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Wade Wilson posted:Oh poo poo guys, the new version of the favorite newbie 3d printer is up on Monoprice. Has been for a while. It doesn't really provide any performance bonuses over the Maker Select v2.1 though. Touch screen is definitely nice since it's much faster in every regard than the old model.
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Aug 6, 2016 00:26
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Acrylic isn't some magic terrible material that cracks when you look at it funny. Assuming the designer knows what they're doing, a frame can be designed so that no strong forces are pushing on the acrylic in the axis where it's brittle. Just don't drop it off a table like that one dude did 
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Aug 6, 2016 00:49
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ante posted:Acrylic isn't some magic terrible material that cracks when you look at it funny. Assuming the designer knows what they're doing, a frame can be designed so that no strong forces are pushing on the acrylic in the axis where it's brittle. tell that to this dope *cracks pretty drat important endpiece* ohh look they clearly had complaints about that part, they included a spare. Not my fault, I'll just be careful this ti- *cracks replacement in the exact same way in the exact same place* The "FUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUCK" that followed caused my neighbours to knock on my door to make sure I was okay.
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Aug 9, 2016 01:17
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Maker Select should really come with a glass plate with PEI on it. It is sooo much better and can't cost that much bought in bulk.
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Aug 10, 2016 05:53
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Why bother with the glass? Straight PEI works great for it.
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Aug 10, 2016 06:50
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Easy, cheap source of a nice flat plate? That's why I use it. Planning on moving to aluminium when I can find a nice flat piece and time to get my pals at the water-jet shop to cut it out. That's primarily driven by the desire to affix an inductive levelling system though. Anyone got any experience with Colorfabb XT-CF20? I picked up a roll on a whim when I was passing through London (iMakr near Holborn, neat shop and a novelty to buy filament in a retail store). I probably won't try printing it until I have a new hot-end as I only have a j-head and the fibre is apparently hard on brass hardware. Had to prod Colorfabb support to find out about chemical/resistance properties but it seems the binder plastic is "similar to" PETG.
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Aug 10, 2016 10:36
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Stupid_Sexy_Flander posted:Why bother with the glass? Straight PEI works great for it. The plate it came with was warped and had lots of low spots
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Aug 10, 2016 14:34
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Hoping I can get some advice here. I'm wanting to pick up a cheap but reliable printer for doing some small-scale modeling. Because I'm a giant geek I want to start printing tiles and terrain for board an roleplaying games. I don't want to spend too much money, but I don't want to throw my money away on garbage. https://www.amazon.com/Monoprice-Se...t+3d+printer+v2 From what I've read this seems to be a good choice. Is it a pick it up and go kind of thing? Or am I going to be spending a huge amount of time getting the settings squared away? Is there something better?
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Aug 11, 2016 03:01
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Cheap and reliable are sort of relative terms in this level of 3D printing. "Pick it up and go" doubly so. Basically, don't expect the printer to be just another tool for your gaming hobby, it's more like a whole second hobby that complements it. That said, the Maker Select is the budget darling of this thread and it's about as good as you're likely to get at the price point. It's got a big community, many mods, troubleshooting advice etc. Also consider - take the money you would spend on the printer, add the same again in materials, tools, consumables, adhesion preparations and time spent figuring it out. See how much that would buy you from somewhere like shapeways - https://www.shapeways.com/materials/high-definition-acrylate where the detail would be as good or better than injection-mould or roto-cast commercial models. ReelBigLizard fucked around with this message at 11:21 on Aug 11, 2016 |
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Aug 11, 2016 11:17
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ReelBigLizard posted:Cheap and reliable are sort of relative terms in this level of 3D printing. "Pick it up and go" doubly so. Basically, don't expect the printer to be just another tool for your gaming hobby, it's more like a whole second hobby that complements it. Awesome! Thank you for that input. I'm thinking about pulling the trigger on it, but I just wanted to ask a few follow-up questions. For complete newbies, how long should I expect to fiddle around with it before I make something anywhere near resembling what the file models look like? Hours? Days? Months? It says it comes with sample PLA filament, but I can't imagine that'll go very far. How much filament would you recommend a total newbie go with and what kind is easiest to work with?
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Aug 11, 2016 17:24
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FuriousAngle posted:Awesome! Thank you for that input. I'm thinking about pulling the trigger on it, but I just wanted to ask a few follow-up questions. I couldn't even finish the baby elephant model with the sample filament  Depending on who around you has filament in stock, you can probably try some 500g or 1kg filaments to play around with and see what you like. I haven't been able to print anything using the extra filament from Monoprice but has good luck with some others from Frys. Just make sure you have a sealed container so the filament doesn't absorb moisture from the air.
