Open Source 3D Printer Questions

[dankim0911]

My team is currently looking to it's third year and we wanted to really get into 3D Printing. I considered open source printers since our budget seems a little tight for the upcoming season. Our main focus is on education of 3D printers and using them to help teach CAD to the team, not embarking on any major projects or using them to create parts for the robot.

Would getting an open source printer like RepRap be effective for it's cost? How difficult is it to build and maintain models like RepRap's Prusa Mendel (or another other model). Or would we be better off getting a cheap kit from say Printrbot or any other model? Any comment, advice, or experiences would be greatly appreciated.

Thank you!

[Qbot2640]

Our team has a MakerBot Replicator 2 that we got from a Donorschoose grant, and a Cube Ekocycle that we got from a FIRST grant - and I am seriously considering replacing them both with a Prusa I3 from kit.

The MakerBot has been expensive to keep repaired because of the proprietary nature of the components - and the Ekocycle is about to be extremely expensive to continue using because of the high cost of the filament.

We have no experience assembling a printer, but have done a good bit of research, and definitely feel like we can easily handle it. I am looking forward to gaining the experience into the "inner workings" of the machine so we can tweak and diagnose it ourselves...and even more looking forward to "hardware-type" replacement parts rather than the costly model-specific items we deal with currently.

[EricH]

Speaking from experience:

If you know what all the parts ARE, it's not that hard to maintain a Prusa Mendel. It'll need some fiddling here and there from time to time, particularly if it's moved from place to place. (If you need to move it a lot, invest in a cart--a solidly-built one, at that.) Mostly it'd be minor stuff--maybe rebending some metal here or there, or releveling the table (the ones I'm familiar with have a non-standard table, for a Prusa).

Also, once you have one, your first set of prints should be for another one. Why? If you can build a second one, you can maintain both of them.

Incidentally, if neither of you have instructions, or they don't come with your kits, I wrote a set a couple years back that's similar to the ones on the RepRap site but have CAD exploded views and some tips on assembly. If I can find it (which I'm pretty sure I can).

[dtengineering]

I've built a couple of the control boards using the RepRap Gen7 board http://reprap.org/wiki/Generation_7_Electronics and was pretty impressed by the quality of instructions. There were a few hiccups uploading the bootloader and firmware, but the board works as promised.

To be perfectly honest, you can purchase COTS control boards for only a few dollars more than making your own, but where's the fun in that???

I'm using the boards on an "own design" printer... it got put on the back burner in September, but I had the X and Y working nicely. Maybe I'll finish it this summer and post more here later.

Jason

P.S. My first printer was a Solidoodle 2, which (once I fixed the lousy workmanship from the factory) provided good service if not great quality prints. We have recently acquired two Afinia H480 printers and I have found their print quality... particularly their ability to separate raft and support material when using the Affinia branded premium ABS and PLA to be amazing. (Mind you, they cost twice as much and are two years newer than the poor old Solidoodle, so I do have higher expectations for them!)

[jgrindle]

Dankim, personally I have a printrbot simple, that couldn't be recognized as a simple at this point. I have printed many parts for it off of our teams printer, and it shows, how versatile these things are. I have actually designed a new party that I'm waiting to print off. If I are too create a second it would be a mendel max 1.5 . I would highly recommend going open source, because the support group out there is so large, and you learn SO much more about the printer building it yourself then if you buy a pre built.

[evanperryg]

I'd strongly suggest finding a good knock-off Makerbot. After our Replicator 2 took some rather serious (i.e. PLA covering the entire extruder assembly) damage, we ended up using a mentor's Flashforge Creator. We ran it harder than we ever ran our makerbot, and it handled the stress extremely well. All the Replicator documentation applies since the Creator is almost exactly the same, it comes with some awesome special features (2 extruders in one, among other things), and you can get it for well under half the price of a name-brand Makerbot.