Anet 3D printer not extruding at start of printing

1. Filament wasn't loaded into extruder before printing.

Most 3D printers' extruders have a problem of leaking plastic when they keep still at a high temperature. The hot plastic inside the extruder nozzle tends to ooze out of the tip, which creates a void inside the nozzle where the plastic has drained out. This idle oozing can occur at the beginning of a print when you are first preheating your extruder, and also at the end of the print while the extruder is slowly cooling. If your extruder has lost plastic due to oozing, the next time you try to extrude, it will take time to come out plastic again. If you are trying to start a print after oozing, you may notice the same delayed extrusion.

To solve this issue, make sure the Anet 3D printer's extruder has loaded filament before printing so that the nozzle is full of plastic and ready to extrude. A common way to do this in Cura is by including something called a skirt. The skirt will draw a circle around your part, and in the process, it will prime the extruder with plastic.

If you need extra priming, you can increase the number of skirt outlines on the Expert tab in Cura. You can also use control knob in Anet 3d printer to extrude plastic before printing.

2. The distance between nozzle and bed is too close.

If the Anet 3D printer's nozzle is too close to the bed, there will hasn't enough room for plastic to come out from the extruder. The hole in the top of the nozzle is essentially blocked so that no plastic can come out. An easy way to recognize this issue is check if the printer does not extrude plastic for the first layer or two, but begins to extrude normally around the 3rd or 4th layers. To solve this problem, you can adjust the four screws at the corner of the hot bed, turn the screws clockwise and the hot bed will move down. Turn a little once to increase the distance until there is enough space for plastic extrusion (The distance is about the thickness of a piece of A4 paper).

3. The filament stripped against the drive gear.

Anet 3D printers use a small gear to push the filament back and forth. The teeth on this gear bite into the filament and allow it to accurately control the position of the filament. However, if you notice lots of plastic shavings or it looks like there is a section missing from your filament, then it's possible that the drive gear has removed too much plastic. Once this happens, the drive gear won't have anything left to grab onto when it tries to move the filament back and forth.

4. The Anet 3D printer's extruder is clogged.

If none of the above suggestions are able to resolve the Anet 3D printer's extrusion issue, then it is likely that your extruder is clogged. This can happen if foreign debris is trapped inside the nozzle, when hot plastic sits inside the extruder too long, or if the thermal cooling for the extruder is not sufficient and the filament begins to soften outside of the desired melt zone. We successfully used relative diameter drill (or relative diameter copper line of electric wire) to unclog extruders by feeding it into the nozzle tip. You need to heat the extruder to 200℃ when you do this. Attention not hurt by the hot extruder. Please contact your printer manufacturer if you need to disassemble the extruder.

For Gearbest customers: If you've purchased Anet 3D printer from us, but the post doesn't solve your issue, please do not hesitate to get in touch with us. Just fill in the ticket with your questions at our Support Center and send it to us. We will do our best to deal with your problem as soon as possible. We are always happy to help.