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Linear Rail Question

Good afternoon,

I had purchased a used Voron 2.4 V1. It worked great at first but quickly had some issues. I found that my MGN9 Linear Bearing/Rails have some issues. 1 the rails seemed to have not been cleaned from the factory. 2 what grease were on them was the wrong stuff and pretty thick. I removed my MGN9's from my printer and cleaned everything and greased with NLGI 1 white lithium grease. Im very new to 3D printing in general and still a noob with my Voron. I was wondering if there are sources that can help spec out better MGN9's for me. Im looking to source some new ones for the Switchwire I want to build plus maybe replace the ones I have on my 2.4 V1. Most of them work great but a few of them seem a little tight and have spots where they seem to catch even though they are clean and greased properly. Im looking for any information on this topic. I found great info on cleaning and tweaking MGN rails on youtube which did help some. I would like to know of any sourcing info, info on what brands are better than others, how to upgrade them. Thank you.
 
So Genuine HiWin are considered pretty good for the price. But the two sources in the US I buy rails from is Fabreeko for there HoneyBadger rails and West3D for there Beserker rails.
 
You can get rails to be good by cleaning and greasing yourself but those ones listed have been tested and proven.
 
I did remove all of my rails. Cleaned and greased them all. Half of them are like greased lighting...real nice. The other 4 have issues. A couple are tight and dont slide down on their own when the rail is vertical. The other 2 experience like a dead spot. Its hard to explain. When I run the bearing along the rail by hand it seems to feel like it catches sometimes. Almost like a bearing has a flat spot in it. If you keep going it will release and move. It doesnt always catch though. It did that before I cleaned it and now it still does it after I cleaned and greased it. If there is a way to get quality parts and rebuild the bearing I guess I would but these new rails you told me about I think is the way to go. Its a bummer my printer is down but I want good quality prints so I will just wait for my new rails. This is a good exercise too because I am going to build the switchwire here real soon and Im going with Dual head extruders.
 
Just keep in mind, sliding free down the rail if you hold it vertical might not be a good thing. That means there is slack and that can create vibrations.
For example, I just got a Baserker MGN9 rail in last week. It will not slide down on its own but if I push it gently, it does more pretty easy. That is what I look for in a rail.
 
oh...interesting. So if I have bearings that slide easily by themselves on the rail if held vertically thats not a good thing? Id like to learn more about this. I might have it all wrong then. I do know that the bearing that has the hickup when I move it is proly bad. I have 4 that move very easily on thier own if the rail is held vertically. They slide quick and easy. I have 2 bearings that will just sit in the same spot when the rail is held vertical but will move easily if I touch them. They will hold thier position while vertical unless I move them but they move easily. These are the 3 scenarios I have with my 8 MGN9's
 
They do have different tolerances as well so one might slide easy and still be tight.

For you, I would try and pack some more grese in to see if they slow down a little and still move easy. There are a few reads out there about the different rails.
 
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