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Aug 11, 2016 18:00
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duffmensch posted:I couldn't even finish the baby elephant model with the sample filament Thanks! I was going to order through Amazon so I was going to just grab a spare filament roll off there. There's a Fry's nearby so I can always go there in case of a last-minute emergency, I guess. So assuming a fair amount of trial and a great amount of error, should I get 1 or 2 rolls of filament? More? And are there any brands that are preferred?
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Aug 11, 2016 18:13
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For starting out I would get 100m / 500-1000g of some high quality plain or clear PLA and work your way through the whole roll tweaking and experimenting. That will give you a good baseline to work from. Other than that, if you can find a multi colour sampler like faberdashery's it's nice to have around for random small prints - http://www.faberdashery.co.uk/products-page/print-materials/rainbow-fun-pack/
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Aug 11, 2016 19:01
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If you're near a place that sells filament, just get a kilo of PLA ($30ish) and use it all up before you buy anything else. It should last for dozens of test prints. Don't use multiple kinds of filament while you're trying to figure out how the machine works, cause every filament needs different settings to work correctly (sometimes even different colors of the same material from the same manufacturer). The easiest colors to print with are the faintly-yellow-clear "natural" variety, or any of the translucent colors. Opaque colors, and especially solid white and black, are more challenging. If you're a total beginner, I'd say give yourself a week to get your first successful print all the way through, and another couple of weeks to tune it until you get nice quality that works reliably. More time if you're assembling the machine yourself, because there's far more tuning involved in that case. Sagebrush fucked around with this message at 19:35 on Aug 11, 2016 |
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Aug 11, 2016 19:32
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Once again, thanks a lot you guys! If anyone has seen good luck with particular filament brands for the Maker Select I'd appreciate that too. It's ordered, and now I just have to wait for it to show up before I can begin the lengthy process of trial and error!
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Aug 11, 2016 19:57
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Hmm, Tinkercad is actually nice and easy to use so far. Didn't take long at all to put together a wing engine mount. I really do need to get down to a makespace to try actually printing something out one of these days.
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Aug 12, 2016 20:26
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Hi there! Remember me? The one who asks questions and never acts? I was hunting around on the web and found the sub $60 e waste 3D printer. It meets none of my requirements except as a learning tool to work out what I need. I realised I already have half the parts and am ordering some other bits and pieces from Aliexpress. Can't really say no to something like that. Has anyone built it? I'm not fond of the instructions on Instructables and there's a lot I would do differently but if it gets me as far as grasping what's needed and how it goes together it's served it's purpose. One thing I couldn't quite work out is why they even need a RAMPS board besides making it look neater. They use floppy drive motors for the axes, so they could use the floppy boards to drive the head steppers anyway. IIRC they work the same as a stepper driver anyway. Bridge the enable pin, and use the step and direction pins. It's been maybe 10 years but I'm pretty sure. I grabbed a RAMPS board and drivers anyway. Anyhow I came here to ask a stupid question. How exactly is the extruder connected to the hot end? I figure it's via some kind of sheath like my MIG welder, but what exactly is needed to connect them? I just got a generic 1.75mm Bowden extruder and E3D V6 hotend off Aliexpress. What do I need to connect them? Because this stuff takes forever to be posted here I'd like to order it too. I figure if I can get the printer working I have some of the important working parts to strip out for a better printer afterwards. Maybe if I'm determined I can use it to bootstrap a scaled down RepRap.
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Aug 13, 2016 03:19
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If you've never worked with a 3D printer before, do NOT start on a $60 e-waste one.
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Aug 13, 2016 03:33
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The E3D hotend attaches to the extruder with what they call a "groovemount." The basic hotend shape is a cylinder, and there's a section of it turned down near the top (forgot the exact dimensions) that you slide into a channel in a plate connected to the extruder. A lot of hotends use the same design -- the E3Ds and their knockoffs, and the million J-head variants, probably account for half the market. Here's a J-head mounted using the groove. The aluminum plate would somehow be attached to the extruder. You can print this piece too if you're sensitive to the pressures and temperatures it will experience.  I've also seen groovemount hotends installed by simply sliding them into a properly sized hole in an aluminum block and pinning them in place with set-screws. That said, insta posted:If you've never worked with a 3D printer before, do NOT start on a $60 e-waste one. This is real good advice if you want to actually print some stuff and not just spend a couple of months hacking with motors and linear slides and software before eventually giving up.
