From a discussion on the Makergear 3D printer forums …
A Makergear M2 user had a strange problem:
Octopi claims the serial connection went down.
LED2 was blinking red, rapidly, and LED3 was shining with a steadfast red light.
LED2 shows the extruder heater PID loop is running and LED3 shows the extruder fan is on:
https://reprap.org/wiki/Rambo_v1.1
You just never noticed the blinkiness before … [grin]
Because the extruder heater is still running, the firmware hasn’t detected a (possibly bogus) thermal runaway or any other fatal problem. It’s just waiting for the next line of G-Code, but Octopi isn’t sending it.
Casually searching the GitHub issues, there’s a report of intermittent serial problems from last year:
https://github.com/foosel/OctoPrint/issues/2647
Which points to the FAQ:
https://community.octoprint.org/t/octop … eption/228
Look at the Octopi Terminal log to see if the conversation just before the failure matches those descriptions.
Assuming you haven’t updated the printer firmware or anything on the Octopi, then something physical has gone wrong.
First and least obviously, the Pi’s MicroSD card has probably started to fail: they’re not particularly durable when used as a mass storage device and “the last couple of years” is more than you should expect. Download a fresh Octopi image, put it on a shiny-new, good-quality card (*), and see if the situation improves.
Then I’d suspect the Pi’s power supply, even though you’re using the “official rpi power supply”. All of those things contain the cheapest possible electrolytic capacitors, running right on the edge of madness, and produce bizarre errors when they begin to go bad. Get a good-quality wall wart (**), ideally with a UL rating, and see if the situation improves.
While you’re buying stuff, get a good-quality USB cable (***) to replace the one that (assuming you’re like me) you’ve been saving for the last decade Just In Case™. Use the shortest cable possible, because longer does not equal better.
After that, the problems get truly weird. Apply some tweakage and report back.
(*) This is harder to do than you might think. You may safely assume all cards available on eBay and all “Sold by X, Fulfilled by Amazon” cards will be counterfeit crap. I’ve been using Samsung EVO / EVO+ cards (direct from Samsung) with reasonable success:
https://softsolder.com/2018/10/16/raspb … sk-memory/
https://softsolder.com/2017/11/22/samsu … ification/
https://www.samsung.com/us/computing/me … 22y+zq29p/
The card in question eventually failed, so having a backup card ready to go was a Good Idea™.
(**) Top-dollar may not bring top quality, but Canakit has a good rep and costs ten bucks through Prime.
(***) Amazon Basics cables seems well-regarded and work well for what I’ve needed.
The Smell of Molten Projects in the Morning 