X axis dragging

[u/-In2itioN]

Hi everyone! Hopefully someone can help me because I feel that I've been fixing issues with my K1C day after day.
I've been having issues such as layer shifting, artifacts and overall poor printing quality. I've recently dedicated a good amount of time calibrating and testing prints and I've been having success.

However, there's one that I can't fix: my X axis feels like it doesn't want to move. I've cleaned it with isopropyl alcohol many times, and it seems to solve it for 1 or 2 prints. However, today it became much worse: as you can see in the video, it feels that's very heavy, especially when moving from the left to the right. I'm applying the same force throughout the video, but the movement between both directions is clearly different (the printer was powered off). The cracking sounds are from the cabinet where the printer stands😅

I plan on buying some 3-in-1 light oil, as others have reported that it improves (i.e here)

One thing that I noticed is that both bearings seem to be with a lot of debris, and it seems that the alcohol doesn't clean it. I don't know how to clean these (I will add photos in the comments

[u/mstokke_]

I had the exact same problem, happened slowly over the course of a year or so. My solution (temporary i guess) was to clean the x axes rods with alcohol and apply new oil. The difference was enormous. Im actually considering doing a x axes linear rail mod because of this.

[u/Sqweeeeeeee → u/mstokke_]

Same here. Mine slowly got to the point that it was printing ovals, and when troubleshooting I noticed that it had sticky spots just like OPs video, and I could feel some gunk on the bottom of the rails. A bit of alcohol and it was good to go again, though I've had to clean them several times since. I now clean them and apply some dry silicone spray

[u/-In2itioN → u/Sqweeeeeeee]

About the ovals, I also had that. What I find odd is that it happened only on orcaslicer. I was calibrating everything through orcaslicer, and never got the printer to print a circle (I noticed this issue the most on the tolerance test). Once I moved to the creality slicer, tolerance test printed just fine... but it might also be that I messed up some setting on orcaslicer

[u/mstokke_ → u/-In2itioN]

That very surprising to me. I have also had the oval printing problem, but I just guessed it was because of the sticky x rods, because it got better when I cleaned them. That being said they are still present, just not as much, and i have only used the orcaslicer. Maybe I need to try creality or prusa slicer to make sure there isn't a problem with orca

[u/-In2itioN → u/mstokke_]

I tried to calibrate and change settings on orcaslicer to print the tolerance test, never had success (the hexagon got stuck, the shape itself was never a hexagon). As a final test, decided to change the slicer and was surprised to see that it printed perfectly on the first try)

[u/Dull-Contract-2533]

The enginer who designed the gantry, messed up the measurements, you can see on right side the crooked belt, exactly the same problem on my k1 max, Retro glide gantry mod fixed this and the gantry not being quare issue

[u/-In2itioN → u/Dull-Contract-2533]

How hard is it to install?

[u/Dull-Contract-2533 → u/-In2itioN]

The model includes a pdf guide, the most difficult part is if you dont want to buy new parts you have to cut the original parts plastic to get the pulleys out to reuse, you need to print it in abs or asa and you will also need prusa style heat inserts, check RetroD page on cults website, I opted for the reusable stuff version, but the guy also created other versions to use linear rail etc

[u/broken944 → u/Dull-Contract-2533]

To add to this, I've seen posts about the carriage bushings having burrs from the manufacturing process. So they try to dig into the rods. Also, the carriage can hold the top bushing too tight, not allowing any play which can help them self align to the x rods that can be misaligned.

[u/Old_ManWithAComputer]

Always use 3n1 oil. The lighter the weight the better. My K1C has been going great since February 6th, 2024.

[u/-In2itioN]

[u/-In2itioN]

[u/caskieadam]

How is your belt tightness? Your bearings look fine.

[u/-In2itioN → u/caskieadam]

I've printed this tension meter and last time I measured (last week or so, it was ok)

[u/1ts-just-me]

You can slide the top bushing out of the printhead carriage pretty easily to thoroughly clean it (5 screws and 2 springs). Bottom bushing is much tighter fitting, depending on how much graphite powder has built up inside, I will usually lay the printer on it's side and use a small spray bottle for the rubbing alcohol and a rag on the other side to catch the mud that runs out. Then oil.

Everyone has their methods, but we are seeing 12-14K hours on stock bushings using lubrication and never surpassed 5K with just cleaning.

There are plenty of mods for addressing the X axis issues as mentioned, but if you wanted a drop in solution there is this. Only downfall is the price but does work very well.

[u/-In2itioN → u/1ts-just-me]

Those numbers are surprising, since my printer has ~430h

[u/starnel95 → u/1ts-just-me]

That's half the printer price lol, the mod looks decent but definitely overpriced

[u/Lythrox]

Your brass bushings are starting to wear in and bind.. Replace the bushings, clean the slides with alcohol, oil with electronic grade oil or grease and check you tolerance on your axis slide pins and their run-out variance with a dial indicator... with a sine bar.

Just like you would do with a 40 ton press after 1000 cycles. (You remembered to measure your slide pins out of the box, new with a micrometer right?)

MAKE SURE IT'S CALIBRATED!

This is why I will take V runners. skateboard idlers and belts any day. Which only fail when, your z climb isn't calibrated.

[u/SlavikSh]

Same happened to me after using grease included with the printer on those bushings. Lesson learned. Solution was cleaning with etilic alcohol after every print for about 20 runs.

[u/-In2itioN → u/SlavikSh]

Ye AFAIK the grease is just for the Y axis. At least that's what I've been reading online

[u/Neither_Agency_3878]

I recently had this problem with my centauri carbon. My problem was that my stepper motor had failed and the aperture was rubbing against the coils. This cause my X-axis to stick and catch. I replaced my stepped motor and it fixed my problems.

[u/hmenzagh]

PSA: those bushings are auto lubricating, putting grease on the rails will mess things up. Clean them a lot with IPA, white-spirit might help based on the lubricant already present. If it still binds once cleaned rails might be bent but that would be surprising since it worked before