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Aug 13, 2016 03:40
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Thanks for the mounting info. It's really good to know. I don't intend on doing anything useful with the e waste printer. It will probably end up bearing little resemblance to the original design by the end anyway because history shows I can't leave a y design "unimproved". It's more to help me learn. I'm hopelessly "hands-on". I have to have something in front of me. I've got another question. I saw a lot of 1.75mm 3D pen ABS cheap. How does it differ from the 3D printer ABS filament? I can't find an answer.
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Aug 13, 2016 06:01
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No chemical difference. If it's the same outer diameter, you can extrude it in a 3D printer just fine. If it's cut into 8-inch lengths for sticking in the pen, though, that's not going to be useful. I would suggest starting with PLA rather than ABS, as it's much easier to print with and doesn't smell bad either.
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Aug 13, 2016 08:38
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Is it cheaper just because it's a smaller amount by any chance? I can't imagine you'd want to use a pen with a 1kg roll.
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Aug 13, 2016 10:15
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Rapulum_Dei posted:Is it cheaper just because it's a smaller amount by any chance? I can't imagine you'd want to use a pen with a 1kg roll. I went back to work it out. The difference is the sellers charge as much for postage as the filament. Figures. It's good to know that PLA is easier to work with. When I actually get something together in the future that's what I'll opt for I guess. How is it for strength, or bonding I guess would be more accurate?
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Aug 13, 2016 13:12
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3D printed parts are anisotropic (different properties when measured in different axes) so it's hard to give an objective comparison that's meaningful. Depending on your print settings, you can make a part very strong or very weak in particular areas. Any part will also be stronger within a layer than between two layers, so simply changing the orientation of your build can make a huge difference to effective strength. In general, though, ABS is tougher (i.e. will withstand a sharp impact better) and more temperature-resistant, but also a bit more flexible and prone to warping during the print. PLA is very rigid and dimensionally stable, but also somewhat brittle, and it will get soft enough to warp if you leave it on your car's dashboard in the summer. ABS also requires at least a heated bed to print properly, and ideally a heated build envelope; PLA can be printed on a cold bed in open air. ABS smells like skunks and burning rubber when you print it; PLA smells sugary, like maple syrup.
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Aug 13, 2016 20:21
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So I got my Maker Select v2 and it looks like they forgot to include the test tape. Since I don't have anything to compare to when purchasing new stuff I figured I'd just get a glass plate. Thing is, I don't know how big the glass needs to be. Just smaller than the platform? Much smaller than the platform? A little bigger than the platform? Does anyone have a Maker Select and use a glass platform cover for it? If so, what dimensions should I get? Or, alternatively, should I just use painter's tape? Edit: First time printing, don't want to mess anything up. Right now I'm only using the filament they sent with the printer and plan on getting some lower-end PLA filament. So nothing fancy.
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Aug 13, 2016 21:39
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For the tape, I thought they included some build tak mats or something that was colored black on top of the aluminum bed now? I use a PEI sheet, but I just measured out the sheet to fit. The print area is like 8x8 but I didn't want to gently caress up and have part of the print bed unprintable, so I just opted to make the PEI sheet the same size. Think it's like 8.5 or 8.75 inches. Painter's tape works fine, just get the blue stuff. Might wanna grab a purple elmer's glue stick as well just to sort of have a bit of sticky working with it. I'd advise against going to the cheapest pla you can get. Any stuff, good or bad,is gonna run about 25-30$ shipped, or slightly cheaper from amazon if you have prime. Spend the extra couple of bucks and get something good, instead of a 1kg roll of bullshit that you will have nothing but headaches with.
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Aug 13, 2016 22:25
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Stupid_Sexy_Flander posted:For the tape, I thought they included some build tak mats or something that was colored black on top of the aluminum bed now? Awesome! Thank you for your response! (You're right- it looks like they included a tak mat already affixed. Eventually I'll need to get a replacement. So a 8-8.75" PEI sheet? I'll have to take a look into that!) I also just looked at my filament and it turns out it's snapped in several places, making it largely unusable. I'm going to have to get better quality stuff than this, at least. Do you have any brand recommendations for the $25 end of the spectrum? I have PRIME so if there are any PRIME-available brands you know of that would be ideal!
