Anyone heard more about the Ekocycle 3D printer?

[driesman]

Hi - anyone having cartridge trouble with the Ekocycle? We've been doing 3D printing for a couple of years on an UP! Mini. Some fuss and care, but easily repaired; the extruder and head can be maintained and declogged pretty readily.

The Ekocycle is more integrated (extruder and drive cogs are part of cartridge) and both cartridges are clogged. They won't extrude, just click-click-click. I have an email into 3D systems, but I am tempted to take one apart. Anyone have a similar issue w/ suggestions? Thanks

[MattRain]

I have had the same problem. One of mine is clogged. They emailed instructions to unclog it... According to them, you can open it up, then load it, from there, do the test print, and manually feed the filament. Im still trying to open the case....

... nvm, finally got it.... brute force.

[mr_yes]

We didn't get our order in until Dec 12th. I just got the e-mail stating that our printer has shipped.

[nixiebunny]

We just got ours last night; haven't had time to make it do useful work. I am seeing several comments that it may have trouble working reliably, which was the whole point of this design, to work reliably.

We'll see how it compares to the Ultimaker at home and the new Duplicator 2 at our build space. At least it looks pretty. I think it would look prettier with all that plastic removed and the bare cast aluminum chassis exposed.

[mastachyra]

So far 2781 is happy with the printer. I have had no issues with it, and our prints are coming out perfectly.

I'm not looking forward to buying more "ink" though, and I wish there were more color options. But besides that, its a nice introduction to 3D printing for our team.

[IronBenderII]

Ours is coming in tomorrow and we've got models waiting to print. We're going to be running that thing 24x7 until the end of build season, I'm looking forward to the students being able to more easily go from thought to part...

[Pretzel]

Originally Posted by driesman

Hi - anyone having cartridge trouble with the Ekocycle? We've been doing 3D printing for a couple of years on an UP! Mini. Some fuss and care, but easily repaired; the extruder and head can be maintained and declogged pretty readily.

The Ekocycle is more integrated (extruder and drive cogs are part of cartridge) and both cartridges are clogged. They won't extrude, just click-click-click. I have an email into 3D systems, but I am tempted to take one apart. Anyone have a similar issue w/ suggestions? Thanks

We had the same problem with our "natural" colored cartridge. Ekocycle customer support was prompt in their response and quite helpful by directing us to take the cartridge apart and describing how to solve the problem. They even told us they would be willing to replace the cartridge if it broke in the process since they told us to open it up.

The general idea of what we were supposed to do is to take the outside (when mounted on the printer) of the cartridge off to expose the filament. They then said to take the cartridge and push it firmly through the nozzle, until it comes clear, since the motor wasn't strong enough to extrude it. This was done during the cartridge installation cycle while the nozzle was heated. It solved our problem promptly.

[pilum40]

Ours is slated by Wednesday. all the extra stuff got shipped separately. Apparently that snow event is impacting deliveries...but to Tejas? It's 75 degrees, sunny and outstanding today!

[Sperkowsky]

Ours comes sometime next week but if it's anything like the old cube 3d it's going to be a pile of junk after a few prints.

[nixiebunny]

We got ours yesterday. I just tried to use it. It wants me to enter my WiFi password, but the text entry menu on the little touchscreen has no means of entering the space character, so I can't do this. Perhaps they thought that no one in their right mind would ever need to type a space key.

It will be interesting to see how many other glitches we encounter in this not-quite-finished product. But, hey, it's FREE!

[Navid Shafa]

Ours arrived today. Time to get it set up, we have parts ready to print!

[IronBenderII]

Hi all. Let's remember that this was a big donation by a company, it cost them a good amount of $. Let's be respectful of their product and give it a fair shake/convey objective results. Ours comes in today and I'm grateful for the opportunity to show the students how useful 3D printing can be...

[Andrew Schreiber]

Originally Posted by Sperkowsky

Ours comes sometime next week but if it's anything like the old cube 3d it's going to be a pile of junk after a few prints.

Source? We've got a Cube3D in 125's lab that works pretty well when we use it. We just don't use it all that often as we have access to more advanced printers.

[nixiebunny]

I'm trying to be objective. It's hard to do so when you read things like the following words on the Cubify website:

"Cubify is the central hub for all things possible with the 3D printed lifestyle. Cubify offers everything from co-creation with favorite brands, a curated shopping experience centered around personalized fashion, décor, toys and more, a community inspiring the latest in 3D design and printing possibilities and access to the easiest home 3D printers and related products. Shop the collections for things to print at home or have printed for you in high-end materials like precious metals, edibles from chocolate to sugar and a range of full-color materials and higher quality plastics; discover the designer in you; join the community and share your print inspirations in the Design Feed; organize and display prints on your Shelf; and design your future, powered by 3D printing. 3D Systems’ consumer technology platform that powers Cubify allows for the safe hosting, publishing and production of branded and licensed content. 3D Systems also manufactures the Cube family of consumer 3D printers, the Sense 3D scanner and a suite of consumer design software, all available on the Cubify hub."

That sounds like the exact opposite of the Maker Credo, as I have absorbed it from years of making interesting things, being featured in Make: Magazine and helping to run a hackerspace.

They gave 1500 free printers to the brightest young engineers in the country, and expect them to be "consumers"? Good luck with that.

I will note that the agreement that we had to sign to get the free printer says nothing at all about re-purposing it to use other brands of filament or a Marlin-based controller, and I expect these to be discussed at length on CD after the build season.

[IronBenderII]

Originally Posted by nixiebunny

I'm trying to be objective. It's hard to do so when you read things like the following words on the Cubify website:

"Cubify is the central hub for all things possible with the 3D printed lifestyle. Cubify offers everything from co-creation with favorite brands, a curated shopping experience centered around personalized fashion, décor, toys and more, a community inspiring the latest in 3D design and printing possibilities and access to the easiest home 3D printers and related products. Shop the collections for things to print at home or have printed for you in high-end materials like precious metals, edibles from chocolate to sugar and a range of full-color materials and higher quality plastics; discover the designer in you; join the community and share your print inspirations in the Design Feed; organize and display prints on your Shelf; and design your future, powered by 3D printing. 3D Systems’ consumer technology platform that powers Cubify allows for the safe hosting, publishing and production of branded and licensed content. 3D Systems also manufactures the Cube family of consumer 3D printers, the Sense 3D scanner and a suite of consumer design software, all available on the Cubify hub."

That sounds like the exact opposite of the Maker Credo, as I have absorbed it from years of making interesting things, being featured in Make: Magazine and helping to run a hackerspace.

They gave 1500 free printers to the brightest young engineers in the country, and expect them to be "consumers"? Good luck with that.

I will note that the agreement that we had to sign to get the free printer says nothing at all about re-purposing it to use other brands of filament or a Marlin-based controller, and I expect these to be discussed at length on CD after the build season.

First, cool site and I love the gadgets! Lots of talent there... Now back to it. Why must it be in line with the maker credo? Why are you assuming they are trying to make the students consumers? Who in their right minds would think giving a bunch of 3D printers to robotics teams would make them consumers? Why are we being so negative about a company that gave away a great tool to a bunch of kids?