Ender 3 Connectors are burning up... Bad XT60's
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 10 ก.ย. 2024
- Some users of Ender 3's have had their printer's power connector burn up. Why anyone would crimp an XT60 is beyond me... please check yours!
Amass XT60's for replacement - amzn.to/2M2OOQZ
Soldering Jig (super handy) - amzn.to/2SLqV2I
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I’ve now had two Ender 3’s that have caught fire at the plugs. Not just turn black, but actually caught on fire. The amazon company I bought them from took my first one back immediately (though I had to fight for them to pay for shipping). Second one just happened a few days ago. I have a third Ender that’s showing no signs of this issue. The two that did catch on fire had just a BLtouch mod and no other mods.
Erg. That's insane, I was hoping no one would say that...! Seriously though, glad it wasn't worse. All of these issues seem to be batch related, and totally random regarding what the end user will actually receive.
Maker's Muse yeah I wondered if it was a batch issue. The Ender 3 that replaced the first has had almost identical issues across the board as the first one, down to the plug catching fire. My third one though (which runs along side the other) has been a champ. I’ve had to do next to no tweaks to get it to print great.
@@blackwolfecc Which version of the ender 3 do you have? I have the V3.3 and have had it for some months without issues now, hoping nothing will happen :P
Wow that's completely unacceptable😡
Were any Ender 3's produced with 12V supplies powering a 12V heater (which would run at ~19A, assuming a 220W heater), or did this happen on 24V units (
I’m beginning to believe this has more to do with bad solder joints. The discoloring is at the solder joints not the center connector. Bad/cold solder joint or solder joint that does include all strands of the wire can produce higher resistance which at high current produces heat.
Do you have any measuring gear for resistances that low? You could be right.
I though during the beginning of the video you would test with a multimeter.
I would not think so. The discoloration is in there because the connector pin is touching the Nylon in that area. The heat from the bad Connection will spread quite some distance...
I just remembered, XT60s becoming loose and turning Brown is a relatively common issue in race quads. Typically when the contacts wear out.
My guess is that the plastic gets discolored close to the solder joint, because that is where it is in contact with the hot pin. @4.30: If the wire had been soldered all the way down to the full circular part of the pin, the heat transport to the wire would have been much better, and may in best case have prevented heat problems. No doubt this is a poor quality connector, though.
Yeaahh I’m so glad you’re spreading the word... If you use the “original” and then use the “fake” it’s a night and day difference, it’s actually unbelievable how bad the “fake” one looks and feels side by side. I’m sure you would be very frustrated and calling them “fake” too (absolutely horrible rubbish). The Nylon on the fake also melts easily like a normal cheap plastic while the original one can handle heat and solder very well. The contacts also feel different like showed in this video. Personally I would recommend always solder XT60, XT90 or any other plastic injected soldered connectors always connected with the other matching side so there’s no risk of pins melting and losing alignment. I have that same red soldering jig/base but holding male/female connected together on a small vice you get better results.
So much POWEEEEEERRR
Awful. Been working on this, it's right before Chinese New Year so progress is slow going. Will make sure it's fixed.
You're a hero Naomi. It seems to be a single batch which is affected, but that batch had many machines in it... :(
Thank you Naomi, for your effort!
The issue that I forsee is that some of the printers in question are not from Creality and instead from another manufacturer like Sansmart or Comgrow.
@@MakersMuse as far as I know the wiring harnesses are subcontracted. I'm suspicious it was specced right, then the subcontractor decided to pad his pockets a little. Still Creality's fault, but this kind of thing happens consistently. They would not notice the difference in the cheaper harness, but that's no excuse for not pulling 1/1000 printers off the line and doing a 100 hour burn in.
good form ^.^ check this fan issue i've noticed th-cam.com/video/CB-HGN_1lOc/w-d-xo.html
Always tin the wire first before sticking it in the hole, make sure the tin soked through.
bit of liquid flux helps too, but I don't feel like a pro enough to demonstrate my technique!
@@MakersMuse , yes flux is essential as it stops hot tin oxidizing and makes the joint better.
@@MakersMuse For like 5 years I thought I just sucked at soldering technique until someone tipped me off that flux is important. After buying a cheapo pot of plumbers flux from Home Depot, I realize how easy it could have been this whole time.
@@snickerdoooodle Beware of corrosive fluxes. For electronics, you want a "no-clean" flux (even though you will often clean it off). Plumber's flux probably contains acids that will slowly corrode your joints, components and boards.
@@MakersMuse hey, there's nothing wrong with it, I'm a drone person and Ive seen hundreds of ways people solder xt60's on fourms and youtube
All those solder joints looked really bad.
You need to wick the solder into your wire first (called tinning the wire), then flow some solder onto the surface of the plug (do not fill up the plug, you only want some solder on the surface of it), then insert the "tinned" wire to the plug and add heat to the plug and feed solder into the wire as it heats up. This is the only way you make a solder connection to a XT60. If you are not experienced at soldering large connectors it is recommended to have a connector plugged into the XT60 when soldering to ensure the pin can't warp if you accidentally add too much heat (so support the connector your are working on with it's partner plugged into it). Most videos on youtube show you the WRONG way to solder an XT60 so beware.
Thank you for your explanation! For me it is enough, but I am wondering if you think about making a Video of how to do it the right way? Again, thank you very much! :)
THIS should go to the top. It is a great description.