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Aug 13, 2016 22:41
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Speaking of Buildtak, is that usable with ABS and heated bed? Someone elsewhere recommended I try that since I can't get ABS to stick worth a drat on my printer, but the reviews I read say it won't work with a heated bed. I haven't tried Kapton yet, so not sure if that would be a better option. I can print PLA on blue tape all day long but ABS just seems to escape me.
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Aug 13, 2016 22:45
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FuriousAngle posted:Awesome! Thank you for your response! (You're right- it looks like they included a tak mat already affixed. Eventually I'll need to get a replacement. So a 8-8.75" PEI sheet? I'll have to take a look into that!) You can buy a 12"x12" PEI sheet from Amazon for like 15-16$. The adhesive sheet to stick it to the aluminum bed is something like a 6 pack for 12$? Just measure your bed and cut it down to fit. I don't know if having the sheet be larger than the print area affects anything, but my prints come out ok. You won't need the painters tape after you put the sheet on, but you might still wanna use the glue stick to just make sure it's gonna grip. PLA is gonna vary a good bit, but I've had some pretty good luck with USfilament (or USAfilament) but weirdly enough the best stuff I've used is this baby blue stuff I got for dirt cheap, Excelvan or some kinda brand name like that. It was something like 12$ shipped when I bought it, I think it's in the 17$ neighborhood now. Just the baby blue was on sale but it prints pretty great. There's a company online that sells 5$ filament but I can't recall the name at the moment (it's literally something like 5$ filament) and it's like 1/4 roll, so you can order a bunch of diff colors to test out. Hatchbox is pretty good as well, but avoid the copper color (not copperfill but copper color pla), and the black. Neither one of those worked worth a drat. The white and the translucent red worked pretty well though. The red is more of an orange color though.
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Aug 14, 2016 02:01
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Whoever said it wouldn't work is wrong. I got the Z offset slightly too close and it stuck hard enough to break the glass. Oddly, PETG won't stick to it. I use PEI for ABS now though.
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Aug 14, 2016 03:11
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I'm still going through my first roll of black Hatchbox PLA on my Maker Select with over 36 hours of print time. I print at 200C with my glass/PEI bed at 80C. I could probably drop the filament temp a bit, already dropped from 210 because it was a bit droopy over gaps. Below 80C on the bed and I start running into problems with prints lifting off the PEI. If you don't have glass, 60 to 70 is probably fine.
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Aug 14, 2016 05:00
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Stupid_Sexy_Flander posted:weirdly enough the best stuff I've used is this baby blue stuff I got for dirt cheap, Excelvan or some kinda brand name like that. It was something like 12$ shipped when I bought it, I think it's in the 17$ neighborhood now. Just the baby blue was on sale but it prints pretty great. Excelvan is unbelievably good for the price. I've tried a few colors now, including that blue (which I think they called 'wathet' for some reason) and it's all been as good as any supposedly premium pla. And they also do funny little half and half spools. Edit; I'd give their flexible stuff a go as well, if I could think of anything I need to print with it. Rapulum_Dei fucked around with this message at 06:53 on Aug 14, 2016 |
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Aug 14, 2016 06:51
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Okay so I picked up some PLA (I went with the MakerBot Grey, 0.2kg since the sample filament came broken into pieces and I couldn't find USfilament or Hatchbox at the store) but I'm running across an issue and I'm not sure if it's because I haven't gotten the leveling down yet or if it's because I screwed up and ended up scratching my tak mat and that's screwing things up. It looks like the output strand isn't "sticking" to the surface and ends up as a jumbled mess. At the "home" settings I can just barely slip a thin sheet of paper beneath the nozzle but I understand it's more than likely that I could be doing something terribly wrong. Also, when I first tried a print run I ended up scratching the tak mat pretty noticeably so I'm wondering if that could be the problem. Nozzle Position This is the horrible mess I get. I'm heartened that at least it's less horrible than the first print I tried, but I've adjusted a few things and it still hasn't gotten any better. Second Pass If anyone feels like helping me out by offering their opinions I'd be really grateful.
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Aug 14, 2016 23:37
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Seems like a leveling problem. Basically, you want the hot end to press the first layer onto your bed, so if you're scratching the bed on some areas and getting spaghetti (i.e. the hot end is extruding onto nothing), then that suggests that your bed isn't level enough.
