I bought one on a whim about 6 years ago. I printed my first print shortly after setting it up and.. the print failed. Plastic spewed from the nozzle and made a tangled mess. I looked into it some more, continued to try to get it to work. Next the plastic doesn't sit on the bed. Once more plastic spewing from the nozzle and a tangled mess.
I kept trying over the years, bed levelling, nozzle cleaning, third party software patching, purchasing a level measuring device, new spools, higher quality spools, new bed covers. Over and over the prints failed and I ended up, every time, the owner of a freshly produced, still warm plastic spider web. Once or twice I managed to get a print that looked at least somewhat like what I was trying to print. But it'd still be marked by poor layer distancing, bumps, fucked up layers where it didn't adhere properly, and just generally a poor, unsatisfactory quality.
Please understand that I've owned a 3D printer for 6 years and don't know the first thing about them. I must admit I didn't realise how much learning I'd have to do when I purchased one and I'm not the brightest when it comes to this kind of thing. I also have a learning disability that makes it hard for me to pick new things up.
I merely assumed I'd be able to print small items I needed or wanted for various purposes and pick up a part time hobby along the way. But my experience has just been miserable. I don't have the money to purchase a better printer, more up to date one, or to really fix any major issues that might plague my current one. And it's made me want to give up the idea of 3D printing altogether.
The printer I have is a monoprice maker select. It uses PLA. I'm not able to check right now but I'm pretty sure the temps I use are ~200 / ~60. The bed is absolutely destroyed by failing to use glue as an adhesive and the bed level being so off that the printer drove it's nozel into it and leaving a permanent dent deep into the bed.
It's in a pretty poor condition but theres not a lot I can do about it unless the solution is extremely cheap or free. This is kind of a last ditch effort to figure out how to use the thing before I either give it away or throw it out. I'm pretty disappointed by the whole affair to be honest. I really liked the idea of 3D printing.
So, I'm here to ask, how do I even begin to make this thing work? Or should I just give up?
Second on the glass print bed. You can put it right on top of the existing bed and fasten it with binder clips. If it's thick enough it will span any flaws in the existing bed and be nearly perfectly flat so you have a consistent platform to level instead of dips and waves.
Just adjust the z stop, and then print single layer leveling prints and adjust the bed slowly while it prints. The biggest things to watch for are where it prints too thin, it will look squeezed out, and where it isn't close enough it won't stick. It seems like a lot of work but after a few runs it starts to look better. Doing other simpler leveling test prints are frustrating because all you see is the end result.
Another thing that I've run into that resulted in leveling issues is if your z heights are different from one side to the other. It's not obvious, but if the z screw of the left is different than the right, you can level all day but it will still try lifting on one side. Run the zaxis up to about 20mm on the left and then move the head to the right and check the height there. A hiccup or crash in the past could have gotten this out of line, but you can manually bring them back to square by manually turning the screw and get things back parallel.
Last thing that really messes with things when you're troubleshooting and then abandoning the printer for awhile is filament getting wet. You can get things dead on, but if the filament has been unprotected for a few days, the slight swelling will fight you when you're already frustrated.
Then, the last thing is measuring extrusion. Raise the head up like 100 mm, Mark the filament 70mm above the head, and use the controls and tell it to extrude 10mm at a time. Do this 3 times and then measure how far away your mark is. By the math, it should be 40mm away from the head. If you're more than 1mm either way, you're probably going to consistently see the issues your mentioning and no amount of need leveling is going to solve it. Technically a simple fix, but there is some math and code to send to the printer and someone here can easily help along the way.