Filling the connection with tin will make it harder to solder, and the risk of cold soldering will be much higher. Especially if you don't wick the wire.
The parts that you will solder should be "wetted" first with electronic soldering flux. It is much easier to get a proper soldering when the parts are fluxed then without. As someone mentioned, don't use the wrong soldering flux, as it got acid in it and will corrode the electronic soldering.
The order of applying heat is important if you want to make a good solder.
0) Use flux on the parts.
1) Wick the wire. Here you can use more heat, so you get good smooth flow between the tin and wire strands. Don't fill the wire with too much tin. You can feel how long the tin has gone up in the wire. If too long, just cut to length (about 1 cm should be ok).
2) Add enough heat to the connector, so that the tin is flowing smooth into the connection, but no more. Don't use to much tin, just so it gets on the surface. As mentioned, ad the other part of the connection as fixture and to remove heat. Can make it easier to not overheat the connector.
3) When the previous step is ok, while stil heating, add the wire. Now the connection surfaces are tinned and the heat needed to make the connection is easier. Top up with tin so that the connection is filled up, this is why you should not use to much tin earlier. But just fill so you get get a smooth tin solder between the connection and wire. Not to much or to cold, as it then will build up a blob with tin. That is cold soldering and makes a bad, high resistance connection. That is no better then the original ones in the video.
4) When the soldering have cooled of, you can remove flux with some tissues in alcohol or even water.
Inspect the soldering, and the "flow" from the connection to the wire should be smooth. It should NOT be a sharp step between the metal connection and wire, with a blob of tin on the wire or connection. That is a cold soldering, and is a bad connection. Both mechanical and electrical.
If that happen, unsolder the wire, put flux on the parts and redo the operations.
Sorry for repeating what you wrote, but this is important, as we could not have cold soldering, as it will certainly make the connections heat up, and even catch fire again.
Yes, there are plenty of videos showing of good electronic solders here at TH-cam.
I'm glad to see I'm not the only one distressed by the soldering advice in the video. This description is excellent.
Yeah im about to soldier a battery to these connectors, I was a welder in my late teens, A long ass time ago, lol, Still its completely diff than holding an arc welder, Or even mig, Having to hold the soldier wire with the soldier in the other hand, Im not very good at doing, Is there any little tips that will make it easier, The soldier wire is from a cheap soldier off ebay, I never learn i always do it buying cheap that messes up to easy, lol, Its for a bafang mid motor so i dont really want to mess things up, An catch fire while im blipping down the street, I will defo connect connectors together before i soldier it, Cheers, Glad i read it....
OMG. Just had a look at mine, and it has started to burn out. I've cut open mine, and yes there are crimped on, burnt on the + Terminal. Looks like I'll get them changed and soldered the right way. Thanks for this video. You have just saved a house from burning down.
To be more specific the internal contacts of the connector is what is causing the heating. The soldering of the wires to the connector is good. The connectors are bad and not capable of carrying the current. My connector was getting warm. I removed the connector by cutting the red and black wires and then soldered the red to red and black to black and used heat shrink tubing to insulate the connections. The wires are now cold. The heated bed heats up faster, the hot end heats up faster. The fans run at a constant speed and I even think the steppers sound happier.
Angus starting to look like he has the printers solely to make new guitar picks for everyone in his emo band.
I dig it.
Lol
He got style man 😎 actually I liked his outfit!
I appreciate you taking time to do a thorough PSA, even though its not what you want to do. Says a lot about your character and how much you care about the community.
Thanks. It's just 3D Printing at the end of the day, but I'd be absolutely destroyed if someone got hurt - especially if they were inspired to buy one because of me.
"And this seems to be...soldered"
Don't sound too disappointed; -)
Honestly it's a relief haha
@@MakersMuse lol, no doubt. I woke up to this video's title then glanced nervously at my Ender 3. Four more hours until my overnight print finishes.
"Surely my house won't burn down because I wanted to print a sexy elf ballerina..."
But I thought the bigger issue here is that they are using fake XT60 connectors? Not whether they are soldered or crimped?
OK, thanks mate. Just checked mine, it is catching brown color and is hot as hell, can't keep it in hands..gonna replace it. Saved my apartment, thanks bro.
Watt? I'm absolutely ex-static that you were able to figure this out for us. That's pretty shocking. Thank you Angus for being our Sherlock Ohms. Hopefully they take these suggestions without too much resistance, because the current situation is getting out of hand.
Snickerdoodle lol
This needs to be a top comment!
You must surely be a dad :D
Very nice 😀
hahaha dad post of the year award goes to this post
My E3 Pro was soldered but burned. We crimp wires a lot for automotive use. So I went that route with 3m butt crimp connectors. It's been cool as a cucumber ever since.
Solder will always conduct better but creates a rigid joint, so sometimes creeping is a better choice for durability.
So I went to go check my cables after smelling something funny while printing, and what I saw was the XT60 connectors all burnted up and very hot to even touch. Thankfully there wasnt a fire. On further inspection, it was indeed crimped and not solder. I bought the Amass XT60 connectors the very same day and soldered them on the proper way. Connectors no longer gets hot. Thank you so much for this video
I replaced mine today. My new Ender 3 connector was getting warm (not hot), but I thought I'd replace it anyway after seeing the many reports. One side was soldered while the other was crimped. I also noticed the same colour difference between the two connectors. Definitly a low cost upgrade worth making. Thanks for the video.
