Quote:
Originally Posted by Vupa
Thanks for all the great suggestions guys! I have been looking at all the options ya'll have supplied and am still deciding. Great news though, my budget bracket has now been upped to around the $2500.00 thus the range of 3d printers the team can afford is now slightly higher.
I started a little bit of my own research and came up with two possible, albeit poorly informed results. The TAZ 3d printer by LulzBot and the Replicator 2 by Makerbot. If anyone has more information on these models and whether or not they're worth their price please inform me. Also more suggestions are absolutely welcome.
Thanks!
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I would say that you can spend $1600 on a great pre-assembled printer (that just works) like the Up! Plus 2 (with auto bed leveling probe) and buy or build a second printer with the additional $900. Having two printers is better than one very expensive printer for a number of reasons, including: print speed, production capacity, and reliability/redundancy.
I am a fan of the Open Source Hardware projects, as the support is plentiful on the web and the systems can be modified/repaired with ease. The Prusa is a great printer and is available in several derivations. Also look at the Mendel series. You can get a kit and assemble it or use the RepRap wiki parts lists and accumulate the parts piecemeal.
Is filament covered in the $2500 budget? I'd expect to budget $300 a year on filament, including PLA/ABS and a variety of exotics (Nylon, Polycarbonate, High Impact Polystyrene, Carbon Fiber PLA etc.). Do you have access to an oven? Some filaments have short shelf lives once opened before they need to be baked for several hours to remove absorbed water.