An all too common problem with the Artillery Sidewinder X1 3D printers is the message "Error: MINTEMP triggered, system stopped! Heater_ID: bed". The symptoms of the problem tend to be that you will be printing a project and at some random point during the print, the printer stops and throws this error. You clear the printer and restart the print, only to again have it at some random point stop with this error. The most common reason for this error is the wires to the heat bed thermistor break. This is due to the poor quality wires used for not only the thermistor, but for the heater power as well. I have had both fail.
Testing
One of the easiest ways to check for this is to power on the printer and click Tools > Heat > Extrude1 (if the Extrude1 Button shows) You may see the Bed button when clicking on Heat. If you do, that is the screen you want to be on. Now use the + (Add) and - (Dec) buttons to set an arbitrary heat value for the bed and let the bed heat to that temp. Next, watchthe bed temp circled on the screen in the image to the right while continually moving the heat bed forward and backwards along the Y axis. If at any point in the bed travel you see the measured value ( the number to the left of the forward slash) go to -15, then you are going to have this problem. The -15 value is seen when the thermistor connection is lost to the motherboard because of the broken wire.
The Fix
Now you say, how do I fix this problem? Should I replace the entire heat bed or is there something else I should do? One thing is, you would not replace the entire heat bed. The part that Artillery sells for this is the heater pad that has the thermistor integrated into it. I do not however recommend this solution. From my experience, it will fix your problem for a short time, but you will just end up with the same problem again down the road. I replaced my first heating pad while my machine was under warranty and had it fail again within 6 months because the new heater they sent used the same crappy wires and wire sleve as the original one. When this happened to me again, I needed a better solution. The actual heater and the thermistor on the pad were still good. It was just the wires that were bad. I decided that I would replace the thermistor wires which I did and later found that I had a good connection to the thermistor, but th bed would not heat. The power wires to the heating pad had also broken, so I ended up replacing both.
What is needed
This is a list of everything you will need:
- Thin wires for the thermistor. I used an old USB cable I had laying around to salvage 2 small wires from. You want to have these a little longer than the original ones which I will explain later. The original wires are approximately 33 inches (83.8 centimeters), so make the new ones about 36 inches (91.4 centimeters).
- Thicker wires for the power to the heater. I used an old PC power cable for this and pulled 2 of the wires from the casing. The original wires were approximately 24 inches (61 centimeters), so make the new ones about 27 inches (68.6 centimeters).
- Heat shrink tubing. Youwill need 3 sizes. One size to fit the larger power wires and another to fit the smaller thermistor wires and a third large piece to cover the braided sleve where it connects to the heater at the bed.
2 crimp on lug or spade connectors for the power wires to replace the ones on the power wires that you are cutting off. These can be the cheap ones you get from the hardware or auto parts store.
Cut and save the small white connector that plugs into the motherboard for the thermistor with an inch or so of wire for splicing. If you have the connectors and proper crimp tool you can use that to crimp a new end on the thermistor, which would be better, but most people don't have those laying around.- A section of PET braided wire sleve about 25 inches (63.5 centimeters) and 3/8 inch (9.5 milimeters) diameter. This is to replace the original coated stiff wire sleve to make it more flexible.
The Procedure
Start by cutting the wires and original braided sleve about 2 inches (5 centimeters) from the bed heater. Next, with a razor blade, carefully cut away about an inch of the braided sleve that is left to expose the wires that we will splice. Strip and solder on the new thermistor and power wires and put the heat shrink tubing over your connections. Next, slide on your section of braided sleve over all 4 of the new wires and slide the larger heat shrink tube down where your new splices are by the bed and shrink it down covering both the braided sleve and th original sleve. It is easiest to slide the wires through the braided sleve with no connectors on the ends as the connectors will bind in the sleve making it harder to get through. Once that is all together, splice on the connector for the thermistor. Make sure to slide a piece of heat shrink tube on both of the wires befor making the splice. I can't tell you the number of times I have for gotten that step. Then crimp on the 2 lug/spade connectors to the power wires. Last, feed the new wire assembly through the hole in the back of the printer and connect the wires for the power. One will go to the neutral (most likely white) power wire connecting to the power supply from the mains cord. The second wire will conect to the Solid State Relay (SSR). Now plug in the white thermistor connector to the motherboard and reassemble the bottom cover on the printer. You can now perform the same test as before, heating the bed to an arbitrary temp and then moving the bed back and forth along the Y axis to see if the temp on the display stays stable. If everything checks out, you are finished.