Is there any chance you could share a photo with me of the crimped connector? I'd love to see how they actually tried to do it. Twitter is good as is email sales(at)makersmuse(dot)com cheers!
@@MakersMuse Sure - I'll send you an email shortly.
Have you noticed that they are actually soldered on the wrong way round! The “MALE” is supposed to be on the PSU and NOT on the lead to the board as is the case with these creality printers-if you want clarification look at which half is on a lipo (the power source). They are done that way for safety so you can’t short the battery (or PSU) out with anything metallic.
YES! I was wondering but it's been a while since I looked at my batteries.. erg that'll be funny if someone plugs a battery into the PSU.
Isn't it easier to short the male ones? You just put a screwdriver in there, and shorted. To short the female connectors, you would need an U-shaped thing. I don't work with batteries, but usually female connectors are on the power-providing side of things, and male on the appliances, power cord for example.
Mark the FEMALE is the one that the MALE fits inside-a very common mistake people make (identifying Male/Female connectors) the MALE XT60 is on the Battery. HOWEVER if you use “deans” connectors they put the “FEMALE” on the battery.
I think we mixed the genders up but the outcome is the same... the 'easy to short' connector is on the PSU and just looked it up and those one are Male.
There's not actually a right or wrong way you can use them any way you choose
still a poor soldering job, the connector hasnt been heater properly if at all
And the wire on the closeup wasn't pushed down to the bottom, into the dent. It's just soldered up near the top end.
THANKS! This is a bad soldering job, Its more like glued on to it. To the top with your comment!
If you heat them too much, the pin melts the plastic and it moves. That's why when I solder them I plug it into its pair first, and that holds the pin in place in case it wants to move. Also adds a bit more thermal mass.
Still my favourite connector - great for making distribution blocks, parallel combiners or Y connectors.
@@ahaveland yup, which is why they probably skipped on some,
You are right, XT60 and others needs more time to heat to solder it properly.
Thanks for the heads up, Angus. My brother in law picked up an ender 3 a few months ago and I just sent this on to him and encouraged him to check the XT60’s.
I watched this video and immediately went to my basement to check the XT60 connector on my Ender 3 which I received as a gift a few years ago. Turns out, I had an official Amass XT60 on my machine, which I had never paid attention to or modified before.
There is actualy no such thing as 'fake' XT60's.. HobbyKing wants others to allso use these, so they allow Anyone to manufactur them..
Offcourse they indeed need to be Soldered to the wires :)
True, fake probably isn't the right word nor is knock off... but 'inferior' might be a good descriptor!
Yep.. that's the word :)
Indeed not knock off, but if you pay nuts... ;-)
That said, the Ender 3 is a fantastic base to build and improve on. I enjoy mine very much.
If you use the “original” and then use the “fake” it’s a night and day difference, I’m sure you would be very frustrated and calling them fake. Absolutely horrible rubbish that easily melts
BrunoPOWEEER Point made by DutchRC Adventures it’s just a standard type connection which is also heavily used within the RC community. So there isn’t really a original one and neither a fake one. There are just solid and well crafted connectors and the not so solid ones which are build to a grade it can barely up to half of the intended specs.
And these kind of printers should never be running leaving unattended for a long time. They are prone to all kind of failures. Just the nature of these type of printers. And it wouldn’t surprise me very much if the early production runs have more issues regarding quality control than the later production runs. I have mine used pretty intensive over a period 6 months up ‘till know and I regularly disassemble the printer for modding and maintenance and never ran into some issues others experienced. No loose connectors on the mainboard, no melting solder on wires in those screw connectors, no melting XT60 connector while printing with the hotbed on 80 degrees celsius and hotend on 250 degrees celsius.
It’s like BMW 5 series, most of them won’t catch fire. But if you have one which catch fire it sucks.
If you notice, the female fakes are also tubes. I've never seen a completely hollow xt60 female before. That could also cause heat and resistance since there's less material to transmit the current.
Yes, they are supposed to be milled out from two sides, not hollow. I don't think this actually limits the current, as there really is plenty of metal there either way, but what it does is limit the amount of solder and heat you can apply before solder flows inside the connector where it would interfere with the male plug. Obviously they wouldn't let it come to that, but that goes half way to explain the sub-par solder job where the solder doesn't even wet the cup properly. Other thing that comes to mind is that shoddy knockoff XT series connector sheaths are frequently made from a lower temperature grade of Nylon that gets soft at soldering temperatures, which also leads to sub-par soldering as they're trying to not melt the sheath.
I just got an Ender 3 Pro yesterday and Creality has fixed many things on their printer. For example the control box fan is no longer facing upwards and the extruders heating block has a silicone sock on it. I just checked and they have also upgraded to genuine Amass connectors so hopefully people don’t have to worry about this issue anymore!!
Excellent video as ever Angus. I am a design engineer and have designed several connectors and am interested in the Ender 3 so this got may attention.
My suggestion to any owners would be to see if the connector they have gets hot when the bed is heating - if it is uncomfortably hot - and certainly if they can see any discolouring of plastic - to replace the connector with one from a reputable source or an alternative such as splicing the wires together. If they are not confident at soldering then a screw terminated connector, or terminal block, of 60A rating would work. This assumes the connector is correctly specified for the application - i.e. the current draw is less than 60A.
