I’ve had my forge for about a month. On day 2 I started getting air assist fan errors and it would only print for 5 seconds before stopping. I contacted Glowforge support and they determined through photos that everything seemed fine so they disabled the error. I’ve been printing fine since but I have noticed flare ups.
My flare ups have been getting pretty constant lately and so I reached out to FB groups, who thought my fan was dirty (I have cleaned it multiple times with very little dirt found and no noticeable difference after cleaning). I took video of my cuts and people alerted that it was definitely not normal and it looked like my fan wasn’t running. Reached out to support again, and they sent me a new carriage plate.
Now today, I’ve installed the new plate, did a test print and still getting flames and looking at video I’m trying to capture of my air assist fan, this one isn’t working either!!! What would cause my fan to not be moving? Is this something Glowforge controls to shut it off completely? It can’t be that I had a busted fan and then got a replacement busted fan so what else is going on here?
The fan is controlled by circuitry that extends from the main processor board through the white ribbon cable that connects to the printer head. From there, the circuitry extends through a small ribbon cable in the printer head, to a set of spring contacts at the bottom of the print head, then to corresponding contact pads on the carriage plate assembly, and finally to the 4-pin connector at the other end of the carriage plate assembly and the fan.
If any of the contact points are dirty, the fan will not function properly or the Glowforge will not see the fan as functioning properly. If any of the cable connectors or fittings are not correctly seated, this can possibly cause issues with the fan or the Glowforge’s ability to see and or control the fan.
Ugh, so there’s another half dozen things that could be wrong with it. I checked all the connectors and pins and they’re all functioning and clean so I’m not sure what the issue is. I hope they can determine a solution and quickly, I hate being down like this and unable to work.
The fan doesn’t run, I have video showing it doesn’t turn. And the new fan I got today is direct from Glowforge so I would doubt they’d send me a new part the wrong way.
I’m so sorry to hear that you’re continuing to run into the same behavior, even after replacing the Carriage Plate Assembly. I appreciate you taking the time to send over a recording of the behavior you are seeing while printing.
I’ve extracted the log files from your Glowforge to review your most recent prints, and checked the speed of the Air Assist Fan. I’d like to review a photo of the new Carriage Plate, to ensure everything is performing correctly.
Could you please follow the instructions here and send over a photo similar to the one below?:
