Cartridge Worn Out

Support & Troubleshooting Form 2
1

Anybody else had the ‘Cartridge Worn Out’ warning.

I have been refilling the cartridge with bottled formlabs resin whilst I wait for my next order in the UK to be delivered. (Uk only has bottled in stock)

But since the firmware update i keep getting two warnings.

  1. ‘Are you sure you have enough resin’ which is easy to bypass
    2.‘Cartridge Worn Out’ which is now a pain in the rear as I cannot continue to print till my new cartridges turn up. Formlabs say it is okay to refill the bottle but have they just changes their minds? Luckily delivery is coming tomorrow. But is there a way round it for tonight?
1 Like
2

Haven’t had that one yet - I hope it’s not some new adjustment to put people off filling tanks with 3rd party resins.

3

Interesting if true, since that change does not appear in the release notes for 1.5 and it would represent a further encroachment on our rights as users to do what we want with our printers, even if they might not be things FormLabs likes… disappointing.

4

Thanks for asking about the new warning message. In many tests, we’ve found that cartridges need to be replaced after they’ve been emptied. While it’s possible to refill a cartridge beyond one liter of resin the resin dispenser valve can fail, causing the machine to fill with resin in places where it really ought not to be. Several hours of carefully removing resin with a syringe only begins to fix the issue before other repair steps, none of which are terribly enjoyable (I’ve done it, I know).
As a possible alternative until you receive your new cartridge, you can enable “open mode” and manually fill the tank. You can read more about how open mode functions here: http://formlabs.com/support/printers/form-2/open-mode/. We’re diligently working on improving our supply chains so that products can be delivered faster. Until then, it would be best to manually fill the tank and avoid the risks associated with attempting to circumvent the “Cartridge Worn Out” warning.

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5

So what happens to the litre of genuine bottled resin have have poured into the old tank? Will the new firmware allow me to top up the new tank, because if not I think you owe be for a bottle of wasted resin. Could I ask as I am new to formlabs do you not announce changes to firmware?

I don’t want to try open mode as I am using genuine resin and I see no point in risking a failed print.

6

I started printing in Open Mode, since I have plenty of bottled resin from my Form1+ and my Form2 cartridges did not ship at the same time as the Form2. When the cartridges showed up, I too was worried about popping them in with resin already in the tank. But the resin level is sensed optically. The printer added a little from the cartridge to what was already in the tank, decided it was full, and started printing. No problem.

Also worth noting, the printer worked flawlessly with Tough resin in Open Mode. Now that I’m printing in “closed” mode with a genuine Tough cartridge, I can’t say the prints look any better to me… I wouldn’t be afraid of Open mode.

1 Like
7

Cheers for the Info Randy. I tried topping it up manually but then it said it was over full.

I will try open mode, or roll back to the old firmware.

8

@thirty6, if you topped it up manually and then it said overfull, you filled it too much and the sensor is detecting too much resin which can result in a spill. Use a syringe to remove a bit of resin from the tank and it should work fine. You are using Formlabs resin, correct?

9

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