Based on your video the most likely fault seems to be the plugging connection - you demonstrated the low mating force compared to a good connector. The soldering may be faulty but I cannot tell from the pictures.
The most likely problem areas are: 1) The geometry of the male/female generating insufficient normal force. 2) The contact material and/or plating being poor leading initial high resistance or a shortened life. 3) The plastic being inadequate for the temperature reached.
Hopefully this problem is a faulty batch so limited in scope. In general, from my experience, connector design is not simple and it is easy to produce a poor quality connection if designs are copied without understanding the engineering and design intent behind them.
[Edit: the responses below develop this topic considerably] Angus, usually your videos are very informative, but in this case could we take a breath and NOT spread the rumor that someone has been crimping XT60s? Has ANYONE shown a photo of a factory crimped XT60? Because none of the "crimped XT60" stories I've seen has shown one. For a factory, crimping those connectors would be a pain, while soldering them is easy. The wiring side of the XT60 is not long enough to crimp with a crimp tool (crimping usually requires individual pins that are crimped to the wire then inserted into the connector shell, which is not how the XT60 is made). And crushing with pliers is not crimping, and will fail rather quickly, not to mention the wire will just pull out. So I think the crimp story is bogus, and while everyone and his 3D printed dog is repeating the story, it's distracting from the real cause, whatever that turns out to be.
The picture from the post in the video shows they've been crimped...
There's loads of photo examples on the Ender 3 Facebook group - just search XT60 crimped. Here's two crap hotlinks that'll probably expire soon - scontent-syd2-1.xx.fbcdn.net/v/t1.0-9/48355972_10156129996482055_305851647714656256_n.jpg?_nc_cat=102&_nc_ht=scontent-syd2-1.xx&oh=6fd0b140067f7603f9d1e2a11440325d&oe=5CBF72B0
scontent-syd2-1.xx.fbcdn.net/v/t1.0-9/48430246_10156527225685342_263703213788626944_n.jpg?_nc_cat=104&_nc_ht=scontent-syd2-1.xx&oh=1f1d0da2d60dcb62232e2c0175d08d1f&oe=5CD86C8D
Here are links that don't expire:
imagebin.ca/v/4T9ghThLj6j6
imagebin.ca/v/4T9go2Cq4c6W
From the looks of it they didn't even use a proper crimping tool (which makes sense, as connectors won't fit in any of the standard ones). Instead it looks like some makeshift/impromptu tool made little square dimples on either side.
@@MakersMuse Thanks for posting those pics. One of those pics (with the single exposed joint) indeed does look like the back side of a crimp... what is happening on the other side.. does it have the half-open solder-cup cylinder? If not, then maybe it's a bad copy that is actually intended for crimping. (Not to say that's a good idea, nor well tested, etc). The other pic with two exposed joints... looks to me like it might be soldered, hard to tell.
@@ultrapwner At what time stamp do you see a crimped connection?
Thanks Angus for telling us that. I don’t have an ender 3 but some of my friends. I’ll have to check them before they burn down their house.
Holy hell Angus, can't thank you enough for this video. Went to have a look at my Ender 3 after this, to find a fused mess of a connector, one side of the heat shrink had actually melted away it got so hot, as well as fusing the "XT60" together. And surprise surprise, they'd been crimped... Not cool Creality, not cool
My connector has burned up recently. So, now I'm gonna learn how to solder. Thanks!
Glad I saw this. I’ve only been into 3D printing for a couple months and this video is 2 years old. (As of March 2021)
Glad I’m doing my own wiring for everything because I wanted to move the electronics to an external enclosure on my Ender 3. I’m no expert but at least I can solder a connector properly lol
I found this problem in a week after buying ender 3 as I arranged the wiring when the bed was heating.
And I immediately noticed that the wires were more hot than the connector
So I opened up power supply and the body and doubled the connectors and and the wires from the power supply to board it fixed it very well.
I'm glad you're being so persistent on the quality control issues, Angus. Since getting involved in with 3D printers 3 years ago, I've been really shocked by the number of apologists and enablers who make excuses for this. Their usual justification is something like "Well, what do you expect for this low price?", or "Us 3D makers love to tinker and modify our machines." None of these folks understand that bad design and bad quality control ultimately damage the popularity of 3D printing and reduce participation in it.
Not only that, but if someone buys one of those printers, they could very well burn their house down. Quality control issues are one thing, but faulty connectors/power delivery in general is a much larger issue.
Yes he is correct! However I know and most people that have done anything with connectors one crimped the connection can and usually is deformed! I HAVE A ENDER 3 AND I WILL BE CHANGING THE PLUGS CRIMPED OR SOLDERED! I am not a paranoid type but after years of working with truck trailer and RC BOATS CARS AND AIRCRAFT. I HAVE SEEN THE OUTCOME OF JUST ONE BAD CONNECTION. Good job bringing this to the public attention! Thank you.
My Ender 3 happened to shut off in front of me(mid-print) because the 24V ground wire was faulty. It was actually in the middle of the wire somewhere. So, I just installed 14AWG power wires instead, and I happened to change out the XT60 too. Now I'm super glad I did.
Edit: Mine were crimped, and not soldered.
A GOOD crimped joint is better than a solder joint. I think you where right pointing out that the problem may be a loose connection between the two parts of the connector.
XT series connectors aren't designed for crimp connections.
