Dangit. According to the very latest changes to the MakerBot assembly wiki, I put the heater assembly together with the heater barrel upside down. I’m not entirely sure what this means for my heater. Clearly it was working well enough that I could extrude reasonably well.
The questions is – do I leave it as is or disassemble/reassemble?
If I leave it as is, I suppose there’s a chance I could bulge the insulator, ruining it.
I’ve already disassembled/reassembled once because of a bad thermistor connection. If I disassemble again, I’m thinking the ceramic tape and nichrome may have had it. Not to mention that I’m probably going to have a royal mess of plastic inside the barrel and nozzle to clean up.