How to Maintain Your 3D Printer

Owning a 3d printer isn't all about printing knick-knacks and gifts. One of the aspects of 3d printing is doing regular maintenance on your machine. Without doing regular maintenance, the quality of your prints will start to degrade, and eventually fail to finish at all. From replacing worn parts, to ensuring the correct tension of the drive belts there are lots of things that need to be done to keep your printer running smoothly. While it may not be as fun as printing out a new phone holder or a novelty cookie cutter, doing proper maintenance will keep your machine for years to come.

It is my hope that this site can act as a guide for how to keep your printer up and running for as long as you need it to. I will explain the methods used to tension the belts, lubricate the rails, and preform upgrades to improve the functionality of your machine. There are many different makes and models of 3d printers in the world, and I can not show you how to work on each and every one. I will be using one of the most common models of 3d printers on the market, the Prusa i3 Mk3S+ which is also the one I own.