Mosquito® Installation Instructions
Mosquito Performance Advantages
Swap nozzles with ease in 10 seconds with the Slice Engineering™ Mosquito all-metal hotend. The patented Mosquito design resists the torque of nozzle changes; no longer must you grasp the hot block with a wrench, risk damaging wires, or pre-heat and risk burning yourself.
Additionally, Mosquito features a heat break of superior performance, with a wall thickness in the heat-breaking zone less than 20% that of monolithic all-metal heat breaks. Mosquito’s supremely thin-walled heat break minimizes the undesirable flow of heat upward from the melt zone along the filament path. Yet Mosquito™ is still the most rugged hot end available, because its heat break doesn’t serve as a structural element as heat breaks do in all other hotends. The Mosquito heat break features multi-body, bimetallic construction that places a copper alloy (thermal conductivity: 320 W/mK) where heat flow is desired and a stainless-steel alloy (thermal conductivity: 15 W/mK) where it isn’t. |
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Mosquito is rated for operation up to 500°C, meaning it can print all printable thermoplastics, including PEEK, Ultem (PEI), ASA, Nylon, and others.
1. Find an adapter
Mosquito adapters for various printers are being developed by Slice Engineering™, other 3D printing companies, and by the enthusiastic 3DP community. Additionally, Bondtech makes extruders specifically designed to integrate with the Mosquito™ hotend.
Mosquito’s black aluminum heatsink features a pair of M2.5x0.45 tapped holes and M2.5 counterbored clearance holes for mounting to its top surface (see Fig. 6) and a pair of M2.5x0.45 tapped holes for mounting to its bottom surface. Any of these three pairs of holes may be used to mount Mosquito to your machine. The M2.5 clearance holes may be used with M2.5x0.45 socket head cap screws, or if fastening Mosquito to a plastic component, with special M2.5 thread-forming screws for plastic .
 | The 4.1mm diameter, 1mm deep counterbore on the top surface of Mosquito’s heatsink is designed to locate PTFE tubing with 4 mm outer diameter, aligning the tubing’s hole precisely with the heat break’s hole. Slice Engineering™ recommends Capricorn XS tubing since its 1.9 mm inner diameter will prevent dramatically oversize filament from entering the heat break where it could become lodged. |
2. Use Boron Nitride Paste
3. Install the Temperature Sensor
Mosquito works with all temperature sensor types commonly found in 3d printers:
Cartridge sensors of 3mm diameter such as those from Slice Engineering™ : 1. Remove either retaining screw (M3 low head socket cap) from the hot block. 2. Insert a metal dowel pin (3 mm diameter with a 6 mm length) into the sensor socket (dowel pins are provided with Slice Engineering temperature sensors). More information can be found here. 3. Apply Boron Nitride Paste inside the hot block's sensor socket with the provided applicator swab and onto the surface of the cartridge. 4. Insert the sensor into the sensor socket. 5. Reinstall the removed retaining screw. 6. Wipe away any excess Boron Nitride Paste using a cotton swab, then allow it to dry as described in the preceding section. |  |
Threaded stud sensors with M3 threads:
1. Remove either retaining screw from the hot blo ck.
2. Apply Boron Nitride Paste onto the threads and shoulder of the sensor.
3. Install the sensor into the threaded hole previously occupied by the retaining screw.
4. Wipe away any excess Boron Nitride Paste using a cotton swab, then allow it to dry as described in the preceding section.
Glass bead sensors : To achieve accurate temperature measu rements with this sensor type, Boron Nitride Paste must fill the space between the glass bead and the wall of the sensor hole. This is achieved by potting the sensor into the hole. 1. Fill the sensor socket with Paste and insert the glass bead deeply into the wet paste. 2. Anchor the sensor’s leads to the Mosquito™ heatsink using the included Panduit zip tie for cable control and strain relief. 3. Wipe away excess Boron Nitride Paste using a cotton swab or sponge and allow it to dry as described in the preceding section . |
4. Install the Cartridge Heater
Any cartridge heater that has a 6 mm outer diameter and a cartridge length less than 22.5 mm may be used with Mosquito.
A low-quality cartridge heater may have a substantially oversize (out of specification) outer diameter and not fit Mosquito. If the heater inserts easily, use it, otherwise replace it. Do not force an oversize heater into the cartridge heater slot in the Mosquito.
1. Remove either retaining screw from the hot block. 2. Apply Boron Nitride Paste inside the hot block’s heater cartridge socket with the provided applicator swab and onto the surface of the cartridge. 3. Insert the heater into the heater socket. 4. Reinstall the removed retaining screw. 5. Wipe away any excess Boron Nitride Paste using a cotton swab and allow it to dry as described in the preceding section. |
5. OPTIONAL: Install the Fan
The Mosquito needs significantly less cooling than a traditional hotend, so just about any cooling fan will provide enough airflow to cool the heat break. When installing the Mosquito as a retrofit the existing cooling fan on the 3D printer is generally acceptable.  If the Mosquito is being installed on a clean build, or brand-new printer the Mosquito fan can be used. We use a tiny, but surprisingly high flow fan on the Mosquito hotend. High flow does generally equal more noise, however Mosquito doesn't actually require much airflow, but it can be useful for high temperature prints in a warm/heated enclosure. |
The fan ships with a pair of M2.5 screws to fasten it to the heat sink of the Mosquito as shown in Figure 11.
6. Install the Nozzle
 | If the threads of the nozzle and the hot block are clean of thermoplastic residue, there is no need to “pre-heat” Mosquito to change nozzles. If thermoplastic residue exists, a traditional hot nozzle change is required as it is with other hot ends. With proper tightening and use of high-quality nozzles, threads will stay clean. Slice Engineering™ recommends the use of a 1.5 Nm torque wrench for tightening nozzles to prevent plastic leakage. |
Not all nozzles are manufactured to withstand 1.5 Nm of torque. Low-quality nozzles may snap under these loads. Do not use the Nozzle Torque Wrench on low-quality nozzles. 7. Provide Strain Relief and Cable Management
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