Filament not feeding

Currently I'm still using the filament that came with the Makerbot TOM. It have no spool, so I just lied the entire row of filament beside the machine, it'll get hair wired once in a while and I need to untied them.

there was one time they really too hard to fix with no choice I just cut the filament and feed it again, and then there was where I face another problem, the filament was not feeding, it just stuck there and I can hear the clicked jamming sound from the driver pulley.

I found some possibility problem from Makerbot Wiki on When Things Go Wrong

I dissembled the stepstruder clean the driver pulley teeth in case some plastic clogged in between them.
Removed the crooked filament that block the entrence of the thermal barrier.
After making sure there wasn't anything clogged in the plastruder, then I put them back and test. It still jam.

I repeated a few times on the above action and I decided to try press and push the filament into it, and it actually can come out from the stepstruder but when I stop pushing it stop. I have to keep pushing and let it run for some time and then it solve the problem, but after this incidence it'll still jam a little bit whenever the beginning of new print.




Below are what I copied from the site:

Damaged Plastic Filament 

Rarely, the toothed drive pulley manages to etch an indentation into the plastic filament. As a consequence, there is nothing for the drive pulley to push against, and the filament doesn't advance.
One way to fix this condition is to apply some physical pressure, pushing the filament into the Plastruder. Eventually, the filament will advance past the damaged section, and the drive pulley will start grabbing the filament again.
Alternatively, you can put the Plastruder into reverse, and gently pull the filament back up and out of the plastruder. You should be able to physically inspect the filament to confirm the problem. Then, use a pair of scissors to snip off the damaged section of filament, and feed it back into the Plastruder.
This can also be a symptom of the idler wheel being too loose to adequately grip the filament. If the teeth of the pulley do not sufficiently indent the filament, the teeth created will have insufficient strength and be striped away, creating a 'flat spot' where it will be unable to advance. Try adjusting the idler wheel slightly tighter than the 2mm guide rod, or even as tight as possible as it will not adversely affect its operation.


Misadjusted Idler Wheel Tension

It's easy to get the tension in the Idler Wheel wrong. If the Idler Wheel is too loose, the drive pulley won't grab and push the filament. We had difficulty with our Idler Wheel tension because we tried to adjust the tension after fully assembling our Plastruder, with the Plastruder electronics in place. It turns out that it's hard to get a wrench in the right place if the Plastruder is fully assembled. Instead, it was useful to adjust the Idler Wheel tension with the Plastruder on a benchtop, with the electronics off to the side. Initially, our team was concerned that making the Idler Wheel too tight might be problematic. We found that we were able to fix the Idler Wheel at its closes position to the drive pulley, and everything worked great. The plastic filament was crushed between the pulley and idler wheel, but this turned out to be a good thing. The pulley applied good, constant pressure to the filament. One word to the wise: do be careful when tightening down the nuts holding the Idler Wheel in place: acrylic cracks easily under pressure. Using washers to properly fill the space along the Idler Wheel bearing is crucial to having a snug fit without breaking the acrylic.


Filament Slipping Off Idler Wheel


On one Plastruder, we observed the plastic filament slipping to the side of the Idler Wheel. The filament would then be pushed against the wall of the Plastruder, where it would jam. Some customers were able to adjust the position of the Idler Wheel by moving washers from one side of the wheel to the other. However, my team resolved this problem by taking two Idler Wheels and super-gluing them together, creating a two-panel-thick Idler Wheel. This Idler Wheel was easier to position and worked perfectly the first time. Note: we don't recommend using this technique on mk4 or later extruders! See a more detailed discussion of this technique here: DoubleIdlerWheelDiscussion


Filament not going through the nozzle

If you find that your filament is blocked somewhere inside the white thermal barrier, it may well be that it got blocked at the entrance of the heater barrel: the thermal barrier hole may be larger than the heater barrel hole, creating a thing edge around. First, make sure that you have heated the plastruder well (a good 2 minutes at working temperature) before inserting the filament. That should help soften it to negotiate the opening. Second, if you still are having problems, before inserting the filament take some sanding paper and sand the edge of the filament into a point. That should make the filament properly align itself in the hole.


Flossing the teeth 

If you get repeated jams that seem to go away if you push on the filament from the top or if you back the filament out and cut off the stripped piece and put it back in, then you probably have clogged driver pulley teeth. The only effective way to fix this is to take apart the plastruder and pick the plastic out. If you find yourself doing this frequently, it might be helpful to leave out the first screw on the motor (the inside one) so you can easily remove the motor by taking out the other three instead of disassembling the whole plastruder. If, however, pressing down on the filament only helps a little and it just gets more stuck and stops, then you probably have a clog in your nozzle (possibly caused by Burning Plastic).