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PSA: Maybe don't buy these shitty extruders
(m.media-amazon.com)
I spent entirely way too much time trying to get one of these style extruders on my Ender 3. Maybe I picked a knock off without realizing it, maybe mine was just defective, I'm not entirely sure.
But it was ultimately the cause for my printer underextruding on certain layers. If you need a new extruder, go for something better than these cheap $20 ones and get an actually decent one.
But on the bright side, my printer is finally fixed! It feels nice to be able to get back into the hobby again.
Crap, I bought one of these and it worked well for a few months, but now my printer has been under extruding for a while and I couldn't figure out why. Do you have a better recommendation?
I ended up switching to this one:
https://store.micro-swiss.com/products/micro-swiss-bowden-dual-gear-extruder
I've heard good things about micro swiss, so hopefully this one will last.
I love my Micro Swiss dual gear extruder. I have some homemade filament made from PET bottles that won't print on a single gear extruder but prints perfectly on the dual gear extruder.
Awesome, thanks! Just ordered one off Amazon. Hoping this does the trick.
I'm a fan of Trianglelab's DDB V2.1. Sure it's fundamentally a clone, but at least they've made some improvements to it, and the original is really not worth the price Bondtech is charging for it.
It's a lot stronger than the Creality extruder and the single gear "all metal" red extruder, which makes extrusions more consistent. It can also print somewhat flexible filaments, at least if you slow down a little.
There are of course better and lighter extruders out there, but the DDB has the advantage that it can be used as a drop-in replacement on Enders etc., and if you want to mod the printer in the future it's compatible with most custom designs.
I have a Monoprice mini select V1 that I still use occasionally. It has a terrible extruder on it that can't handle anything. I put a better hot end on it and it runs much better.
I did the hot end because there are no aftermarket nozzles for the V1 Monoprice hot end that I'm aware of. Anyways, the better heating of the filament made the extruder skip less.
It won't make it amazing, but if you find a knockoff CHT nozzle for the printer. More efficient heating might flow more easily, reducing the pressure on the filament that the extruder has to overcome.