Wild how this has only just popped up - as a heavy user of xt-60, xt-30 and xt-90 for various drone projects, I noticed how insanely cheap they looked 10 minutes into the ender 3 build.
Instead of replacing, possibly just remove the connector all together? Once it’s assembled I don’t really see the need for a connector.
Also thanks for the safety message, gives me more insensitive prevent it from happening
I just checked my Ender 3 and it has crimped connections on both ends. I bought it on December 3/2018. I was more concerned that I could pull back the heat shrink tubing and push it back. On the other hand, if the connector were too hot the shrink tubing would not be able to be pulled back and be slightly grayed as I've seen on overloaded joints in the past. The crimp looked solid and was a 4 point crimp. I only do PLA, so my bed is not above 60 but I have done 10 HR prints. Since there was no discolouring on the plastic I'm just going to keep an eye on this and post if I see anything show up. Every owner should use their own discretion. Thanks for passing this on and the heads up!
We've known for a long time in the RC world about cheap knockoff XT60's burning up (cause as you know, we use them on the LIPO packs and on big RC units, they can pull a lot of sustained power).
I would wager its the same problem and its because of the same 2 issues. 1: They're knock offs and all the issues that go with that as you described, ie contact pressure, contact surface, material type, etc. But issue 2 is i would say the solder joints are iffy. You got a couple of good ones, but there was a couple there that looked iffy (that first one?) and this goes back to issue 1: Poorly copied. With original XT60's, you fill the terminal completely with solder then drop in the wire (preferrably pretinned to help with the wicking), but obviously thats not possible with those terminals because they're open ended and the solder would just flow down all over the spring end of the terminal.
But again, this is a known thing in RC stuff, and tbh considering where the printer came from, its not even surprising.
I gather others have said this too: those do not look like good solder joints to me. The last one in particular looks like a "cold solder joint." I'd want to see the solder much better "wetted in" throughout the joint.
I plug the connector to another (that already has heavy wires soldered in)
one of the concerns while soldering these connectors is: if you get the joint too hot, you soften the plastic housing. If not plugged to the mating half, the bullet can get out of line.
Some people will build a soldering jig that has even more secure mounting for the end being worked on to plug into.
That Turnigy clamp does not address the issue of the hot bullet possibly deforming the plastic.
I affix up to 10 gauge to the Xt60 and EC3.
I also use EC5 (XT90 are the same size bullets) with up to 6 gauge wire for 120 amp demand in RC aircraft.
Above 120 amp, I go to the Castle Creations 8mm bullets.
*************
Or you can go to EC3 which you solder the bullet to the wire, then snap on the plastic housing (can slide the heat shrink on the wire and bullet after soldering) Since the plastic is never exposed to the heat, once snapped in, its going to be properly aligned.
What i do, is that ill plug the male intk the female, so that way even if it does deform, the male and female will still be aligned
Bless you for taking time to address a safety concern for our community.
Can't wait to see the video about that Portuguese frame.
This happened to mine.
I'm just going to solder the two cables together and be done with it. I don't need an XT60 there.
I have just removed the whole lot and fitted new wire, I have extended it also so I can put the Power Supply outside of the enclosure Im planning to build
You could get XT90 connectors. Those should do the job even better.
exactly..
I started a print on my Ender 3 just before this video began, I've just gone to check it and it's 14mins into the print and held the XT60 connectors....they're warm!
I'll check the solder connectors tomorrow when there's more light but if they are crimped I shall be soldering them and putting fresh heatshrink on too
Maybe take out the connectors entirely. Odds are, it might not be the solder joint but connector quality. They aren't supposed to fit this sloppily.
@7:17 it appears that the actual conductor inside the male plug, between the solder joint and where the conductors are making contact, is where it's overheating and burning up. I wouldn't be surprised of the solder joint and the contact between male/female conductors is OK but that it's actually the male conductors themselves, between where they mate and where they're soldered, that's not providing enough cross-section area for current. Otherwise it could be a case of bad contact but it's just heating up the male and is only visible where it's held by the plastic housing that's browning/burning.
Angus, looking at the connectors you have on both your printers, they are knockoffs, they don't have a 'bottom' within the barrel, you can see the wire if you use your jig to solder them you're going to fill them up with solder.
I'd totally agree with you Angus, the fake XT60's are the most likely cause of the problem. The plug pins don't look anywhere near as sturdy add the genuine ones, if they do overheat the heat tends to anneal the metal, which then loses its spring tension, making the situation worse.
I agree with what you have said. My Ender-3 Pro came crimped and sure enough the cables got hot, so much so that you could see the deformation on the shrink tubing. The plug was too warm even with the bed only set at 60°C. I swapped the cables with 14 AWG and skipped using a plug all together. As an Anet A8 user for nearly 3 years as well, I didn't think these things today wouldn't be a concern but it seems they are.
Hi Angus it's me again, the guy who's cetus caught on fire. Just wanted to let you know they asked for pictures which i provided and now they are not responding to my emails. I asked for a refund since i cannot trust that printer, it won't work now even if i felt lucky. Anyways do you know their contact guys jason or joshua at all? I could use some help dealing with them.
Matthew Poole holly crap
I wrote an article about those damn Anet printers, terrible quality connectors as well vectormfg.net/anet-a8-firestarter/
@@pmally2006 yeah, i am really getting pissed. I got new mk3 extended version. Friggin $500 dollar paperweight now and they are ignoring me.
