Looking at 3D printers...

[RCHeliguy]

OK, that didn't take long. Working with Fusion 360 now. There are a lot of tutorials out there, but Fusion 360 looks different than many of those dating back a couple years. This is for the new version. AutoDesk claims this is free for personal use, but I can't tell if that is just for the first year or going forward long term.

 

[Zipdrive]

When the Fusion 360 licence runs out you just renew it.

If you changed your "usage" from personal to commercial then you change that also when renewing it and pay accordingly.

 

[RCHeliguy]

Great! So far I like Fusion 360 the best.

About to pull the trigger on my 3D printer, nozzles, both the smooth and power coated textured print surfaces and a pile of PLA to play with.

I am getting the kit rather than pre-assembled because I want to be familiar with it for future upgrades and maintenance.

 

[karoliens]

BTW with regard to printers. What I've read on the Ender 3 is that what you get is luck of the draw. They have some serious quality control issues.

Some people get printers with bad bearings, warped beds, etc.. etc.. Some people are willing to take the gamble because it is such a good deal, but it appears that there is no telling what you will actually receive if you order one.

Well the printer you're planing to buy costs double so of course Ender 3 has some down sides when it comes to quality of the printer. But when you sort out all the bugs if you have any (in my case I didn't) I don't think the quality of the prints is any worse.
Warped bed? Just put glass bed and you're good to go. 0-20usd
Need auto bed leveling? Just buy BL touch around 30usd.
IMHO For the price it's hard to beat Ender 3.

 

[RCHeliguy]

I agree that for the price the Ender 3 is a bargain. If I were more price sensitive, I may have gone that way.

 

[RCHeliguy]

Thinking I may wait for the Prusa XL to be released later on this year. The i3 MK3 is a couple years old now and updates are coming in the relatively near future and I'm not in a rush.

The mini has a 32 bit board with Ethernet port and Joseph has already said there are updates coming to the MKx lineup, so I can only expect that board will become standardized across the lineup, so I think it's worth waiting for a board that has more room to grow, better feature set and for more print volume.

 

[RCHeliguy]

This looks very impressive in price and capabilities. Other than the 220 x 220mm print size, this is amazing. 3D printing, laser cutting, and routing ? Wow!

The extreme resolution and tolerances that allow it to compete with resin printers is extremely impressive. I think this caters more to figurines vs. structural pieces like I would build.

The kickstarter price seems insane for these capabilities. Even the list price they are suggesting seems crazy low.

 

[RCHeliguy]

Interesting. He did mention that Prusa and Cura specific settings are currently not included in 3MF, but that there was room to include them.

STL = old, bulky, limited
3MF = new, smaller, more powerful

Sadly the free Fusion 360 plugin for 3MF gets poor reviews. Hopefully they will offer direct support for this in the near future. https://apps.autodesk.com/FUSION/en/Detail/Index?id=9199586017740700165&appLang=en&os=Win64

 

[RCHeliguy]

Hmmm.....
It's possible that I may end up building my own, since anything worth doing right is worth doing yourself.

I have no idea how long I would be waiting for a Prusa with a larger build volume. An Ender 3 becomes a DIY project anyway. Why not just build one from scratch.

I'm not sure that I need something quite this size, but the whole point is that I could build exactly what I wanted and use the best bits I've seen out there. The only real issue I see is that something like this uses a lot of 3D printed parts. If I built something like this from scratch, I could actually fabricate what I needed out of wood, plastic, acrylic etc pretty easily in my shop and it would likely even speed up the build.

A profile and wood 3D printer... blasphemy right?

 

[RCHeliguy]

So far, I'm thinking 600x300x400 print volume.

Duet3D Duet 3 6HC 3D Printer Controller Board
Duet3D PanelDue 7i Integrated Touchscreen
E3D Hemera Dual Drive Extruder and Hotend Full Kit (24v)
E3D v6 High Temperature Nozzle X - 3.00mm x 0.40mm
3D Printer Motor & Vibration Dampers
BLTouch - Automatic Bed Leveling Probe
Meanwell SE-350-24V
BuildTak FlexPlate System 12" x 12"
linear bearings

Looks like I'll need two heated beds as well.
Probably stick with belts for travel
Looking at the NEMA motors available.

Looks cool, but probably not something I need eventually. Mosaic Palette 2S Multi Material Filament System - 1.75mm

Note: editing this list as I go.

 

[RCHeliguy]

Right now I'm leaning towards a Core XY design.

It allows for a large build volume.
The frame can be an integral part of the enclosure.
The build plate only moves in the Z direction so the hot end will be a constant light weight in both the X and Y direction and not affected by the weight of what is on the build plate.

The belts will be a bit more complex and require careful tensioning.

The current idea is
2 x screw drives Z axis to move the build plate down.
2 x belt drives for the Y axis
1 x belt drive for the X axis.

The top build plate will be held in place with magnets only to help avoid heat expansion twisting.

What this would give me.
A 32bit micro processor with micro stepping
The ability to drive everything I need initially and the capability for expansion boards if I need to drive more motors.
A large touch screen
A large build volume
A top of the line hot end with direct drive allowing me to use numerous materials.
An enclosure for consistent prints.

The cost is piling up.

