Good morning forum,
Last night I was printing a simple design on my glowforge basic and during the print the gf stopped firing the laser, moving servos, and powering the fan; it was acting like power was off but it was in fact still on. I looked at the app for print progress to see if there were any errors and it was still counting down the timer on the print as if it were still printing. The outlet still has power and I even tried another one with verified power to no avail, my gf still won’t work and comes up as offline on the app. Sounds like it may be a power supply issue to me as nothing is working electrically but I’m not a glowforge expert (contacted support but waiting for a reply). Has anyone else seen something like this while I wait for support?
Thank you,
James
Uh-oh! You might want to check all the cable connections at the write up here, but otherwise it sounds like something support will need to look into.
Also, just FYI, by posting here in “Problems and Support” you’ve opened another support ticket. For future reference, it’s best to do one or the other (post here or email), not both, as creating duplicate tickets can slow things down. (Plus they’ll just close this one and we won’t get to find out what the issue was to add to our own knowledge!)
The fan that cools the electronics on the right side would run at idle with a bad cable connection to the lid, head, or even the left side circuit board. Only two possibilities that I can think of: no power to the GF; or a failure at or near the internal protection circuitry. If there is power at the GF end of the electric supply cord and there are no lights or sound inside then it’s on to Support.
Thank you for your response! The fan that you’re speaking of isn’t the exhaust fan but a very small fan on the other side by the power switch correct? If I open the lid and stick my head in I can hear a very quaint sound which almost sounds like a buzz coming from inside of the metallic box directly behind the power on/off switch. When I turn off the GF the quaint sound fades away after 30 seconds to 1 minute which would make sense if that’s a fan making the noise. I know the outlet has power so that’s out. I’m really hoping that it’s just a loose connector somewhere but I didn’t find one in my initial check over.
Thanks I did not know that!
Thanks Jules, I will check tonight when I get home!
Yes. But, for most people, that fan is very easy to hear. As soon as you turn the unit on it’s obvious. I apologize for saying this, but I’ve worked around jet aircraft all my life. Not too long I might be stone deaf. If your hearing is normal the fact that you only hear a very faint buzzing inside doesn’t seem good. That fan runs always at the same speed and loudness. If I power down the fan noise dies in a second or two. Not sure what would take 30s to stop. Something more serious?
That fan is the air intake–if the right side of the machine is blocked, or a loose piece of paper is stuck under the right side of the machine, your unit cannot draw in sufficient air for the cooling & exhaust system to function, and this might be contributing to your problem! (Worth a check, as I found out the hard way, too!).
I see you already emailed us about this and we’re working on it there, so I’m going to close this topic.