Tiertime have a forum, head over there and post some pics, that might help. I'm on there a lot and have noticed an improvement in support...
@@owensparks5013 ok i will do that. Thank you. My screen name is Carbide.
I was given a full refund for my Ender 3 pro because of the plug burning. I just cut the connector off and hardwired it.
Lucky :)
In that case, i would love faulty connector.
I use those loose XT60s on my mini-quads and they have no issue handling up to 120amp draw. I prefer them as it makes disconnecting and connecting batteries much easier. Can't say if they'll burn up from sustained load but bursty loads they have no issue.
The images you showed of the burnt connector didn't show the damage at the solder joint. Rather, it showed the burn marks roughly at the point where the contacts of the split terminal meet the cylinder. This implies either a lack of contact surface area or pressure. If the connectors are easy to disconnect, then it would be appropriate to spread the split contact slightly apart to improve contact pressure. If the shrink-sleave is burned up, then it is likely a cold solder joint.
Thanks for this video. I checked my Ender-3 and the power connector was getting hot, while the wires leading in were normal temperature. I cut out the connector and soldered the wires together. The solder joint stays normal temp. If I ever have to change the power supply I’ll put in a new connector at the same time. BTW, the connections in the connector were crimped.
Ive been running my ender 3 for over a year, and had been keeping an eye on the xt60 connectors, regularly checking them to make sure they were not heating up. Recently I must admit I had got a bit lax, as for a year I had had no issues. But today after a 1 hour print, the xt60 connector has burn marks and almost burnt me when I touched it. The wire either side of the connector was also hot. I'm a bit freaked out! Ive cut both connectors off so I don't inadvertently use the printer until I can take care of the problem.
I felt sure based on the fact the connectors had never got hot before that there was no issue.
I think though what has happened, is the crimped connector (there is no solder on the side closest to the control box, now that I have removed the heat shrink!) had a good solid connection for its entire life time, until I had to do some maintenance the other day and was moving the printer around, and now the crimped connection is a bit loose!
So I would strongly suggest anyone who has doubts to not risk it, replace the connectors or at least take a closer look at them, I feel like I've dodged a bullet here!
Thank you for this. I was really alarmed when I noticed this was happening on my ender 3. I have experience soldering so when I saw the problem I bought authentic connectors right away and swapped them out.
Those solder joints should be filleted and blend smoothly into the base metal all the way around. What I see in the video is some or all of the joint is a solder blob overhanging the base pin metal. IMO this means the base metal pin wasn't hot enough for a good joint. Or not enough flux. As others have said, it takes a lot of heat to do this properly. I usually plug in a dummy connector to act as a heatsink and keep the pins in their correct alignment.
Mine were soldered, after 4hr prints the cable and plug was red hot, I cut them off replaced all the wire back to the PSU and put XT90 plugs on, 24hr print and cool now :) Replace ur xt60s as soon as u get this printer... Still a great printer
Thanks for the video. Have bought Ender3 Pro in November on Aliexpress (CREALITY 3D Official Store) and the printer had male connector crimped, female was soldered. Funny is, that the crimped one looks almost like original, but the soldered one is looking fake as hell (faded yellow, barelly can read XT60 marking). I didn't have problem with the connectors, but i replaced them just to be sure.
Just checked mine, bought at the beginning of may 2019, it has official plugs, the stamp design, high friction push together, brass components etc all look and feel like the branded component and not a knock off... looks like they are listening and making updates
i bought my ender 3 pro from the creality site itself and my xt60 connection is super snug, the company may have fixed the issue with newer models or I just got lucky
My ender 3 pro is a very snug plug too. Haven't cut mine open but I can't really unplug it without really trying.
I'm monitoring my connector using an infrared thermometer. (They are inexpensive and handy to have around, non-contact measurements). I'm about 40 min into a PLA job...Nozzle = 215C and Bed = 60C; IR Thermometer is reading 94F (~34C). Seems a bit high. Will try some higher bed temps later.
This happened my ender 3, I had it for about 3 months, so glad I never left it on when I was out of the house! Got a smell of burning one day when I turned it on, I had just swapped to a new brand of filament so I suspected that for a while, then got scared and turned it off. At which point I discovered the connector was burned black from the heatbed side. Just checked after watching this and yep, mines crimped not soldered!
Yea, noticed the connector was getting warm on mine a while ago. Too much resistance in a not too well crimped connector. I just cut off the shrink wrapped tubing and soldered the wires on to the connectors. Then added 2 coats of liquid electrical tape. I have been checking it now and then and its staying cool.
Over 10 years using XT-60 connectors for R/C hobbies.
100% verified mine were crimped.
Very poor solder job on those connectors, not enough solder and not enough heat. The knock off XT60s have been a problem for years. The "original" XT60s are far better, and they are not expensive. Creality should do better.
This isn’t the only connection issue the ender 3s have. I had to re solder the power wire for the heated bed. The motion of the y axis back and forth caused the wire to partially break away from where it was soldered. I only noticed it when I began hearing it spark and my bed temp wasn’t stable. It was an easy enough fix, but that shouldn’t have happened.
If you “spread apart” the male posts, it will add extra contact pressure to the connectors. Use a small Phillips screwdriver or punch. A very weak contact will heat these connectors up too
Back when I was at collage, many years ago, we were told that solder only joints were not good enough . Crimp joints were preferred as a mechanically and electrically sound. I believe the issue is with substandard mating connectors. Solder joint is not a measure of quality. I’ve not tested the theory but in industry, crimp is preferable over solder.
