I have 4 P1Ps that print almost constantly. About every 2 months I need to replace the nozzle due to a jam that I can’t clear (although I don’t try very hard, it’s just easier to replace the hot end). On several occasions though, I can’t pull out the thermistor from the tiny hole. The thermal grease has hardened and it gets stuck in there, so I end up having to replace the thermistor and heating element as well.
Is the thermal grease really necessary for the thermistor in that tiny hole?
In a word… yes!!!
One of my other hobbies is overclocking PCs. There’s a great joy in being able to brag that your desktop can go to 11. 
However, now and again, while doing quick builds, I’ll refrain from putting on thermal paste until I have everything in place. From a pure performance point of view it makes a substantial difference of anywhere from 10-20c as opposed to not using thermal paste. Now consider that is just for a CPU or GPU. Consider what will happen with an NTC Thermistor and skew the readings 10-20c for your hotend. It’s just courting disaster.
Thermal paste is just one option though. If you don’t mind the notion of a permanent and much more secure thermal mount, try thermal glue. I use it when I adhere thermocouples to MOSFETS on GPU cards which really have no otehr good way of mounting a Thermistor to the device. Unfortunately, I don’t have a photograph of that since I never thought it would be of interest to anyone but myself.
Here’s a listing to a bunch of variants of thermal glue. I haven’t found much difference between the various glues. Epoxy is more permanent but also much more messy.
https://www.amazon.com/s?k=thermal+glue
Just remember, it’s a one-way installation, once the material cures, it’s on there for good. The only jeopardy is if the wires on the Thermistor break, then you have to replace the whole hotend.
I don’t usually worry about reapplying the thermal grease, there’s usually enough on there to smear it around a bit. For the thermistor, I wouldn’t go to the trouble of trying to clean it out anyway. For the heater element, yes you need to make sure there’s a good, even coating on it.
Have you considered running cleaning filament through every couple of prints? It is great for keeping the inside clean and I find it does help prevent clogging issues. I just unhook the PTFE from the toolhead after a print and manually draw it in until it comes out clean then back it out and load back the filament I’m using next.
Thermal glue is exactly the opposite of what I’m after. Many times the thermistor gets stuck in the hot end and so when I need to change the hot end out I end up breaking the thermistor trying to get it out of the hole.
I just had to do this again, and this time I put just a tiny tiny bit of thermal paste on the tip of the thermistor. Resulting prints are coming out fine. Hopefully in a few months when I need to replace the hot end again I can reuse this thermistor instead of breaking it.
hi. yes. I have made a video tutorial on YouTube look at Arno’s 3D on YouTube.
regards
Slice Engineering boron nitride paste is a popular choice and is what I use.
This GENNEL stuff, in the description, says “do NOT use for CPU ↔ Heatsink”
Hope you aren’t using that for the overclocking
Sorry to necro thread. Was looking myself for the specs for the bambu stuff.
