3d Printers

[riggler]

Does anyone here have direct experience with any of the $400 - $600 3D printers out there? I want to print in ABS, and every model has people saying that it's better than the other models out there! Looking for opinions from people that actually *have* them!

This is something I would probably get next year. Looking at the Buccaneer, Solidoodle, the PortaBee...

 

[pucho812]

I am wondering of the uses of doing a 3d printer for front panels. You know for making a facade. Hmmmmmm.

 

[joaquins]

If you are at this forum maybe you could go for a DIY one... Lot of controller boards out there, parts shouldn't be expensive to build a small one. Same for steppers, many avaiable and with NEMA17 you will be fine... I'm building a CNC and most avaiable products doesn't meet my needs, most drivers and motors around are too small so I'll have to go for something bigger... But seen a lot of parts for 3D printers around.

Maybe you are talking about a kit... Maybe bought separetly is cheaper... I don't know.

JS

 

[emrr]

Someone needs to sort this out and start turning out the 'Rollo' fader knobs for old Altec, Langevin, Electrodyne, etc faders.  I'll buy a pile, as will a lot of other people. 

 

[gemini86]

I made a 3d model of a big federal knob...

I use shapeways to do 3d printing and I love the results. If I could find a way to get the brass inserts, I could see about what it would cost to do some hard to get knobs.

Although they are cool, 3d printed parts still aren't very smooth and have a "grainy" finish.

 

[sahib]

What's the difficulty in getting the brass inserts? 

Do you not know any machine shop who would turn them? 

Is Marik not the man for that?

 

[gemini86]

Difficulty #1: I am but one man and the buying power isn't there to make them affordable.

Difficulty #2: How to bond them to the knobs. Most knobs are injection molded with the inserts inside. We might be able to epoxy them in place. Adds cost and another step in production.

 

[maq3396]

Hi

I have two of these with a third on order
One is a Replicator 2 from Makerbot
The other is a Bukobot from Deezmaker in Pasadena
The latest addition is an Acuity Helix that should be delivered in the new year.

All the consumer level printers have their pros and cons which is why they can be obtained for a lower price

When "tweaked" properly most will give pretty reasonable results for a small investment of material.

Prices are dropping by the month with many different companies supplying printers.

If you look closely you will see that many are similar in using "off the shelf" parts for their hot ends, extruders, motors, print beds electronics and software. This is likely positive as attrition of companies may be fairly high!

Many new materials are coming to market that will provide a great variety of printing options and may very well satisfy the needs for our community.

Not sure about the brass inserts but if you can find them for a reasonable price, modifiying a design to accommodate them is straight forward.

If someone is interested in having a knob or two printed for experimentation purposes please let me know.
Currently can do PLA with good outcome, ABS in the next week or two and ideally more variety in the next few months (new hot ends coming for Bukobot plus the new printer)

Cheers
Mac

 

[walter]

There is an Objet printer at work that we use for rapid prototyping. It works great for rapid prototyping. We then have the items milled out of some kind of plastic. The printed items are brittle. Smaller brackets and buttons are o.k. but I don't know how robust a knob would be. We made some frames with button actuators and the button actuators tended to bind from surface friction, the milled plastic did not bind. There is also a slight degree of settling that may be due to gravity. The printed parts are not consistent when printed in various orientations. A donut printed upright will not be true. There may be more suitable printing material for knobs, I don't know. My first position with this company was cleaning parts from the 3-D printer. When asked how I liked it, I said it's interesting, but I wouldn't want to make a career out of it, I'm an electronics tech. They immediately booted me off that task.

 

[bhpmoto]

I searched for an affordable 3D printer, every one that I looked at that was under 1K spat out some pretty fugly parts. My neighbor who has a design firm bought a twin head "Cube" printer for over 3K and can't even make good parts on it. The only ones that I saw that seemed to make ckean parts were a little over 2K. I know someone with an Ultimaker that puts out good prints, but there isn't much support here in the U.S. I purchased a makerbot replicator 2 and am very happy with it. The only downside is that it only prints in PLA, which actually isn't that bad. It is really helping me out with prototyping my own stuff. I like the Objet printers, but I don't have the 25k.