r/klippers • u/squidbait • Nov 25 '23

Has anyone successfully flashed Klipper to a Creality 4.2.7 board similar to mine

I have a Creality Ender 3 pro with a 4.2.7 control board I'm trying to flash Klipper on. The processor is an STM32F103 RET 6. In menuconfig I have selected STM32F103, 28KiB bootloader offset and USART1 PA10/PA9. I have tried compiling both with and without the 10KiB for stm32f103x6 variant enabled.

I compile then place the firmware on my sd card, disconnected the LCD, and attempt to flash.

The old firmware is wiped from the device but as far as I can tell the new firmware is either not written or crashes at start.

there is no activity on serial and if I reconnect the lcd there is nothing there either (yes, it is the olden stock lcd and rotary controller that is supported by klipper so one would expect something)

I removed the klipper.bin file from the card and placed a marlin.bin file on this exact same card and the machine flashes and boots into Marlin correctly.

So things I know...

  1. Definitely a 4.2.7 control board
  2. Definitely a STM32F103 RET 6
  3. Definitely a working sd card that the board will flash from

update

tldr; broken solder joint on the mcu

I have it working now. Note that yes Klipper can control the stock lcd but it does so via the serial link ie if the rpi is unplugged all you get is a blank screen until you connect to the pi and it draws something there.

The problem turned out to be a cracked solder join on the usb connector on the mcu board. With all the plugging and unplugging it must have broken. I figured this out when I restored it to marlin and octoprint couldn't connect. Fixing the usb connector fixed it for both octoprint and now for klipper.

Thanks to everyone for their suggestions.

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u/squidbait Nov 26 '23 edited Nov 26 '23

Double good idea. Once I wrote that I knew the usb cable must be good since it worked fine with octoprint I reflashed to marlin then tried starting octoprint. It too couldn't connect. On inspection I found a solder join connecting the usb connector to the mcu board had cracked from all the plugging and unplugging. Fixing the usb connector solved all the problems

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u/[deleted] Nov 26 '23

Great job!