What printers do you all use?

GiGaBiTe said:
I have a Tevo Tarantula, probably the worst 3D printer in existence.

It took three days to assemble from a kit of something like a thousand parts with a piss poor excuse for an assembly book that didn't bother labeling which parts when where. Basically had a complete diagram of every step and left the reader to figure out which fastener/part in the described bag went where. Later steps in the book required redoing previous steps several times because they somehow missed putting parts in when they needed to be.

The originally included firmware before I flashed it was improperly configured so the front 1/3 of the build plate was unusable, as well as it badly missed steps so printing out a complete part was impossible.

The original build plate went up in smoke within a week and I had to fight with the seller on banggood for a month to get a replacement. They tried to get me to perform diagnostics that would clearly void the warranty so they wouldn't have to honor it. I eventually got a second hot bed out of them. After I got it, I carefully cut into the burned one to find out a manufacturing defect where the insulation on the legs of the thermistor was missing, causing it to short against the bed and burn.

Leveling the bed is a nightmare, and it almost always requires re-leveling before every print.

Despite the frame being made from aluminum, it's extremely wobbly on the X/Y axes and requires significant external bracing to avoid print artifacts.

I've not yet been able to make ripple-free print on the Z axis, no matter whether PLA or ABS was used.
Click to expand...

This is precisely why I opted to pay a bit more and go with the Prusa MK2S as my first printer. Exact opposite experience building their kit, took about 8 hour to assemble (I took my time, spread it over two days), it has auto bed leveling and has been printing flawlessly since day one.

Knowing what you know now, would you have taken a different route?
 
Supercharged_Z06 said:
Knowing what you know now, would you have taken a different route?
Click to expand...

At the time, I would have gotten the same printer because it was the only one in the price point I could afford with the build volume I needed. All of the other printers in the same price point had a much smaller build volume.

Though its a different story today, there are cheaper and better printers with the same or greater build volume. I'll probably start looking at buying one sometime this year.
 
Finally had a free weekend to put together the Prusa i3 MK3 kit that arrived a couple months ago:

PrusaMk3.jpg


Love the improvements over the MK2S, especially the new Y-axis frame and the magnetically mounted/removable print bed. That and the fact that it is completely silent when printing. The only thing you hear is the extruder fan, and that little Noctua is already pretty damn quiet to begin with.

Printing a benchie as a first test print - will update with a pic once it's completed.
 
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I've been using a CR-10S for a little over a month. I'm quite happy with it thus far. I will be trying ABS in an enclosure in the next few weeks.
 
Anet A8 with a E3D v6 hotend & other printed upgrades. Has come in pretty handy. Didn't realize that [H] had a 3D Printer section until today.
 
CR-10 with a fang mod to use a noctua fan for the hot end...got to tackle the control box fans next, then maybe the wife will let me bring it back inside.
 
I am using Anycubic Photon.
Very good quality but resin is a messy, stinking, toxic material.
This is my first 3d printer. I need to wear gloves, facemask and goggles to protect myself.
I feel like a chemist.
 
I have an Anet A8 I bought from eBay, nothing special and it was cheap, as long as I have the bed leveled the prints come out fine.
 
can you guy recommend a decent starter printer? I have a project I want to try and use 3d printed things for but have no idea where to start. Needs to be able to make things some what precise i guess.
 
Bigbacon said:
can you guy recommend a decent starter printer? I have a project I want to try and use 3d printed things for but have no idea where to start. Needs to be able to make things some what precise i guess.
Click to expand...

I recommend the Creality Ender 3. I think at this moment it is the best bang for the buck, and can make some really great prints.

How large of prints are you needing to make?


Need to do some wire management (ENDER 3 PRO) :

file-14.jpeg
 
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Viper16 said:
I recommend the Creality Ender 3. I think at this moment it is the best bang for the buck, and can make some really great prints.

How large of prints are you needing to make?


Need to do some wire management (ENDER 3 PRO) :

View attachment 148769
Click to expand...

I was looking at making what I need it 2 parts so probably 2 parts that are maybe 6 to 8 inches long and 62mm to 82mm at the widest point
 
The ender 3 should fit the bill, anything bigger though and you may want to look at the CR10S
 
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We've been buying up all the Stratasys Dimension SST printers within about 250 miles. 2x 768 SST, 2x 1200 SST, 2x 1200 ES. Companies and schools are dumping them for $2000-5000. Don't pay a penny more, the deals are out there if you can wait for one. Still searching for a suitable soluable support material substitutes but there's still enough available via eBay for now.
 
