Blog Objet Prime Head Filling Timeout/Material Suddenly Not Being Accepted
Objet Prime Desktop units are capable of running Tango material. The only desktop machine capable of doing so. There is one slight downside to this. Tango and materials are a bit thicker and have a different filter system that had to be developed. The new filters are similar to the ones used in Eden / Connex machines. Although the prime is capable of running tango there is still one issue that plagues the machine… and that is filter clogs.
Filters on the Prime tend to clog from time to time. When a filter clogs it prevents material from reaching the print head causing a head filling timeout. In the event that a filter clogs, a replacement filter will be sent to you for replacement. They simply twist off the material line and replace.
Objet Machines also have a security system in the machines that may be triggered as well. To prevent people swapping RFID tags from bottle to bottle the machine records how many pump cycles are used while that bottle is being used. When the target number is reached it will trigger the machine to no longer accept that RFID tag or bottle it is attached to. In some cases, we see a filter that is starting to clog and the flow rate is very slow causing the pumps to take a long time to fill the heads. This can lead to bottles not being accepted by the machine as the target pump cycle number is reached. We have seen a customer who had 4 bottles that all stopped being accepted while there was 300 grams left in every bottle. Because the target number was reached at the same point with every bottle. If it is determined that a clogged filter is the cause of bottles suddenly not being accepted or the machine getting head filling errors Stratasys will send filters (assuming you are under contract) and will replace the material that was lost.
Dave Murawski
Computer Aided Technology