Been printing for 2 months with 91% success. Yesterday i changed clear resin and tank to a new black resin and new tank.
I started a print, and while preparing and heating, i noticed that printer says “unused” under the tank.
After heated to 30 degrees, it was stuck on filling tank yet nothing was coming out of the cartridge. i waited 15 minutes, and nothing.
I aborted the print and removed cartridge and inspected it. Nothing strange was found. Removed the tank and inspected it, and found nothing strange. Reinstalled cartridge and restarted the print, and this time it did fill the tank but i noticed that it filled it above the max line. None the less it stopped filling and the print started.
About 3 hours through the print, i checked on the printer and found that it had stopped and a message on the display said “motor jammed please check for obstructions”, and no error code was given.
I looked at the print and found a DISASTER!!
The tank had over flowed and spilled resin all over the printer and inside the crevasses flowing into the printer and seeping out of the bottom edges of the base towards the outside.
I immediately took pictures the started cleaning, and found that the resin cartridge was dripping one drip every about a second into the tank causing it to overflow i think.
The glass optical window had resin on it, i cleaned the resin then i cleaned the glass as instructed by Formlabs, but although i got the glass cleaned, now there are streaks on it that wont go away.
I will inspect the mirror area and take pictures and post them later.
Anyway there is resin inside the printer and its aluminum frame and all over the table. Its a mess!
Anybody had an issue like this?
jimy_f_84
Improvements happen from errors and disasters.
I am sure Formlabs will investigate and work on solving this issue.
It seems to me that with the Form 2 there are more Moving parts.
To me, the more moving parts, the more issues that will occur.
I am sure Formlabs will get you up and running soon.
I hope!!!
Thanks for sharing your experience.
Sorry to see this happen, I own a Form 2 and this is the second time I have seen a post like this. I will definitely follow this post to see what you determine was the cause. I do not what this to happen, as your post title suggests it is a DISASTER.
Mike
Scout Design & MFG
Yeah i opened a support ticket with Formlabs and will see what they suggest.
I will keep you guys posted!
I performed a test print after i cleaned up as much as i can. And as expected the results were bad.
Would you say this is the result of a bad cartridge?
My though is that it is a bad cartridge as i found it dripping into the tank when i found that all this had happened.
But also when the printer was preparing the print it filled the tank over the max line which i though was not right.
Good luck I had this problem. Mine was caused by a large print coming off the build plate and fouling the wiper which then wiped resin over the side of the tank. The printer kept filling to the line and the wiper kept splashing resin over the side. As you say it was a disaster. Get in touch with support they were really helpful and have clean-up instructions etc.
Man this is sad to hear. I hope Formlabs help you solve this problem and get you up and running soon.
Looks like it’s a faulty valve on the cartridge, I hope Formlabs will fix this for you–a lot of the limitations of the printer are so that they can avoid user error so when something does go wrong like that you know that it’s not your fault.
Thank you guys for the replies. I am sad as i was using the printer every day and i had beautiful results and i am so in love with it.
Formlabs sent me a cleaning procedure that i am working on at this point, but some of the steps involve taking it apart and breaking the warranty seals, which i am so weary about doing since its a month and half old and still under warranty.
Anyway here are some pictures i took. The cartridge may have a bad valve as it keeps dripping out the bottom all the time.
It seems to me that Formlabs should take some responsibility for this failure and at minimum offer to do a factory cleaning without interruption of your warranty. This cartridge valve is an old design which is known to be problematic on other machines that are not 3d printers. I also suspect that these resin cartridges are supplied by a 3rd party supplier and Formlabs may need to work on quality control with that supplier.
Mike A.
Scout Design & MFG
mlabird, They are so far!
Formlabs had me disassemble the printer (i made sure for the record that they know the printer is a month and half old and under warranty) and clean and drain the resin and there was A LOT in there.
It was on the electronics and power supply and optical window and on and on 
This is painful to see. 
Yep. Happened to me only 1 week in with a grey cartridge. It dumped 1/4 liter of resin into the printer, All over the laser housing and fried something as the printer would never level. Luckily I have the advanced support and they sent me a new printer. Still lost $75 worth or resin though, Out of curiosity I put the empty cartridge in the new printer and it would not register Said it was empty but when I took it out of the old printer it registered 1/3 full, I was testing as I may be buying a second printer and wanted to see if I can swap cartridges between different printers but it looks like you can’t.
I had made a suggestion that they put a drain hole in the back of the printer so when this does happen it drains out the back into a puke can… I will be making my own so this doesn’t happen to me again My comment never even warranted a reply so I guess mission critical changes are not of the highest priority.
Here is my original post if anyone cares aka “FORMLABS”
Thanks for sharing the pix. Ugh. It is painful to see all that. Please update us when things settle down.
Yeah, I think if that happens the printer is pretty much trashed, you’re never going to get it cleaned enough when it goes everywhere.
billiejean,
Sounds very similar to my problem. Sorry to hear that.
Part of perfecting a product is the disasters that happen and taking care of the, but Formlabs support have been very good so far.
I just repacked the printer and i am sending it back as soon as i get the shipping label.
I am hoping i get a new printer because this is not a fix for a mechanical or an electronic issue. This is an issue to witch its very difficult to return the printer to the original shape it was in before the problem.
I will keep updating this as we go…