I am far from done but I just got to a point in the last 2 days where my Anet E12 is fully functional again. It started out as total crap and is already printing really well and I hope after I spend more time bracing the printer it will print in identical quality to my Prusa for obvious reasons.

gU2Nkh2vPONtbj3sKDTpTYuCpCtU_bIjc032fVVPPZWysWYu4rM7_nJVVpAhB0e8j7aEHx_nAOWEw-0yw=w1459-h1095-no.jpg


Look at that glorious cable management, yesssssssssssss!
sQRe_dwZPq1Jlm4xTIVkPfpiRexPFeep769mt_POZi2u-o60nooYb5MjHDgWTMJGrF-bzUvgQ3dRBRDTI=w1459-h1095-no.jpg


Before I bought this printer I had already decided to make it a project machine and convert it to direct drive along with linear rails and anything else I decided I wanted to fuck with. When I started learning Fusion360 I then decided that I wanted to adapt my favorite Prusa MK2S extruder setup to the platform so that I could, in theory, make identical profiles and just have different print volume settings and maybe nozzle/line width and do it as an exercise to learn how to actually design some more complicated things. This is what I ended up with and I'm pretty happy with it.

qtv_HtcGqKgIbjeVEI135-Lqm37PKLpMMTVZTvevPj7SMRyfH3m8HRcvNgt6EDJP-MFmJpms2MR_W0o_F=w1459-h1095-no.jpg


BUgoWNozvKw_b5MvwZ9oQ9H77GNCbqOZvaQZNt3YZiL0yCW58_mdoMqnmVp5PbGxHlIb8gnAIR0i1ER87=w1459-h1095-no.jpg


I think I ended up designing 11 individual parts for various parts of the machine including the beefy ass mount that connects the extruder body to the slide block. I'm glad I made it cover the block as the red/green showing was pretty ugly (I realize the printer is hideous but it will be pretty eventually)!

uyMSYs5Izw6gvvcMNOxesC0NxiTVXPZskfuWHG-C489jP4v9tDW2cyjtnty4-N0TnoGWMp4qemjEJfMtS=w1002-h1336-no.jpg


In the end what really matters is how it prints and so far without changing a thing from my MK2S/MK2.5 profiles I get some stringing but otherwise very clean prints. I haven't before ever printed with a nozzle diameter outside of 0.4mm and I attached a 0.6mm nozzle for this guy. It prints really well at 0.24 layer height but I need to get my line thickness reined in because it made a BEEFY ass vase overnight when I wasn't paying close enough attention.

NUIp1QGF30oaEuMLE23LQwCyGk5nyYRKGS25VawvLFZHAE-K9BWwjwhATSJO_V_uqypACwu4dNoUSqikT=w1002-h1336-no.jpg


Oh, and as far hardware upgrades..

E3D v6 w/ 40w cartridge and sock and 0.6mm nozzle
0.9 degree extruder stepper (I'm struggling with linear advance, TMC2130 spreadcycle and 12v right now so this may change to a Moons super low amp motor later)
Prusa i3 MK2S direct drive conversion modified for EZ-ABL and linear rails
EZ-ABL auto bed leveling probe
Noctua 40x20 hotend fan and Sunon maglev vapo bearing blower (I have extra and I think this needs two blowers later!)
MGN12 linear slide rails and MGN12H slide blocks for X and Y axis (I have Z rails but that's gonna wait a bit)
MKS Gen 1.4 controller with TMC2208 steppers on X, Y, Zx2 and TMC2130 on E (potentially will revert to A4988 on E axis)
Meanwell 350w slim PSU
Probably more I'm forgetting, who knows...
 
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guitarslingerchris said:
Oh, and as far hardware upgrades..

E3D v6 w/ 40w cartridge and sock and 0.6mm nozzle
0.9 degree extruder stepper (I'm struggling with linear advance, TMC2130 spreadcycle and 12v right now so this may change to a Moons super low amp motor later)
Prusa i3 MK2S direct drive conversion modified for EZ-ABL and linear rails
EZ-ABL auto bed leveling probe
Noctua 40x20 hotend fan and Sunon maglev vapo bearing blower (I have extra and I think this needs two blowers later!)
MGN12 linear slide rails and MGN12H slide blocks for X and Y axis (I have Z rails but that's gonna wait a bit)
MKS Gen 1.4 controller with TMC2208 steppers on X, Y, Zx2 and TMC2130 on E (potentially will revert to A4988 on E axis)
Meanwell 350w slim PSU
Probably more I'm forgetting, who knows...
Click to expand...
Hmm. some different choices there.

