Quote:
Originally Posted by Bald & Bearded
So there are good printers out there less than $400.
Monoprice has there MakerSelect printer (it is a rebranded Wanhao I3) that I can recommend.
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I picked one of these up a few months ago for around $350.
I've done quite a few small prints with zero failures and only some minor adjustments from the JetGuy YouTube videos to make sure all my axis were square. I leveled it once haven't done any maintenance yet. All prints are in PLA so far, but I have some ABS I'm gonna try out soon. Also haven't done many large prints yet, but my expectations are high based on other users reviews and videos.
I have to say this is a world of difference over the Makerbit Replicator 2 that we have on the team. I feel like its a dice roll just getting parts to adhere to the bed on that machine. Even with PLA. And this machine is more than 5x cheaper.
If you're looking to spend less than $2k on a printer, I'd definitely suggest checking out the i3 clones out there. I'm very happy with my purchase and there's a great community designing parts and developing mods for new features. Wanhow is also very responsive to the changes the community is making to make the printer work better.
I watched prices for about 6months and in that time they improved the way the extruder was mounted, fixed electrical problems, improved the print bed material, improved the adjustments for bed leveling, changed the way the LCD and button are arranged to make it easier to use. Lots of little things, but its great to see active and quick responses to problems found by end users.