3D printing?

[Robert]

I'm going to have to check out the Wizmaker.

As much as 3D printing annoys me it's a necessary evil... I keep giving my old printer the "stank face" every time I catch it glaring at me from under the workbench... I'd love to show it the middle finger and have the last word.

 

[vigilante398]

I'm going to have to check out the Wizmaker.

As much as 3D printing annoys me it's a necessary evil... I keep giving my old printer the "stank face" every time I catch it glaring at me from under the workbench... I'd love to show it the middle finger and have the last word.

I'm not affiliated (unfortunately), but they really make a great printer. I don't have the patience to sit around and dial things in so I didn't use my Monoprice as much as I would have liked, but the Wizmaker has been running almost constantly since I got it.

 

[Robert]

Bed leveling is one of the things that annoys me more than anything. I've turned those damned thumbwheels so many times they're digging into the bottom of the bed, that makes them even harder to turn.

Do you use the included removable bed sheet? I've never had any luck with those, my best results (and least amount of frustration) came from a glass plate with a light coat of hairspray.... Which is yet another thing that has to be removed, cleaned, and recoated on a somewhat regular basis.

It's hard to get enthused when JLCPCB offers 3D printing for $1 per piece now, but unfortunately my usual pattern of "print, measure, adjust, print measure, adjust, repeat" isn't very economical when shipping starts at $20 each time.

 

[Deperduci]

Might be why I never got an FDM printer... my photo-resin only has to have the build plate squared to the LCD screen. How big are the projects you want? might want the 1 style for getting the 1st 1 'right' then send to places like JLPCB or such for the mass production run.

 

[Robert]

I've had the design finalized for a few years now but when I had them printed by JLCPCB they came back completely the wrong size.

I suspect that my printer scaling has always been off and I accommodated by making adjustments to the design.

 

[Deperduci]

ahh, I see. 1 of those FDM vs photo-resin issues..

 

[vigilante398]

Bed leveling is one of the things that annoys me more than anything. I've turned those damned thumbwheels so many times they're digging into the bottom of the bed, that makes them even harder to turn.

Do you use the included removable bed sheet? I've never had any luck with those, my best results (and least amount of frustration) came from a glass plate with a light coat of hairspray.... Which is yet another thing that has to be removed, cleaned, and recoated on a somewhat regular basis.

It's hard to get enthused when JLCPCB offers 3D printing for $1 per piece now, but unfortunately my usual pattern of "print, measure, adjust, print measure, adjust, repeat" isn't very economical when shipping starts at $20 each time.

I use the included removable bed sheet, it's pretty handy. I like that I don't need to use a putty knife to remove stuck prints, I just pull off the sheet and bend it, the part pops right off. A lot of people recommend putting glue stick on the sheet for extra adhesive help, but I haven't found it to be necessary yet. Bed leveling was hands-down the worst part of printing before.

 

[Alan W]

I've had the design finalized for a few years now but when I had them printed by JLCPCB they came back completely the wrong size.

I suspect that my printer scaling has always been off and I accommodated by making adjustments to the design.

Make (in CAD) a one inch cube, export to stl, and slice it using your printer’s software (or third party). Print it and measure it with some decent calipers. This will give you a rough sense of how the printer scales. I think your suspicions are probably correct.

I have about 25 years experience working with 3d printers, and up until 2 years ago, owned several filament and resin printers. We still sent the bulk of our printing out, generally needing a higher level of resolution than either is capable of. (Although the new gen. of micro led resin printers are crazy, in terms of bang for buck.) we basically used our in-house printers to proof designs and scaling, before committing to better prints or machining.

I’d be happy to try and answer questions, but I also know next to nothing about “hobbyist” level machines. But those who have said that there is a large learning curve, and that you need to approach printing as a hobby unto itself, are totally correct. I think we went through weeks of frustration getting our first viable filament prints, and resin was no easier. By weeks, I mean several hundred man hours.

I actually printed a tiny fixture this week to help me tolerance some LDRs For some phasers I’m making. (Think it’s probably a fools errand to do this, ur my goal was to match the response curves on the double phaser as closely as possible.)

 

[vigilante398]

I also know next to nothing about “hobbyist” level machines.

Industrial level machines are amazing, my last job was in rapid prototyping and our mechanical team had a whole room full of printers, the cheapest of which was $30k. The highlights:

• I wish I could remember the brand, but the main FDM printer they used had dual nozzles so they would print ABS and a support material at the same time, and the support material was water soluble, so after the print is done you throw it in a bath and all the supports wash away.
• The finest resolution printer they had was a carbon fiber printer, I think made by Desktop Metal. It wasn't as fast as the one that they used for ABS, but they used it whenever they needed really fine tolerances and high strength for fit checks and prototypes.
• One brand I do remember was the big Desktop Metal machine. It printed parts slightly larger than the CAD drawing, then it went through a de-binding and sintering process, and at the end you were left with a solid metal (they mostly did steel, but also had copper and some others) part. The resolution was about as good as any hobbyist FDM printer, but obviously after sintering there was no visible signs that the finished part was printed. Unfortunately material wasn't cheap, and every time you fired up the sintering furnace it cost about $400 in gas.

Bonus machine: the electrical team spent $200k on a Nano Dimension Dragonfly PCB printer. It was essentially a resin printer, but it had one nozzle for resin and one nozzle for a silver substrate, both of which were UV cured. It wasn't very fast, a medium sized board would take 24 hours or so to print, but you could print ANYTHING. Our lead designer used it often to prototype 12- and 16-layer PCBs, and the salesman showed us how to print embedded SMD components, which was mindblowing.

As in most things in life my excitement for 3D printing outweighs my knowledge and ability, but 3D printing is super freaking neat.

 

[Robert]

@Bricksnbeatles You might be setting yourself up for failure, but if I replace mine you're welcome to it if the shipping cost doesn't make it unreasonable.

I'm sure it'd be great in the hands of someone who cares enough to learn how to dial it in properly. I do not have the patience or time.