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Here's the carnage! Was running a long print and saw this when I went to check on it. Was running the stock Ender 3 hotend with a Capricorn tube fix for nearly 5 years. Served me well. I haven't yet been able to remove the white PLA. To see the full damage but, I'm pretty sure that the threads are gone.
Guess it's time to upgrade the hotend.
My worry is stripped threads and, in even if not, I think it's probably about time to let the poor thing retire (until I repurpose it into a filament extruder). It's served me far better than I expected.
I'm not sure what you mean by stripped threads. Metal is stronger than plastic, there's nothing the PLA blob can do to cause physical damage to your hot end besides damaging cables. And I don't know what threads would be exposed to even be damaged.
I mean if you're wanting to buy a new hotend by all means get one, but don't do so thinking you have to because of this. I almost wanna guarantee everything still works as long as your cables are intact.
True but, with pressure, water can cut metal. I'll be heat softening it with my PCB toaster oven to see if I can recover it. If it's just a leak, and no electrical damage, as you mention, it's probably ok.
Probably, I'll still get a new hotend, even if there's no breakage because I think that the PTFE feed tube is a bit of a weak link.
I would suggest setting your hot end to 80-90 degrees. At that temp, PLA becomes rubbery and pliable without being a melty burned out mess. You can then clip and remove the blob with care and proceed with breaking it down.
For other types of filament, you want to be just above the glass transition temperature and below the melting point. (usually it's a bit above your heated bed temperature.)