Triangle Labs Dragon Drop In Hot End

Triangle Labs Dragon Hot End

Justification:

The Triangle Labs Dragon is a direct replacement for the E3Dv6 Hot End.  The Dragon is mechanically and thermally superior to the E3Dv6 in the following areas:

1. Mechanical loads are transferred from the Heat Block to the Heat Exchanger via 4 stainless steel hollow tubes.  This allows the Heat Break wall thickness to be reduced and therefore reduces heat creep into the cold part of the Hot End.
2. Filament path is via a single metal tube all the way to the top of the heat exchanger.  This insures the filament, during retraction, is fully cooled prior to entering the very short PTFE tube.  This completely eliminates the heat blob at the end of the retracted filament and subsequent jams on filament reload.

Options:

The Dragon Hot End can be dropped into the most printers that are currently using a E3Dv6 hot end or 100% clone. 

Optionally the Groove Mount top may be removed and the Dragon installed on a plate using 4 screws provided with the Hot End.

Finally the Prusa extruder-cover can be modified to prevent Dragon rotation during nozzle changes.  This is accomplished by adding a flat boss to the top portion of the Prusa extruder-cover that engages with two of the Heat Exchanger structural posts.  This permits one hand nozzle changes without the necessity of a wrench to prevent Hot End rotation.  The change is only to the extruder-cover which is easily replaced during Hot End replacement.  Air flow disruption is minor and has no effect on the cold end cooling.

Print Settings:

*If you are using a slicer that does not allow infill to be increased on a local basis, increase infill to 50% overall.

Assembly:

Follow Prusa instructions for removing the removing/replacing hot ends:

https://help.prusa3d.com/en/guide/how-to-replace-a-hotend-mk3s_161575

NOTE: It is not necessary to remove the Heater and Thermistor from the control board since we will reuse them on the Dragon.  

If you are replacing the Prusa extruder-cover with Extruder Cover - Dragon contained herein, the extruder-cover will need to be completely removed rather than just loosening.  In this cast reassemble with Extruder Cover - Dragon instead.  Make sure to align the Dragon with the longer portion of the heat block pointing to the back of the printer.