Not sure if even matters - I purchased on from a local retail store in Feb 2020 and Ender has changed the connectors as I have legit XT60 connectors on my Ender 3 Pro . Thanks
Would have been nice to do a temperature test against the fake XT60 and a real one. Maybe it's not even nylon.
This has been done, they're very popular in car audio and those dudes have punished them. The "fake" XT60's have much lower tolerance within the barrel contact. Bad connection = heat. Better off just to replace the connector all together. Why risk it. Insurance isn't going to pay for shit if your power supply isn't UL rated and it torched your home and dog.
The best way to test these is whilst they are under load from the heated bed and measure the current with a clamp meter and the volt drop with a decent voltmeter across the cable and connector. With a ounce of ohms law you'll get the resistance. You should be able to get the impedance of the connector itself, the solder joints, and the complete connection including the cable.
Your standard AVO won't be accurate enough on ohms and a decent low ohms meter is expensive
I'm always concerned about potential safety issues with cheap products (not just 3D printers). Thanks for bringing this up.
I might terminate the wires myself with those XT60 connectors that have sleeves. Keep in mind though, XT60 connectors have existed for a long time. They come in varying colors and textures. Older ones I've seen area darker yellow, almost orange. They're also weird to the touch, not smooth and kinda feel like matte plastic. When soldering XT60 connectors I always plug in a matching XT60 to make sure the pins are aligned and it doesn't melt the plastic (not sure how much heat XT60 connectors are supposed to withstand, but I solder them at 450 degrees Celsius).
In order to make the connection better (this applies also on original XT60, the connection will become loose connecting and disconnecting the plugs) the is a small trick.
Use a screwdriver and try to separate the 4 parts of the connector, try to move away each other. The key word here is GENTLY, you have to do this slow and try not to overdone.
I had a lot of a XT60 connectors on most of my RC planes and no one ever fail on me. Not a single time.
Looked to my connectors. Female is soldered, male crimped. Both of them without issues (Ender 3 from 11/2018). Both methods are valid, because female connector was made for soldering and male for criping. (different construction)
As a dealer in RC for the last 5 years I've seen tons of poorly made XT60 connectors and thrown hundreds of them in the garbage rather than sell them. We only use and buy Amass connectors and they're not expensive. There's no point in trying to save a few cents on this part.
Hobby king is a distributor of AMASS connectors, a Chinese company, these are very nice gold plated connectors.
I was wondering why they weren't putting enough solder on the joint. The Ender one is a hollow tube that would allow solder into the connector half if over done, and that would stop the plug fully engaging. The HobbyKing is a sold piece drilled from both ends, so it has two separate chambers.
If replacing the connectors, always make sure the gold is tinned first. The gold dissolves into the solder, making it porous and brittle., which increases the resistance of the joint. I'd suggest heavily tinning the gold and removing the excess solder before inserting the tinned wire (most good training resources suggest double-tinning like this). Soldering gold has a very odd stench that I still strongly remember, even though it's been more than 25 years since I did this with any frequency :)
Good video and well pointed out, I don't see the point in doing anything other than making a direct soldered connection here, even with good quality XT60 connectors there is still a possibility for a failure, in any electrical system you want to avoid terminations or connections of any kind where ever possible, the best advice you could have given on this video is to advise people to buy a small length of heat shrink, a 25w soldering iron and simply solder and sleeve these connections, its also worth pointing out that here in the UK the mains lead for the printer was supplied with a 13A fuse inside it? ive replaced mine for a 3 Amp, I am not so sure the power supply on my ender 3 pro is a Meanwell power supply.
Neat, a good thing to watch out for from the connector, I’ve had the occasional burn out from various printers and they were all due to krimped connections in a dusty environment and only after pushing the machine beyond PLA temperatures which is rare for me. Hard to diagnoise the problem because most people print with low PLA temps and never try printing difficult stuff like ABS or have the budget for higher temp stuff. Anyways, the connection would burn out and shut down the heated bed or hot end before a fire started requiring a quick soldered connection, I keep a fire extinguishing ball beside my printers anyways but I feel like because I use a torch or soldering iron so close to my printer sometimes or just any hot element, I’m more likely to popping my automatic fire extinguisher than my printers lol
Thanks for the video.... Checked mine while building, the soldering was sub par and had knockoff connectors replaced and all looks good now.
You really can push the metallic connectors on the man side a litte bit, best with a nail, or something that is round.
In the rc would you have to do this after you had crashes by example.
After that it should be much stronger than before to get them together or out.
Yes they have to be soldered, normally you use more solder and put more wire in the connections than in you video.
While soldering xt60s you should have put both xt60s together, because they can melt out of place.
Use a spare one, or leave them together (without power connected) if you haven't the soldering "base" from hobbyking.
My Ender 3 has crimped XT60 power connector and I just noticed it is discolored and I measured the temperature and it was over 60 deg C with a bed temp of 60 deg C. I just replaced the crimp style XT60 with the good solder ones shown below and the temperature at 70 deg C is 20 deg C. The crimped XT60 connectors are bad news!!! The resistance went from 20 milli ohm to over 50 milli ohms on just one of the power leads going through the crimped XT60. The new soldered XT60 measured less than 8 milli ohms for both power and ground.