$230 Duet3D Duet 3 6HC 3D Printer Controller Board
$100 Duet3D PanelDue 7i Integrated Touchscreen
$120 E3D Hemera Dual Drive Extruder and Hotend Full Kit (24v)
$30 E3D v6 High Temperature Nozzle X - 3.00mm x 0.40mm
$35 3D Printer Motor & Vibration Dampers ( 3 pack )
$38 BLTouch - Automatic Bed Leveling Probe
$40 Meanwell SE-350-24V

$17 x 3 NEMA 17 Stepper Motor
$186 X 2 C-Beam Double Wide Gantry Actuator Bundle with NEMA 23 Stepper motor

That's just over 1K

+ Hot bed
+ flexible steel PEI magnet plates
+ misc V-Slot profile
+ belts, pulleys, tension adjustment pulleys.

 

[RCHeliguy]

After all of that, I just ordered the Prusa i3 MK3S and 4 x 2kg spools of PLA.
I'm going to focus on Fusion 360 and see what I can get the printer to do and see if I can work within its constraints.

If I find it is limiting me, I should be able to easily sell this printer as it is always 3-4 weeks backordered or keep it for extra capacity and build my own later.

 

[RobPhoboS]

I'm curious about 3d printing stuff, and this was the first thread that popped up when I searched. I have a background of visual fx in movies/tv, so the software side of it isn't a concern (except for Autodesk, which I wish didn't exist as a company awful).
Anyway, I wondered how you are getting on with your machine !

 

[RCHeliguy]

I ended up getting Prusa i3 Mk3S that I've been very happy with. I've also really enjoyed using Fusion 360 as my design tool.

Here is a bunch of the stuff I've done.

RCHeliGuy's Thingiverse Profile

Having a lot of fun after assembling my first 3D printer in September 2020. Loving Fusion 360 that I've been learning since then as well. I think my designs are interesting, but I am very new to 3D printing and just using default settings from PrusaSlicer. I also know my STL files are...

www.thingiverse.com

The 3D printed a button box and basically an entire dash for my Sim Rig below is what I've been working on for the last few months.

Camelbak 1liter bottle holder

Foot Plate isolators

 

[RCHeliguy]

I'm glad people are downloading my designs, and I'm happy to share, but I am getting tired of people asking me to design things for them.

 

[RobPhoboS]

Glad to see it's working out nicely for you !
I'd be interested in getting on much later in the year, or next year. Mainly for my actual track car to prototype some parts before going to metal, and of course for the odd little bit here and there with sim stuff.
Very cool indeed !

 

[Brun]

I bought a Flsun Q5 last year and have been really pleased with it. Much more straightforward to setup and get going than I expected given the home-brew nature of 3D printing. It being a delta printer means the volume is limited (200mm dia x 200mm height) compared to cartesian ones, but I haven't been constrained by it yet. There is a larger version but I'm struggling for space.

Do all my modelling with Modo which works perfectly despite not being CAD.

 

[TedBrosby-]

The 'best bang for the buck' is still the original Ender 3 to my understanding. It doesn't make the best prints available, but does the job. Perfect for anyone that values functionality over aesthetics. At the price range of the mentioned model, I would also be considering SLA printers.

I own an Ender 3. I don't recommend unless you're incredibly cost constrained.
The bed always goes out of calibration from even slight shaking or table movements.
The temperature sensitivity is too high so ABS has a higher chance of warping.
PLA is fine, but you'll want ABS if you want something more durable.

The Prusa i3 is great. Wish I got that instead.

Btw, make sure you use high quality PLA. I used cheap PLA and almost replaced my printer because I thought the extruder had gotten bad.

It turned out the filament was a cheap quality.
You can make back the cost by selling Nintendo Switch accessories to people.

 

[GeekyDeaks]

The bed always goes out of calibration from even slight shaking or table movements.

Replacing the woefully inadequate springs fixed that issue for me. I actually think this was one area they should not have skimped on the way they did as the stock springs are so thin that they don't maintain shape

I have had very few failed prints, but it is definitely a printer you need to be comfortable tinkering with

 

[RCHeliguy]

I'm not going to get into a printer debate. I simply wanted to focus on designing things and reduce as many variables as possible. I'm not cost sensitive in this price range. I was more concerned about my time.

So Prusa i3 mk3s, PrusaSlicer, Prusa stock profiles for their printer and Prusament filaments. They've already dialed everything in.

I've had people tell me that I could adjust settings to print faster, but I've never worried about the print times. I just wanted the end product to look right and I do care about cosmetics on my rig.

I've mostly printed PLA. I did try PETG and it worked fine. Once again, I used Prusa profiles and filament.

I set my printer up last September. After moving the printer to my basement and it getting colder down there, I had a brief issue with first layer adhesion. I lowered the Z height a bit to resolve that issue. I assume this was due to metal contraction.

I had one large print with a layer shift that I noticed and aborted. I resliced it and the 2nd print went perfectly.

PrusaSlicer has worked well. I started with 2.2, but started using 2.3 since it hit beta because of the features I wanted.

2.3 has a few features that mattered to me.

1. Painting where you want and where you want to exclude supports.

2. Ironing the top layer helped the appearance of the labels on my two color prints.

3. Allowing easy layer height adjustment. On my rotary wheels I dropped the layer height from 1
5 down to 0.7 on the curved edges. It has an auto adjustment feature, but I did this manually.

Past that, the Prusa magnetic build plates have been excellent. The textured plate in particular creates a fantastic looking surface if you can print face down.