Welcome to the SeeMeCNC Community

So this happened last night.
I've been printing on bare glass with no problems up till now, but I guess it's time to look at installing that FabLam I bought. I was printing a geared cube from Thingiverse (http://www.thingiverse.com/thing:213946/#files). The individual gears and center-piece were all still adhered, so my guess is that one or more of the small pins in the lower right let loose from the bed and then it was off to the races. Too bad as I started the print and watched the first 4-5 layers go down before heading to bed. This couldn't have happened more than 10 minutes after I left the room...

After removing the bird's nest, you can see on the gears how the last layer somehow got offset about 12 mm in X and 5 mm in Y before going completely zonko.
My real question is, "what's the best way to clean a hot end that looks like it was dipped in a bucket of plastic?"
I've warmed up the hot end and been going at it with a combination of tweezers, small needle nose pliers, and leather gloves, but it's still pretty bad. I'm worried about the metal tools possibly shorting across the heater leads and whatnot, so I've been working in cycles--heat it up, turn it off, and try to clean chunks off while it cools.

Is there a solvent that just dissolves PLA? If so, I'm ready to buy a bucket...

Be careful about cleaning off the hotend with metal tools. I've heard more than one story of someone shorting the heater wires and blowing a fuse.
Otherwise, you've got the right technique

SeeMe needs to make silicone heater block covers like E3D does!
[img]http://e3d-online.com/image/cache/data/ ... 0x1000.jpg[/img]

I keep my hot ends clean and polished with a piece of thick leather. And you could clean that gnarly hot end the same way. Heat it up, hold it firmly and swipe it with the leather. Safe and fast. When done, the plastic peals off the leather.

Printing on bare glass works best if you've cleaned the glass with an alcohol wipe first. Finger oils and plastic oils don't help adhesion.

g.

Yep, I've been cleaning the glass with a blue scrub pad and dish soap whenever I remove it, and using isopropyl on a microfiber cloth between prints with no problems thus far. I think in this case I just had too much of my print too far from the proven level area of the bed. Things have been fine so long as they were small and near the center of the bed. I can tell by looking at the surfaces of the parts contacting the bed that I've still got some level issues. Combine that with the small surface area of the pins on that last print attempt, and BIRD NEST.

You can sorta see what I'm talking about by looking at the bottom of some of the pieces from my last failed print--there's definitely a difference in the first layer quality at different locations. It's tough to capture in a photo (tried 2 different light sources), but for some parts the first layer is perfect, for some it's too close/smooshed, and and for others the extrusion path is thin/under-extruded in comparison with the good areas.