3D printer recommendations

[dagus]

rpcraft and his post on 3D printer deals got me thinking about this again.

My oldest is learning to use a 3D printer in 7th grade shop class (or the modern equivalent of what we used to call shop class, anyway). He's having fun and I'm thinking it'd be neat for him to have one around the house after the class is over. They use a number of different printers at his school, so the question of "what do you use in class?" got me a solid "I dunno" from him.

I know nothing about these things.

Can any of you recommend a decent entry-level unit? And let me know what kind of software I'm going to have to familiarize myself with, here?

Thanks much.

[rpcraft]

LOL, well, the ender 3 pro for even 200 dollars is a good entry level unit, even better if you can find one for 100 bucks. Many upgrades can be done to it to make it a superior unit, and ironically a lot of those upgrades can be printed by the printer itself. Out of the box it will do PLA and TPU fine and once you start to learn some finesse you can do more with less tweaking, and with a cheap enclosure it can do the other filament types better (It's all about temperature control when trying to print nylon or abs. If I were to buy one new though I would go with the Ender 3 Neo series, if only because I have pushed bedyond the learner phase and wanting to make some parts that would survive in hot zones or sunlit areas, which is where the nylon or ABS comes into play. They have all the upgrades done that include a direct drive extruder, bed level sensor, and are fantastic. I think the price goes up to about 300 or so USD's.


AS far as software goes, it depends if you are on mac or windows. For windows you can use a free version of Fusion 360 and there is an education version. It is a learning process to use it, but it is one of the better units, and while hard to find the free portions, it is free. It limits on how many projects you can save as well as export features. Not a huge issue because it does allow you to export your drawings in a older format you can re-open and modify. I think the education version may be a bit more liberal with the saved projects and counts. Also there is Solidworks and I think it has a education version for free as well.

For Mac there is also a fusion 360 version (I think) but also I have been using Shapr3d (they also have a windows version and you get access to all of them with one license, which is a difference overall. I use a copy on my work laptop (PC), home PC, ipad pro, and Mac. Unfortunately, the free version limits the number of projects you can have and it decreases the quality of your export mesh files so prints can be a bit ugle. The paid version is around 300 to 300 a year if you catch it on special but considering you can have it on an ipad and draw with a pencil or fingers and essentially skip all the keyboard shortcut BS. It is far superior to learn and intuitive to use. The only drawback I have found aside from the price is that the way it will not allow you to modify saved STL's, but that is an issue inherent to the way those files are saved and it becomes a chore to try to import and modify in other software, and that is also a challenge you find when you download premade files from Thingiverse and other repositories.

I have tussled around with using freecad (yeah there is a free version called that) of importing and modifying in steps but depending on the complexity of the STL files (which is what the downloaded files are, your results will vary.

[rpcraft]

Also the print bed on these units comes into around 7 3/4 inches cubed. The upwards is slightly more but I think given the gantry may collide with things its best to determine a cutoff point.

[frinesi2]

I treat 3D printers like boats - I'd never buy one, but always have a friend who has one

[rpcraft]

I treat 3D printers like boats - I'd never buy one, but always have a friend who has one

I don't like having conversations with people so if I can avoid interacting with someone by staying at home and doing it myself that is my favorite option.

[bezier_kid]

I bought a gen 1 Wanhao Duplicator i3 printer about 8 years ago (maybe). It's a Prusa type printer. It's been rock solid. Very easy to work on and there are a lot of things you can upgrade with it as you go. It's very easy to work on. I've done ABS and PLA with it.

[Maritime]

We have this one - Monoprice Maker Select 3D Printer has been pretty solid since 2017, it does PLA really well but struggles with ABS, We're building an enclosure for it and hoping to do bike/car parts. It's cheap and can have a lot of upgrades. The only fussy thing is re-leveling the bed between prints. IF you are not good at fiddling and tweaking I would recommend spending more on a unit with more automation than this one. We have gone through 10+ KG of filaments PLA and wood and one other I can't remember. Replaced a few nozzles and sensors etc. but it still chugs along.

[6]

I have a manual 3d negative printer, a few actually.. . Makita.. dewalt.. love em.