Depends what you want to achieve, I guess. I'm looking for a sub $10k industrial unit that makes functional parts, not trinkets I can crush with my bare hands. Fits the bill.
3D Printer Recommendations
- Thread starter mildot
- Start date
Depends what you want to achieve, I guess. I'm looking for a sub $10k industrial unit that makes functional parts, not trinkets I can crush with my bare hands. Fits the bill.
If you plan to print ABS a fully enclosed 3D printer is preferable. If you plan to do some funky stuff that might require removable support material I would stick to PLA.
Most of the time if you keep in mind design rule of thumbs for 3D printing you won't need removable support.
Printing on a borosilicate glass (Pyrex) plate makes life much easier when it comes tongetting the plastic off the printing bed.
That's all I have off my head right now. We run 3 printers pretty much 24/7 where I work l, all ABS on pyrex plate.
Most of the time if you keep in mind design rule of thumbs for 3D printing you won't need removable support.
Printing on a borosilicate glass (Pyrex) plate makes life much easier when it comes tongetting the plastic off the printing bed.
That's all I have off my head right now. We run 3 printers pretty much 24/7 where I work l, all ABS on pyrex plate.
- Location
- Prairie drifter
I have had good luck with my $180 Anet A8. It takes some work to keep it running tight, but it can churn out good quality prints.
Work has one of the 5k machines. Works really well but is effectively the apple of 3D printing. Don't expect to change the settings like temp, print speed etc. You don't need to, but it's effectively locked to the MF materials. Also, STL settings matter. Oh, don't lose the 3$ glue stick. Otherwise it won't print worth crap. (The sticks are common and easy to get.)
Are you running the fibre reinforcement?
You've drank the kool aid!
This is marketing garbage. You can print the Markforged filaments with almost any 3D printer that prints poly carbonates. With a few mods the cheapest of Ali Express printers can print that stuff. You do realize, however, that the continuous carbon fiber filament you're talking about costs 1000$+ CAD per kg, right? Are you an aerospace engineer? Because no normal machine shop has a use for printing things that cost almost a thousand dollars per kg! Not to mention it's still an FDM printer and therefore you will always have the same weaknesses built in as any other filament: layer lines.
Contrary to popular belief FDM printing has been around for decades. The only reason it has become so popular recently is the patents on the original tech have run out and the public domain got hold of it. Everyone who experimented with FDM printing over the last few decades couldn't really make any money with it. Because extruding a tiny bit of polymer line by line introduces inherent weakness into the final product. When you quote the strength of aluminum you are failing to mention that is only in some types of strength tests. In other tests it still fails along the layer lines just like all FDM filaments.
The Markforged machines aren't even true 3D printers, they still print in two dimensions. I'd start to consider paying that much for a machine if it could print in all three dimensions...
I use a 3D printer in a fabrication type setting and I have to say you are dreaming if you think you will be able to actually produce things that people will buy with Onyx or Continuous Carbon Fiber. 3D printing shines for one thing, rapid prototyping.
The guy who commented expensive 3D printers are like Apple products is exactly right.
I'll be the first to admit I am not an expert in 3D printing. I've only just started researching. The reviews I was seeing on the Markforged were all very positive and the print quality looked great. It looked like a great machine.
Then I finally found some reviews of people that hadn't bought the machine, so they weren't justifying their purchase. Then I start reading it's cloud based software with very little adjustments by the user. My opinion has totally changed. The "Apple of 3D printers" sums it up.
My hope was to make near aluminum strength, usable parts. My initial research had shown material costs to be on par with aluminum. Savings being in setup and tools.
I'll keep poking around. Maybe just get a cheapo unit to get my feet wet and figure out what I need.
Then I finally found some reviews of people that hadn't bought the machine, so they weren't justifying their purchase. Then I start reading it's cloud based software with very little adjustments by the user. My opinion has totally changed. The "Apple of 3D printers" sums it up.
My hope was to make near aluminum strength, usable parts. My initial research had shown material costs to be on par with aluminum. Savings being in setup and tools.
I'll keep poking around. Maybe just get a cheapo unit to get my feet wet and figure out what I need.
Strongly recommend a cheap unit, no matter what your budget is. That's a smart move. Building, setting it up, calibrating and tuning your settings is where half of the learning comes from. Once you've got the knack of how 3D printing works, and whether or not it has a permanent role in your shop, then you can move on to the high end machines and actually appreciate the quality of life improvements a 5000$ machine will offer. To be totally honest, and I think I've already said so in this discussion, I find with my use case I would be better spending 3000$ on MORE CHEAP PRINTERS than I would spending that money on a single machine. It's so quick to modify your design in your CAD program but waiting for each design to print is the killer. With 4 printers I could print 4 different prototypes at once and then test them all at once. Printing v1, testing v1, making changes, then printing v2 and testing v2 etc etc is a sluggish process.
Anything cloud based is a no-no. There have been printers with cloud-based slicers which are multi-thousand dollar bricks today because the company went tits up and there's no more cloud to control the printer.
Even if you find FDM in it's current state doesn't fit well into your shop you will always be able to dust off your cheap printer when you need a plastic fridge part that Samsung wants to sell for 130$, for example. You can't go wrong with a cheap one.
StandardIssue
CGN Regular
- Location
- Onterrible, Communist Turdezuela
Stuff like how they need to upgraded out of the box, or that they stop working after a bunch of prints, things not printing correctly, and a need to replace the hotbed.
This is my concern. I want a machine that will work without a bunch of screwing around. I'm not looking for a hobby machine that I spend hours tinkering with to make it work.
Can look into the Ultimakers and Makerbots. They're the go-to machines for schools and makershops.
No just onyx. It's strong enough for what we do. IIRC there is an offline option for markforged software but we don't use it. I have no skin in the machine since I didn't select it at work. I'd be curious if one of the ultimakers could get similar print quality using nylonx or even markforged onyx.
I was just researching the Ultimaker units. Looks promising. There's a seller in Calgary, hoping they have an actual location that I could maybe look at some units.
