I've got it would seem a very unusual problem with my extruder on an Ender 3 Pro. I've had the printer for about 4 years, installed a BLTouch about 2 years ago, and have never had any issues until recently. The extruder stopped extruding during the print, and made a clicking noise, like when there's a filament jam, or something. I cleaned the nozzle, but it wasn't clogged. I could initially solve the problem by turning the stepper motor manually when the printer was off. The motor turned freely, so it didn't seem to be damaged. It then worked fine for half a print, then started making the same clicking sound. When I tried turning it manually again with the power off and then printing, the extruder made a ringing sound. I checked the wiring connections, but they seemed fine.

I bought a new stepper motor from creality and had the same problem. So the motor was clearly not the issue.

Now the thing I can't understand is that, when I go the prepare settings and move the extruder to extrude filament, it works fine. (Turns out the old motor could do this, too.) When I tried printing this time, there was no sound, vibrating or clicking for the extrusion operation, but the motor did perform the retract operation.

So... surely if there were a problem with wiring or the driver, then I wouldn't be able to extrude at all, right? Everything works, except when I print from the g-code. My only guess is that this is the motherboard.

Thanks in advance for any helpful advice you could give!

I have a very unusual problem with my extruder on an Ender 3 Pro. I've had the printer for about 4 years, installed a BLTouch about 2 years ago, and have never had any issues until recently. The extruder stopped extruding during the print and made a clicking noise, like when there was a filament jam or something. I cleaned the nozzle, but it wasn't clogged.

I could initially solve the problem by turning the stepper motor manually when the printer was off. The motor turned freely, so it didn't seem to be damaged. It would work fine for half a print, then start making the same clicking sound. When I tried turning it manually again with the power off and then printing, now the extruder would make a ringing sound. I checked the wiring connections, but they seemed fine.

I bought a new stepper motor from Creality and had the same problem. So the motor was clearly not the issue.

Now what I can't understand, is when I go to the prepare settings and move the extruder to extrude filament, it works fine. (as it turns out, the old motor could do this, too.) When I tried printing this time, there was no sound, vibrating, or clicking for the extrusion operation, but the motor did perform the retract operation.

So surely if there were a problem with the wiring or the driver, I wouldn't be able to extrude at all. Right? Everything works, except when I print from the G-code. My only guess is that this is the motherboard.