I too have a project printer, I print on a Robo 3D R2 and a HercuLien (Ultimaker kinematics). But my project printer is a TronXY X5-400

So far the upgrades include:
  1. E3D Titan Aero Clone with Volcano hotend, 0.6mm nozzle and 50W 24V heater cartridge. 40 mm x10 mm 24V Sunon Maglev cooling fan.
  2. Mainboard is a SKR 32-bit with X, Y and Z axis using TMC2130 with SPI and the extruder uses a LV8729. My research indicates that the LV8729 runs cooler and smoother than the TMC2130 (in any mode) when used for the extruder stepper.
  3. rPi 3B+ with 4.3" capacitive touchscreen running OctoPrint and this (https://github.com/noxhirsch/OctoPrint-TFT) fork of OctoPrint-TFT.
  4. MGN12 linear rails and MGN12C carriages on X and Y.
  5. Z is currently a T8*2 lead screw and two 8 mm rails per side.
  6. Chinese 24V 21A power supply.
  7. Chinese 5V 8A power supply for RGB LED strips and the rPi.
  8. Bed heat supplied by 120V 650W silicone heater running off a DC/AC SSR.
  9. 1/4" MIC6 cast plate for the bed with removable glass, garolite, plexiglass plates used depending on filament type. Most printing is on the glass bed.
  10. X and Y are using 17HS8402 (48 mm) steppers and the Z is a 17HS6001 (60 mm) stepper that uses a closed loop belt to move both sides of the bed. All steppers are 1.8°.
  11. Part cooling fan is a 50mm x 15 axial fan but I haven't designed the fan duct yet.
Maximum print volume is about 450 x 450 x 480, but I will reduce that to something that doesn't require the head to move to every extreme. I am still debating how I will set up endstops. My choices are using StallGuard2 on X and Y or microswitches, I have a few options for Z; piezo board and sensors, or inductive sensor, or BL Touch. Not sure what I am going to do there. The other plan is to swap the Z lead screws for two 1204 ball screws to increase precision and remove backlash. Since this is a CoreXY design and built in a cube the last upgrade will be to enclose all the sides with acrylic sheets. I am sure there is more stuff I am missing. If I can get some free time over the next week I will try to upload a picture or two.

If I was looking at your list correctly, and the images, that is a very workable printer. The only thing I would change is the TMC2130 on the extruder. The A4988 is okay, but not as smooth as a DRV8825 or the LV8729 stepper drivers, also 0.9° is overkill on an extruder, especially with 16 microsteps and an 8-bit board like the MKS. As you fine tune your set ups and increase print speed, you are asking for missed steps on the extruder. Granted that is not as bad as missing steps on X, Y and/or Z, but if you can avoid the possibility, you should try.
 
WheresWaldo said:
If I was looking at your list correctly, and the images, that is a very workable printer. The only thing I would change is the TMC2130 on the extruder. The A4988 is okay, but not as smooth as a DRV8825 or the LV8729 stepper drivers, also 0.9° is overkill on an extruder, especially with 16 microsteps and an 8-bit board like the MKS. As you fine tune your set ups and increase print speed, you are asking for missed steps on the extruder. Granted that is not as bad as missing steps on X, Y and/or Z, but if you can avoid the possibility, you should try.
Click to expand...
So I had not read about the LV8729 drivers at all but I definitely will now. I had a full set of 2130s on hand from a friends' MKS Gen L board that is slated to go into his Ender 3 soon so I just grabbed one to try spreadcycle without having to permanently modify my 2208s. The 0.9 degree stepper was the $20 hail mary to see if a much lower amp stepper would reduce the noise and it DID significantly reduce the noise but even running it at 450mV I still hear it annoyingly so and it's pretty close to skipping steps at that point so I'm definitely ditching the 2130/2208 on the extruder regardless. I tried immediately turning up 256 native microstepping and it was pretty laughable how hard it was for the printer to still fail to keep up but it has been a champ at 32 with the 0.9 stepper so far. The A4988 stepper I am assuming/hoping will be the same as my MK2.5 extruder which I think is a A4982, and on the E axis alone I can live with that but I am going to look at the LV8729 for sure.
 
guitarslingerchris I was pointed to the LV8729 on the RepRap forums when I was researching the TMC2130's. Almost every person who had TMC2130 for X, Y and Z went with something else for the extruder stepper. I was actually very surprised to see that. I have some TMC2208's, LV8729 and A4988 drivers sitting in a box, so I will be able to try them all. I think the A4988 is just an updated version of the A4982.

