Is there such a thing as a filament tension sensor?
Like a runout sensor, but which stops a print when the filament becomes too tight.
I’ve had a number of problems with poorly wound filament that has become knotted or tangled on the spool, or where vibrations have caused the spool to move and filament to become wrapped around the spool holder.
There is still in the print feed mechanism to the runout sensor is not being triggered, but the head is pulling against a tangle and no more filament is being drawn in. So I’m not getting any feed or print, and the printer is still going.
I’m like some form of sensor that acts like a runout, but if the filament isn’t feeding. Does anybody make one?
I’m not confident that I could make my own. I don’t have the tools, experience or background knowledge.
Forget about implementing such an idea on Bambu’s platform. It is closed off and there is no “easy” mechanism to send a pause command to the printer. It was possible to do before Bambu implemented their Draconian Bambu Connect in January but if you upgraded past 1.08.03 firmware, you no longer have access to MQTT protocol which would allow you to send a pause command to the printer.
I suppose a motivated person could look at the Bambu Studio source code and hunt down the pause subroutine and emulated that.
It’s actually an idea I’ve seen implemented as a DIY project using an ESP32 or Arduino. However, it can’t work with Bambu Labs since they have a closed architecture. The example I saw was assuming a Marlin based Firmware on the target printer in order to initiate a pause. That won’t work with Bambu.
“Extrusion motor overload” is basically a tension sensor when there is a knotted tangle. But for just “lots of resolvable tension” I dont think it would suffice