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Aug 14, 2016 23:46
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rawrr posted:Seems like a leveling problem. Basically, you want the hot end to press the first layer onto your bed, so if you're scratching the bed on some areas and getting spaghetti (i.e. the hot end is extruding onto nothing), then that suggests that your bed isn't level enough. I was afraid of that. I'm not scratching the board at the moment, but I AM getting spaghetti. But at least that means it's unlikely that the scratches did any damage that would impair printing, correct? It's just that I have to make the board more level. I'll work on that. Thank you! EDIT: Do I need to take the filament out every time I stop printing? And do I need to flush it so that melted filament doesn't stay inside the extruder while the printer is idle?
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Aug 14, 2016 23:58
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The only issue with scratches is that in future prints they'll get imprinted onto the base of your prints, so unless you're anal about that it's not really an issue. You don't need to take filament out, and you don't need to worry about flushing it out; if anything you'll notice that at the end of your prints some leftover plastic will droop out. That's why it's generally good practice to enable the setting that prints an outline/skirt around the footprint of your part to re-pressurize the hot end for every new print job. Have fun!
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Aug 15, 2016 00:14
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FuriousAngle posted:I was afraid of that. I'm not scratching the board at the moment, but I AM getting spaghetti. But at least that means it's unlikely that the scratches did any damage that would impair printing, correct? It's just that I have to make the board more level. I'll work on that. Thank you! I have a wanhao duplicator i3 which is basically identical to yours. What you are describing sounds like what I dealt with: a warped print bed. The aluminum print bed is just a little to thin. If you find that the paper test works at the corners but not in the middle then that is your problem. You will have to get a sheet of borosilicate glass to put down to have a perfectly flat print bed. I saw that your are getting a sheet of pei to print on. Most who go this route get some thermal foam adhesive to put down on the aluminium bed then put down the glass, then a 3M adhesive that sticks the pei to the glass. There is a signstek brand glass that measures 213*200*3mm which is what you need. In the "frequently bought together" area it shows the foam adhesive. I'm sure if you search for pei on Amazon you will also see the 3M adhesive listed. If you go this route and live in a humid area you will probably need to bake the pei in the oven before sticking it to the glass because moisture gets trapped in the pei. I layered it in the oven like this: cookie sheet, foil, pei sheet (no adhesive), borosilicate glass sheet (again, no adhesive yet, this step is just to keep the pei flat while baking), heavy non-flammable thing to press down on everything.
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Aug 15, 2016 02:30
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jubjub64 posted:I have a wanhao duplicator i3 which is basically identical to yours. What you are describing sounds like what I dealt with: a warped print bed. The aluminum print bed is just a little to thin. If you find that the paper test works at the corners but not in the middle then that is your problem. You will have to get a sheet of borosilicate glass to put down to have a perfectly flat print bed. I saw that your are getting a sheet of pei to print on. Most who go this route get some thermal foam adhesive to put down on the aluminium bed then put down the glass, then a 3M adhesive that sticks the pei to the glass. So fortunately it looks like I just sucked with the initial calibrations. I got a tiny level and really got in there and tried to get everything not only level, but really made sure the nozzle was the right height off the print bed. I'm about 25% of the way through one of the test prints and everything looks like it's going well. After a while I'm going to have to get rid of this tak sheet that it came with so I'll probably get some glass for it. So definitely thank you for the advice. I live in Georgia so it's humid as balls around here. For right now I'm just going to try using up what I have since I already spent more than I should have on my budget 
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Aug 15, 2016 03:53
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I'm in Louisiana, and know the irritation of humidity pretty well. I just use a straight PEI sheet glued down to the aluminum bed. I also lob on a small bit of the purple glue stick as a "better safe than sorry", and so far everything prints fairly well. I picked up a micro swiss new whot end for it (round about 35$?) and other than having to increase my temp a bit it's been pretty great. I have the maker select v1 though. Dunno what other options/stuff they changed on the newest models.
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Aug 15, 2016 04:01
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FuriousAngle posted:So fortunately it looks like I just sucked with the initial calibrations. I got a tiny level and really got in there and tried to get everything not only level, but really made sure the nozzle was the right height off the print bed. I'm about 25% of the way through one of the test prints and everything looks like it's going well. Well, the thing is it's not that the bed has to be level with the floor it's that it has to be perfectly parallel to the moving head. The correct word is tramming but everyone uses level. So a your tiny level isn't going to help much. Your printer could be on a slope, so long as the head is trammed to the bed it'd be fine. Doing the paper test at multiple points, bearing in mind every time you adjust you need to recheck, is your best option. Get yourself some cheap picture frame glass from the dollar store and start lurking round the cosmetics isle reading hairspray labels 
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Aug 15, 2016 07:24
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