Just buy a fire alarm. JK, I'll buy some XT60s and change mine. Thanks for the video. I thought it was weird how easily the connected together, now I know.
After watching this video I was concerned. I looked at the xt60 connectors on my ender 3, burned black. Shrink tubing on red wire was melted all the way through. When I tested it the plug was too hot to touch. I'm pretty pissed. I have two little kids and the thought that the house could have burnt down when I was printing overnight makes me really mad at this company.
It's unforgivable really.
I use cheap XT60's from Ebay all the time too. They all fit tightly and work well. They also don't look exactly like the ones you have on that printer as the metal contact ends looked different. Never had a problem with my connectors when running 12v @20-30A pretty much 24/7.
The soldering on your machines was quite poor. I guess it worked OK but there needed to be a better flow and better heating of the connector.
The fail will be the poor contact as you suggest. That's going to be a higher resistance point that will get hot when there's about 100W going through.
I inspect soldering jobs for high reliability pcbs (150 deg C high vibration enviroments) and the soldering on the 'fake ones' seems to be lacking. there should be a fillet of solder around the wire and there seems to be just a bulge. Looks like they didn't use additional flux and just relied on the flux in the wire. I didn't get a good look but the backs of the solder cups should have a bit of solder on them since to do the soldering correctly, the heat has to be applied opposite of the solder and the molten solder will flow to the heat.
Thinking about it this is a race to the bottom printer and they are definitely not going to use flux. It is additional material (tiny) but it is definitely slower. Always use flux.
It's probably that garbage lead free solder everything is made with these days ...
@@danp2779 I use lead-free (silver bearing) solder all the time. Needs more heat, but I've never encountered a situation where leaded solder would have given me a significantly better result. The stuff that doesn't have silver in it (almost pure tin) has inferior wetting and flow properties, but does (as small compensation) make beautifully shiny joints.
As someone who inspects cable harnesses, mostly class 3, but some class 2, I'm still trying to figure out why these should never be crimped if they have a crimp contact instead of a solder cup
Should be obvious, but if you're already out of your comfort zone resoldering things and stuff it's easy to forget: if you're replacing those connectors with proper ones, MARK EVERYTHING before you take it apart so you know which side goes to which wire!
Oddly they're also connected 'backwards' in that the male plug (attached to the PSU in the Ender 3) is usually used on the load and the female plug (attached to the board in the Ender) is usually used on the power source (battery usually). Obviously the electric field cares not which way the plugs are set up, but it is strange- and it foiled my attempt to measure my Ender 3's power consumption with a R/C Power meter.
I’ve built computers for years. One of the final thing I always do is load test it, and take some measurements of current flow and temperatures, along with jostling all the connectors. On my work side I’ve seen huge damage done by loose and poorly soldered connections. Knowing my ender 3 would be printing alone in the house for hours using significant electricity, I checked it with a surface temperature gun (20 bucks) while it was running its first print. Was also useful to check bed temperatures (way off), and hot ends. No problems, but I suppose I should check it periodically. A meter and temperature probe are useful cheap tools, particularly needed for somebody who makes his living in this space, instead of randomly guessing what’s going on.
I replaced mine last week and soldered them.(They were crimped) I had the same issue before i saw this video. The connector was so hot it could not be held. After replacing them, no further heating issue.
Super stoked for the bee review! Can' t wait, keep it up
Just got mine yesterday. Without cutting the insulation I can tell it's crimped. Will be replacing them soon.
Oh, you should always tin the wire first. Don't try to solder these connectors w/ bare copper wires; takes more heat.
When you connect or disconnect it is important to have friction so that you connect and disconnect that you have a quick make and a quick break connector to avoid sparking on the connections.
Another reason for the burning may be use of a lower temp resistance plastic housing, that combined with a poor joint is more likley to discolour due to the high temps
Indeed, those contacts are not designed for crimping - they are solder cups with just half around shape. BUT, it also looks to me the wires are not going all the way to the end of the cup. So only half of the conductive area is used. On the other hand, I would like to know if the contact material is good springy phosphor bronze, or if it is just cheap brass. Brass becomes loose even without heat and disastrously bad with a little heat. Further, measuring the contact resistance would tell a lot. Run 10 A DC current through the connection and measure the millivolts from one side wire to the other side wire (or actually the solder cups on each side). Calculate milliohms. At as little as 1 milliohm, at 60 A you would generate 3.6 W of heat per contact.
Even the soldered units have trouble. One joint (the negative from the power supply) on both of my ender 3 had a cold solder joint from improper tinning prior to soldering. One of my printers even had mismatched connectors, soldered on psu side and crimped on motherboard side.
I would connect the XT60 Male to Female so that you don't over heat the connector when soldering. The male may warp because of the thin walls and the heat when soldering. I have had to bin one because of this issue and never did that again.
I have wondered for some time whether some Chinese manufacturers are outsourcing batches of subassemblies to suppliers with low experience levels... effectively "cottage industry". There is nothing wrong with the concept; it has been common practice worldwide for a very long time, but it has the potential for inconsistent processes, and makes quality control essential. This is pure speculation on my part, but it may explain the variations of quality in the end (Ender?) product.
Yes, precisely
Just an Fyi. I recieved an Ender 3 Pro last week and the connectors looked a lot nicer. They are branded, soldered and have good friction as you connect them. They have heard everybody's concerns.