Houston we have smoke

Community Support
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I have been preparing for a local Maker Faire next weekend, so I have been cutting a lot recently.
Our the past few days i have really noticed a lot more order in the room when I was cutting.

I thought it might have been coming from a small hole in the hose until today. I had been cutting several sheets of wooden coins with no issue, just some extra burning wood odor. Then when it started to cut the coins out smoke filled the room fairly quickly.

After closer investigation I noticed that it was coming out from around the top glass and all the gaps around the front door. I quickly taped those areas up and the smoke went away.

I had been cutting the same coins for the past few days with no smoke. Not sure if something caused a clog in the line or what. The outside vent is still opening normally and there is smoke venting out so I don’t think that is the cause.

My next step is to thoroughly clean the inside since I starting to see a lot of build up of some of the inside parts including the rear fan.

Anyone else experiencing this? or have any suggestions?

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There was a post about the rear fan getting all clogged up from residue and smoke. Led to smoke coming out the gaps in the GF. I’ll look it up.

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Thanks, I must have missed that post.

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And here it is:

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Wow, they really don’t make it easy to clean up the exhaust vent. That whole unit should be removable to make it possible to clear out all the build up.

I would also suggest they add cleaning it out regularly to the Cleaning, Service and Moving section of the support page. It would be a lot eaiser to keep clean if you dont let it get clogged.

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Yep, took me a while to figure it out. Liability probably requires the grill to prevent being able to touch an open fan. (Odd, since there will be a duct attached). What surprised me is it’s like 1/4" aluminum. The fan would be even more efficient without having a significant percentage of the area blocked by that grill.

Probably be the first mod I pull on my unit after the warranty turns into a pumpkin will be to open that up a bit. It will be a lot easier to clean.

After that massive box job you did I figured you would be next. It will be infrequent depending on usage, but it will happen. Just a matter of time.

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Update: I would guess that about 90% of my exhaust port was clogged. After cleaning it out as best as i could and giving the rest of the unit a good cleaning I am back up and running with almost no odor and no smoke.

I even did the flame test around the gaps and there appears to be no air coming out anymore. In fact it was pulling the flame in around some of the larger gaps.

@dan I think it would be really beneficial for everyone to and this to the maintenance section since it is easily overlooked.

Thanks @AhnoldZ and @PrintToLaser.

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Out in left field here…how exactly can we access the exhaust port, please? Detach the vent hose…and get to it from there? I just did my first all-lenses clean on Glowria a couple days ago…(she didn’t need much cleaning, but I’m not a power user like some of you are)…it would be good for me to add doing an exhaust port check/clean to the now-scheduled routine on my calendar…or maybe every other time. If I don’t schedule stuff like this on my calendar, I will forget.

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Yes, remove the flex duct and clean it from the rear. I had the best luck using a stiff piece of wire with a short 90° bend at the tip, poking around and sucking it out with a shopvac. It’s easy to do.

Most of it was an accumulation of smoke particulate, but also small bits of paper that the airflow sweeps back there.
If it’s easy to get to, a glance with a flashlight will tell if you need to do it, but an increase in smell in the work area will be a good indicator.

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Anybody remember pipe cleaners? I wonder if those wouldn’t do a prime job on the cleaning… :thinking:

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Thanks for that tip. It won’t be that easy to get to, but I’ll figure out a way.

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Seems like those would work well, but I’ve not yet seen the grill itself nor the gunk that needs to come out. My husband has pipe cleaners around here.

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They would work fine. It is a soft accumulation, comes right out. Just dislodge it and vacuum.

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Especially if you have cats as they will be instantly attracted to the pipe cleaners, and their fur will get the particulates out as cats are very statically charged…

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and if you have two cats, just rub them together a bit while shuffling your feet on carpet for a little extra charge.

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4 inch chimney brushes are available on Amazon

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I’m late to the conversation, and it’s been answered, but just for a little clairity for everyone else–any time you have smoke coming out of the unit, check your exhaust fan. the Glowforge keeps a negative pressure inside when it’s running (meaning air flows in and nothing else comes out). If anything comes out of the gaps/passthrough, etc., then negative pressure has been lost and you need to look very closely at your exhaust set up, starting with the exhaust fan :smile:

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