Hey,
How about we make a thread where everyone writes which printer(s) they own and are they happy with it (would buy again) ?
I’ll start. We have an Ultimaker at the hackerspace. It caused us a lot of grief. They sent a new hot head after finding severe flaws in the original design. It works well now but we put in many days fixing it. Probably would not buy again.
I am happy with all my printers…because I took the time to learn them and build them myself from scratch. They are completely reliable, amazing quality, and I’m not clueless because I bought a pre-assembled unit or a kit.
Awesome so if you buy a kit you’re clueless. Cool.
He means that you learn a lot about the machine by building it, so you have a clue when it’s time to troubleshoot.
I’ve been satisfied with my MG Prusa, but I wouldn’t buy it again. Lots has happened to printers in 2 years.
@Brian_Evans , there’s a lot of extra stuff you learn self-sourcing vs just buying a kit. You learn why things are done, vs just putting them together. So when it comes time to figure out a problem, you know the likelihood of the problem existing in [X] part, because you had to weight the benefits/drawbacks of the parts you ordered/printed.
@ThantiK Fair enough and I agree with your basic premise. Calling folks clueless for starting with a kit is rather harsh though. Personally I think the kit option is the best compromise in terms of getting printing faster vs. getting bogged down in the bowels of the McMaster catalog wondering wether to buy tool steel or stainless or how many M3x12s to buy. All the same I wouldn’t fault anyone for buying preassembled either if thats what sparks someone getting into 3d printing. They’ll have to learn soon enough anyway when the thing breaks and we all know it will.
I don’t think someone that doesn’t have a printer and has never self-sourced a complex project should start with a DIY. It will end up costing more than a kit (due to mistakes, shipping and other overheads) and can be very discouraging. I think kits are a great compromise, as you can learn a lot from a assembling a kit.
When I say clueless, I mean that literally. I mean lacking in or without clues. I do not mean that someone is stupid. Look up the definition, the definition of clueless is someone who is ignorant or without knowledge. That’s exactly what I’m saying. Self sourcing gives you knowledge you would otherwise be ignorant of. I’m not calling people who don’t know this stuff stupid. Too many people are offended because they confuse ignorance with stupidity. Ignorance is fixable, stupidity is not.
And @Shachar_Weis , my very first printer was all self-sourced. Yes, it costed more than a kit because of mistakes in the long run, but I was able to spread the cost over the 3 months or so it took me to learn everything and I got valuable education which allows me to now work on nearly any variation of printer regardless of design, while understanding benefits and drawbacks of each.
Well, we started off with a MB Rep2, thankfully not too many issues there, though still learning along the way. But will now like to get maybe an ABS printer (kit type) to play with a different material and like some mentions above, to get really down and dirty with fixing the stuff together.
I started off with a reprappro huxley kit, then moved to a reprappro Mendel kit but printed the parts myself, now Im building a self sourced rostock and i3 because building the pervious kits allowed me to learn what I liked and disliked in design and function of the printer. I think building a kit is an excellent and satisfying option. if I would have tried to self source my first machine my ADD would have kicked in and the project would still be sitting on my work bench in pieces.
Oh and I was very happy with quality and performance of both of my reprappro machines!
Mendel-Parts Orca 0.2. Mine works pretty well now after putting a lot of work and extra money into it, however it cannot print fast. The new Orcas seem to print nicely and at good speed without much effort after assembly. (My printer is now basically the same linear motion hardware on an old frame.) I also like their hotends because they’re fairly simple and I rarely have problems with my now outdated V9 one.
However, dealing with Mendel-Parts can be a pain and you will expect to wait a long time and not hear about your printer until it ships or you call. Lately the only blog posts from them are “We still have issue with our phone/email.” Basically they get bogged down a lot with orders and a ton of questions. In summary, the current Orca design looks good but the customer service isn’t so hot.
Got myself an UP Plus as didn’t want to build just print, just love it.