My end goal was to try to eek out as much speed and precision as possible. So the frame was beefed up with every corner getting added bracing, every bolt was replaced with a socket head (supplied with all philips head screws) and every place necessary got thread lock. Every remaining acrylic bracket was replaced with aluminum or stainless steel plates. Swapped the bowden setup for a direct drive since it is easier to control extrude flow. I was going to go with Noctua fans, but I am a fan of the MagLev and so far every comparable MagLev seems to have higher static pressure than the same sizer Noctua. I don't need my printers to be completely silent, since they are on a different floor than the bedrooms.
 
A4988 Drivers are noisy/cheap. I would use the TMC2208's. Coming from the A4988 and going to the TMC2224's, it is night and day better.

you would want to possibly look at using stealthchop2 which I believe is supporting on the TMC2208's....dont know much about the LV series. Alot of the higher end control boards use Trinamic drivers.
 
Viper16 except we are speaking about a specific use case, yes the A4988 are cheap, but they are much better than TMC2208 for an extruder, which tends to run the stepper very hot. Extruder steppers have a very different use profile over axis movement steppers so the requirements are different. I am not sure you can use the TMC2208 in StealthChop anyway, most of the cheap TMC2208 driver boards available are preconfigured for SpreadCycle to make them drop in replacements for Allegro and TI drivers. It would require some board level solder bridging and adding a drop resistor and jumpers to AUX2 pins to make them work in StealthChop mode.

There is a Hybrid mode that starts in StealthChop2 but changes at some threshold to SpreadCycle as the speed increases. Marlin supports this mode, you still need to do the solder bridging and jumpers.

Alex Kenis did an interesting video charting torque, current, and temps in StealthChop vs. SpreadCycle,
 
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WheresWaldo said:
Viper16 except we are speaking about a specific use case, yes the A4988 are cheap, but they are much better than TMC2208 for an extruder, which tends to run the stepper very hot. Extruder steppers have a very different use profile over axis movement steppers so the requirements are different. I am not sure you can use the TMC2208 in StealthChop anyway, most of the cheap TMC2208 driver boards available are preconfigured for SpreadCycle to make them drop in replacements for Allegro and TI drivers. It would require some board level solder bridging and adding a drop resistor and jumpers to AUX2 pins to make them work in StealthChop mode.

There is a Hybrid mode that starts in StealthChop2 but changes at some threshold to SpreadCycle as the speed increases. Marlin supports this mode, you still need to do the solder bridging and jumpers.

Alex Kenis did an interesting video charting torque, current, and temps in StealthChop vs. SpreadCycle,
Click to expand...

The 2208s I have are all default in the hybrid mode I believe and like others I had no luck with linear advance and stealthchop together unfortunately. I am unwilling to give up linear advance so even if my 2208s were able to stay cool and it printed fine otherwise I wouldn't do it. The 2130 in spreadcycle makes a horrible, HORRIBLE screeching sound since I stuck with the 12v setup and I tried the factory stepper, my extra prusa/LDO stepper and a $20 0.9 degree motor which allowed me to run it at half voltage basically and that definitely reduced the noise volume and obnoxiousness but it's still more audible than my actual Prusa extruder with the A4982. I went ahead and ordered a single LV8729 to play with and until it gets here on the slow boat I'm guessing the A4988 will make it's way into the printer along with my extra Prusa stepper just because it makes me happy seeing my homemade extruder setup say Prusa.
 
WheresWaldo Thanks for the video, learned some stuff, with the Duet Masetro board I have, I found out the stealthchop2 runs until a certain speed and then switches over to spreadcycle, and is on by default. Very interesting.
 
guitarslingerchris The noise would be helped moving to 24V, some. Also SpreadCycle is crappy at low rpms that is why Hybrid mode exists.
Viper16 I wanted a Duet Maestro but I already had a MKS SBase and when I decided to dump the TronXY board, I got the SKR from BigTreeTech, then since I already knew how to configure the SBase, I am going to replace it with the newer MKS SGen (basically an SBase with pin socket headers) with replaceable drivers. Plus these Chinese clones are much cheaper than the genuine Duet or Smoothieboard setups. I am running Marlin 2.0.x on the 32-bit boards instead of Smoothieware.
 
Hey Viper16 do you have the diagnostics set up for the TMC2208 or are you using it in Legacy mode? It look like there is an easy way to set up the board for UART diagnostics then you can change between modes easily and set up power usage via G-Codes without having to reflash firmware. I am going to do this with my TMC2208



 
KarsusTG said:
Flashforge Creator Pro. It has performed admirably and basically paid for itself.
Click to expand...

