How To Set Stepper Motor Current / VREF on Ender 3

Stepper motor skipping steps? Overheating? WATCH THIS
In today's episode, I show you how to set VREF / stepper motor currents on Creality Ender 3 32-bits silent mainboards (V4.2.2 or V4.2.7) with TMC drivers.
You may need to check or adjust the stepper motor currents when a stepper motor becomes too hot during printing, when a stepper motor skips steps or when replacing a motor with another type.

⏰ Chapters ⏰
0:00 Intro and disclaimer
0:12 When adjusting stepper motor currents?
0:36 Ender 3 stepper motor specifications
0:53 Mainboard version
1:11 Identify stepper drivers with letter on card reader
1:25 Potentiometers to adjust
1:40 Stepper driver specifications and stepper motor current - VREF formula
2:08 VREFs for Creality stepper motors
2:34 Tools needed to adjust the stepper motor currents
2:57 Accessing the mainboard
3:11 Measuring nominal VREFs
3:32 Adjusting VREFs

➡️ Music: "Elegant Advertising" by SoundDesign (ShutterStock)

[YouMakeTech]

Please hit the like button if you find this video helpful as a token of appreciation for all the effort it took to make this video and also so that this video can spread to more people. Thanks for your support!

[D.TH.]

After 2 years of don´t know what i am doing, i have found your video! Thank you so much!!!!You are all our hero!!!!

[lextorn]

Great useful video - complete, clear and concise! Thank you.

[kinney]

Thank you soo much for the chart of voltages and amps for each stepper. I fried my old mobo on my printer and had to adjust the voltages on the new mobo. Some were set to 1.6 and extruder was nearing 2

[lucase]

Super helpful video. I'm setting vref on a motor with a rated current of 1A on a 4.2.7 board. I might be back with some questions. :)

[louiskatzclay]

Thanks! I have extended my bed on my Ender 3 to about 60cm. It is almost working with the original 42-34 motor but I am going to upgrade the motor to the 42-40 and need to get the current up some. This is what I needed.
Since someone might ask, it works well but the vibration noise in the print is up. Since the vibration is consistent, for my non-critical application it looks good.
I pressed the Like and Subscribe button. Cheers!

[Lcperez]

I'm really liking your videos. Especially your klipper video. Great work. Keep it up.

[Flederratte]

Thanks for this video! It is a great help. The 1000th like on this video is from me :) Have a nice day!

[ChainsawDNA]

Beautiful video. Informative and direct. Thanks!

[LenordeFPV]

I like this video because it is straight to the point ! Where did you find the specifications of the motors? Most shops advertise the Creality 42-34 to be 1.5A and 4kg.cm torque. Because of the Vref values, I was thinking it might be wrong but your datasheet seems closer to reality.

[beachwat]

La technique du tournevis, mec... MERCI.

[mgrantom]

Great video. Succinct, to the point. Thanks!

[comradequicheairsoft]

Checked the voltage for X, Y, Z and all are set to 0.89 from the factory.
This is a 4.2.2 board.
Trying to up the current, to be able to handle the Dual Z-stepper upgrade.

[ravisngh]

Awesome. I wanted to ask if this can also help get rid of stepper motor noise. Recently, I replaced my failed motherboard on Ender 3 v2 with 4.2.2 silent mobo. However, the stepper motors are making too much noise, which was not there before. But steppers are running cooler than earlier.

[mrajay]

Failing to buy a multimeter, I just kind of gently turned these by feel and temperature of steppers. If they don't get over 40c all good :)

[legofreak]

Double check your boards + and - pos on the board i just fired popped a driver because of it and now have to replace the whole board

[dantel]

i have ender 3 pro. my printer have sliping problem and my volt is 0.5 for each motor. 4.2.2 is my board and for driver part its writed GD and i dont know witch driver is it.

[MrDiMaggio]

Very helpful thank you. Having issues with Ender 3 Pro with extruder skipping. Checked everything, replaced just about everything and was always able to hand push filament without issue. Tested E axis stepper and was coming in at 1.19, I bumped it to 1.24 and I'm currently running a 12 hour print and about 2 hours in with no skipping (actually very nice so far). What is considered too hot for the stepper? Any heat at all or burning skin? It's a bit warm but not scalding. I never touched the stepper before this to have a baseline to go by. Great video, thanks again.

[joemusto]

The motors on Creality printers are unlikely to get hot. More likely is the driver chips on the board getting hot. My Ender 3 Pro 4.2.2 had VRef set at 5.78V for XYZ from the factory with 150mOhm resistors. When I bumped them up to a volt, the driver chips started getting very hot (>65°C on the heat sinks). I dropped them down to 0.72V and the temp dropped by 20°C to the mid 40s. I left them there, since I wasn't having any skipping at that voltage. Same for the E channel. At 1.2V, driver chip got hot. Dropped it to 0.9V and temp is steady in the mid 40°C range. My point is be careful because the driver ships will heat up way before the motors and if you fry them, you will be replacing a board. I'm not sure why the calculations don't seem to jive but wanted to report my findings.

[feilko]

tenk iou my friande veri usefule vidéo !