry in place, or at least gently bring it down.
@@MaxyMeanderings Yeah don't use wobbleX on a dual lead screw setup like on your ender, it needs quite a bit of weight to work properly. It was really meant for ball screws I think but I've seen those get a lot cheaper
@13:30 I'm rebuilding my CR-10 and went with the oldham coupler setup from this video. Anyway, I lubed the threads of my POM nut as well as the oldham coupler, and I'm noticing the gantry slipping or skipping (??) as I manually move the gantry up, by turning the lead screw using the motor coupler on the bottom. That may not be the answer to that question, but it's a new issue that I now have to resolve.
This is an amazing video and I'm having these same issues, so I wish it could help me 😭. I'm new and have a printer without a lead screw, and I can barely get any help for it online.
My stock fixed coupler was from factory extremely misaligned. So fixed coupler is a no no for me. But if you get one that's well made, I agree is a better option.
Great video, really enjoyed it and learned a lot, but the motor with intergrated leadscrew is only £5 more expensive than the other combination options so I wouldn't call it financial masochism, plus you have fewer chances of user error
@ The end of the Video I was just about to watch "Curb Your Enthusiasm" and heard the theme song in your video, Magic. No idea how I got to this video, but you are entertaining. Thanks.
Please explain the jargon. What is PID tuning please ? Palm Nuts ? PID Tuning ? We beginners need explanations of technical terms we have not heard before. Thank you !
PID tuning fine tubes the electrical current running to the thermistor, the heater for the hotend. The tuning keeps the temperature steady, so there's minimum cooling / reheating of the hotend...creating as steady a temperature as possible.
The just about to be released, Ender 3 V3 with CoreXZ kinematics seems to be a good approach with no lead screws. How would CoreXZ compare to linear rails? Of course, the Ender 3 V3 is nearly double the cost of the Ender 3 V3 SE.
I found printable motor mounts to help with XY alignment online and upgraded to polymer lead screw nuts and old ham couplers. No more Z banding that appeared out of nowhere!!
So once again, purpose built items beat all; still though, there are issues sometimes caused by the print, and those can be frustrating to try to flush out..
z acceleration can also affect this issue try lowering it from the usually default value of 500 to 200/100 and you probably might reduced/eliminate the issue in a few of your configurations.
🎯 Key points for quick navigation: 00:23 *🛠️ Z banding is a common issue in 3D printers caused by mechanical problems with Gantry and lead screw.* 01:50 *🔩 Z binding can cause ribbing in prints due to missteps on z-axis lead screws.* 03:43 *🧽 Regular maintenance like cleaning and lubricating lead screws is essential to minimize Z banding.* 07:26 *🔧 Leveling Gantry and ensuring motor mounts are square can help reduce Z banding.* 09:33 *📏 Ensuring lead screws align with motor couplers is crucial to prevent Z banding.* 13:18 *⚙️ Consider the type of nuts used (brass vs. palm) and lubrication to reduce Z banding.* 16:54 *🏗️ Lead screw covers can protect the top of the lead screw while allowing rotation.* 18:49 *💲 Consider cost-effective solutions like oldham couplers and flexible couplers to address Z banding before opting for more expensive options.* Made with HARPA AI
Excellent video; Z-wobble can be a real PITA to resolve, especially for n00bs, so this should be a great resource. 👍 Technically, POM _does_ need lubrication, but, IIRC, only if it's loadbearing, which in this application is absolutely minimal. So, even though it's not required, a dab of PTFE or silicone lubricant should be fine. There are a few types of co-polymers of POM, such as POM-C which contains ~10% PTFE, so no lube at all would be necessary. 🤓 Oh¹, and *_Old Ham_* made me both laugh and cringe in equal proportions; it's pronounced as _hold 'em,_ but without the _H._ 😂😬 Oh², how I wish I could run this video through an audio filter to replace every _"ZEE"_ with a _"ZED",_ but that's a _me_ issue, lol. 😜 Subscribed!
Imo, spider coulplings are a terrible option for anything CNC. Adds extra play and backlash, which is not ideal (even compared to stock sleeves that are not of a great quality). They're great for something like a centrifugal pump coupling though, lol.
the lead screw in ender 3 series is 365mm. Nema stepper motor with integrated lead screw have a max length of 350. Can these missing 15 mm be a problem ?