I have a bank of these. Last year they were running nearly 24/7 to keep up with orders. Cash flow was terrific. Things are slower this year.
They are great, but like everything, they wear out.

I don't think most people realize that stepper motors get weak with time due to heat and definitely do need to be replaced.
The magnets are susceptible to heat induced demagnetization. So over time, the printer will get less and less accurate and more prone to mysterious print failures as the motors torque drops.
You can adjust the voltage to some degree to compensate temporarily, but that makes them run even hotter.
ALL my printers have coolers on the steppers and STILL they eventually fail. This is only a big deal in production environments.
For home hobby use they can least a LOT longer.

I keep CASES of stepper motors for them onhand :)
 
Barometer said:
I have a bank of these. Last year they were running nearly 24/7 to keep up with orders. Cash flow was terrific. Things are slower this year.
They are great, but like everything, they wear out.

I don't think most people realize that stepper motors get weak with time due to heat and definitely do need to be replaced.
The magnets are susceptible to heat induced demagnetization. So over time, the printer will get less and less accurate and more prone to mysterious print failures as the motors torque drops.
You can adjust the voltage to some degree to compensate temporarily, but that makes them run even hotter.
ALL my printers have coolers on the steppers and STILL they eventually fail. This is only a big deal in production environments.
For home hobby use they can least a LOT longer.

I keep CASES of stepper motors for them onhand :)
Click to expand...

Ya, I don't use mine nearly as much as you. Probably once a week printing either nylon or abs. I have been experimenting lately with they high strength abs and "carbon fiber" filament.
 
guitarslingerchris said:
I am far from done but I just got to a point in the last 2 days where my Anet E12 is fully functional again. It started out as total crap and is already printing really well and I hope after I spend more time bracing the printer it will print in identical quality to my Prusa for obvious reasons.

View attachment 149311

Look at that glorious cable management, yesssssssssssss!
View attachment 149312

Before I bought this printer I had already decided to make it a project machine and convert it to direct drive along with linear rails and anything else I decided I wanted to fuck with. When I started learning Fusion360 I then decided that I wanted to adapt my favorite Prusa MK2S extruder setup to the platform so that I could, in theory, make identical profiles and just have different print volume settings and maybe nozzle/line width and do it as an exercise to learn how to actually design some more complicated things. This is what I ended up with and I'm pretty happy with it.

View attachment 149313

View attachment 149314

I think I ended up designing 11 individual parts for various parts of the machine including the beefy ass mount that connects the extruder body to the slide block. I'm glad I made it cover the block as the red/green showing was pretty ugly (I realize the printer is hideous but it will be pretty eventually)!

View attachment 149315

In the end what really matters is how it prints and so far without changing a thing from my MK2S/MK2.5 profiles I get some stringing but otherwise very clean prints. I haven't before ever printed with a nozzle diameter outside of 0.4mm and I attached a 0.6mm nozzle for this guy. It prints really well at 0.24 layer height but I need to get my line thickness reined in because it made a BEEFY ass vase overnight when I wasn't paying close enough attention.

View attachment 149316

Oh, and as far hardware upgrades..

E3D v6 w/ 40w cartridge and sock and 0.6mm nozzle
0.9 degree extruder stepper (I'm struggling with linear advance, TMC2130 spreadcycle and 12v right now so this may change to a Moons super low amp motor later)
Prusa i3 MK2S direct drive conversion modified for EZ-ABL and linear rails
EZ-ABL auto bed leveling probe
Noctua 40x20 hotend fan and Sunon maglev vapo bearing blower (I have extra and I think this needs two blowers later!)
MGN12 linear slide rails and MGN12H slide blocks for X and Y axis (I have Z rails but that's gonna wait a bit)
MKS Gen 1.4 controller with TMC2208 steppers on X, Y, Zx2 and TMC2130 on E (potentially will revert to A4988 on E axis)
Meanwell 350w slim PSU
Probably more I'm forgetting, who knows...
Click to expand...
I've got rails for the zed on my cr10 but just haven't gotten around to modding it for them. Too many things to print.
 

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Paladin21 said:
Damn, I had PTSD flashbacks of the dot matrix squeal there. Too many years of listening to payroll process checks across the hall....
Click to expand...

Those things were so solid they could print on copper roofing flashing and survive though...
 
Creality Cr-10s heavily modified, and a Monoprice Delta Mini.
 
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