Had some weird printing issues and after spending days thinking it was my nozzle/hotend/wet filament etcetc finally noticed this. This is honestly insane and poorly designed that the wires can be folded until they are broken.
What is this fan even called? I can’t seem to see it on the store. I really need a replacement asap.
Looks like you need one these.
How did the wires get chewed up?
Thanks.
It wasn’t chewed up, it was just bent 90degrees until it broke. The little nub of hotglue came loose a while ago, and I guess when I closed the lid, the wire wasn’t put back in a good position like in this picture. It sticks up like this:
That 50*15 fan is probably hard to find anywhere else with the XL exhaust and the custom connector.
It looks like the little plastic hook that holds the cable in place broke off first, then the extra pull would have caused the hot glue to come loose over time. Could be fixable with soldering but not sure, even with the sticker off it could be too hard to reach without opening the fan.
Yeah I removed the sticker to check. I don’t think I’m capable of soldering these as it’s super fine and close together (I’ve only done crude soldering on LEDs and replacing my ender fans). I’m not even sure I can open the fan up without breaking the clasps; it’s sealed pretty securely.
At this point you really don’t have much to loose. So why not attempt to solder it. The challenge at hand is identical to repairing a broken solder trace. Yes, removing the PCB and going through the hole is a better way to do it but if you can’t get access to the underside or if you don’t have a desoldering pump then the next best thing is to treat it like a broken trace.
Since it’s toast anyway, why not try to repair it while your replacement fan is on the way? If it were me, and I’ve been here before - I tend to use these sorts of catastrophes as an opportunity to sharpen my repair skills.
About two years ago I mangled a USB load tester and ripped off a component. In the process I messed up a very fine trace on the PCB. I left the broken device in the junk drawer precisely because there have been many occasion where I may have broken something and later acquired the tools and/or skills to repair it. Every repair challenge I take on usually gives me an excuse to purchase another tool I previously didn’t have. Like last time, I ended up buying a purpose-build desoldering iron for an unrelated project and stumbled over the load tester that I forgot about.
I had previously watched a whole bunch of YouTube videos on repairing traces and decided to give it a try. The trick here is you want to find lead-based solder as it has a lower melting point making it easier for the kind of task you’re looking at. Also, plenty of rosin based flux and IPA to clean it off afterwards. The videos linked below show that you can never have too much flux when attempting this kind of repair.
This video actually inspired me to attempt a repair directly to the PCB trace I mangled. I was successful after a few tries.
Here’s a search term for a whole bunch of videos on how to perform various delicate repairs. What you’ll quickly see is that you don’t really need special equipment, just a soldering iron and lead based solder.
https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=replace+solder+pad+on+circuit+board+
Here’s the approach I would take. My recommendation is to use between 22AWG and 28AWG multistranded wire. Remember, lower numbers are thicker. I’ve used this pre-tinned silicon jacketed wire for such repairs. The silicon insulation makes the wire very flexible rather than stiff.
This video shows both one technique to use the insulation to handle the wire and a method to solder. Here’s another method of twisting two wires together, then solder them.
