Right. Help me spend some money.

[corsechris 2,731]

I often see the assertion that the Prusa is in a different league to everything else, but I don’t think I’ve ever seen an explanation as to why? Linear bearings are nicer than V rollers for sure, beyond that, what other significant differences are there? That’s a genuine question by the way, I honestly don’t know,

 

I do certainly accept that out of the box, a Creality is going to need a modicum of patience and mechanical sympathy to set up, but it certainly isn’t hard to do. I also accept that quite a large section of the 3D printer market probably don’t have that patience and mechanical sympathy! Wouldn’t expect anyone here to lack those attributes though.

 

I also get there might be an element of distaste for things like the Ender as they are, frankly, a knock-off.

[Steve (sdh2903) 3,449]

I'm looking at this as a furlough hobby to learn, so more than happy to tweak and modify as I go, I'll probably learn more about the machine that way. If it were for more a business opportunity or continual prints I'd happily stump up for a better quality machine. 

 

I've ordered the ender 3 v2 and a bl touch along with some pla and petg to mess up with. 

 

Stand by for several 'how do I......' threads. 

[Kit Car Electronics 1,899]

19 minutes ago, corsechris said:

I often see the assertion that the Prusa is in a different league to everything else, but I don’t think I’ve ever seen an explanation as to why? Linear bearings are nicer than V rollers for sure, beyond that, what other significant differences are there? That’s a genuine question by the way, I honestly don’t know,

 

I do certainly accept that out of the box, a Creality is going to need a modicum of patience and mechanical sympathy to set up, but it certainly isn’t hard to do. I also accept that quite a large section of the 3D printer market probably don’t have that patience and mechanical sympathy! Wouldn’t expect anyone here to lack those attributes though.

 

I also get there might be an element of distaste for things like the Ender as they are, frankly, a knock-off.

 

Improving the Creality becomes a hobby in itself - little tweaks here, larger tweaks there. After many, many hours of fettling, we reached a point that prints were consistently excellent quality and reliable - but every time a major filament change was made, that fettling process started again.

 

The Prusa, on the other hand, just works. No fiddling, perfect bed levelling, perfect first layers. Less stringing on PETG, mid-print faultless filament swaps. Lovely textured and smooth beds, brilliant adhesion. Quiet, fast, smooth. Print after print after print without any frustration.

 

I think the main difference for me is with a Prusa the machine isn't a hobby, the prints are, whereas the Ender is also part of the hobby, if that makes sense.

 

I have massive admiration for what Prusa has achieved and contributed as well - I'm planning on buying a second printer eventually, and wouldn't now look at anything else to be honest.

[nice_guy 509]

10 hours ago, corsechris said:

I also get there might be an element of distaste for things like the Ender as they are, frankly, a knock-off.

 

I may beg to differ : My first printer was a prusa textbook clone. With an extruder looking very much like an E3D. But cloning an opensourced design ?

The ender 3 is a design on its own, one of the first using those nifty ally extrusions.

 

I personnaly print rather anything, with various filaments, I'm still using the stock extruder, bowden tube and mechanicals on the ender 2 pro (wanted the beefy PSU rather than the glass bed).

 

I upgraded to the bltouch for easy z probing but seldom use bed levelling, and the skr board (because firmware updates were a breeze with this one, but I did it only once).

 

Admittedly I'm not always looking for perfect surface finish, rather mechanical properties (the stock extruder still behaves at 260°, even though I have an all metal one in a drawer just in case), so I often print hot and slow, with overextrusion cranked a bit to maximize layer bond, in an enclosure.

 

It's been rather faultless, except for the odd power outage.

 

I understand the prusa is a very good item with very good support and a direct drive extruder, but I've printed my share of soft filament (and squishy shores) with the bowden setup.

 

And without a lot of fettling. It's not meant to be the rule for everyone, I upgraded things for convenience (and I swap print surfaces a lot, I'm still fond of the polycarbonate sheet) rather than performance. It went through a significant amount of filament without showing any wear, and I'm still using original belts.

 

Reliable, would be the best word.

[Mark (smokey mow) 1,395]

11 hours ago, Kit Car Electronics said:

 

Improving the Creality becomes a hobby in itself - little tweaks here, larger tweaks there. After many, many hours of fettling, we reached a point that prints were consistently excellent quality and reliable - but every time a major filament change was made, that fettling process started again.

 

The Prusa, on the other hand, just works. No fiddling, perfect bed levelling, perfect first layers. Less stringing on PETG, mid-print faultless filament swaps. Lovely textured and smooth beds, brilliant adhesion. Quiet, fast, smooth. Print after print after print without any frustration.

 

I think the main difference for me is with a Prusa the machine isn't a hobby, the prints are, whereas the Ender is also part of the hobby, if that makes sense.

 

I have massive admiration for what Prusa has achieved and contributed as well - I'm planning on buying a second printer eventually, and wouldn't now look at anything else to be honest.

Mike, any suggestions where to buy from or any recommended extras to buy at the time of ordering? I feel I’m missing out but not having something like this in my garage and I like the idea of something that will work straight from the box.

[corsechris 2,731]

Perversely, and I really do get the irony, the 3D printed bits on a Prusa make it look cheap to my eyes!  Printing bits for my Ender 3 is one thing, spending significant cash and getting a machine that comes with a bunch of them just feels wrong. As I said, perverse!

[Kit Car Electronics 1,899]

2 hours ago, Mark (smokey mow) said:

Mike, any suggestions where to buy from or any recommended extras to buy at the time of ordering? I feel I’m missing out but not having something like this in my garage and I like the idea of something that will work straight from the box.

Buy direct from Prusa, we have both textured and smooth beds and switch between them depending on the use. Here's a typical PETG print with the textured surface. We print a lot of these  

 

[Kit Car Electronics 1,899]

35 minutes ago, corsechris said:

Perversely, and I really do get the irony, the 3D printed bits on a Prusa make it look cheap to my eyes!  Printing bits for my Ender 3 is one thing, spending significant cash and getting a machine that comes with a bunch of them just feels wrong. As I said, perverse!

 

On the other hand, I see it as a brilliant vote of confidence in the machine, that the factory uses it for their print farm for the actual retail product...

[corsechris 2,731]

15 minutes ago, Kit Car Electronics said:

 

On the other hand, I see it as a brilliant vote of confidence in the machine, that the factory uses it for their print farm for the actual retail product...

I did say I was perverse!  

[AndrewOBW 520]

Budget option that just works well is Anycubic. I had my i3 mega for years and despite several house moves and plenty of abuse I never needed to adjust/recalibrate anything. When the hot bed finally died I bought a creality ender 5 plus, and I'd send it back if I could. They're so difficult to deal with when you've got a problem so I've had to resort to replacing most of the printer with aftermarket parts to get it to work properly. If I had the chance again I'd go with anycubic. No upgrades necessary. Just set it up and away it goes. The creality bed isn't even nearly flat (I've got two of them, both the same) which is why it needs the BL touch. Anycubic one never needed it. 

[Steve (sdh2903) 3,449]

Well the new toy arrived today and got it all set up. Only had time to do a wee test print. But happy with how it turned out. From tiny acorns and all that........

 

[corsechris 2,731]

That looks good. Must be a Benchy next then

[Steve (sdh2903) 3,449]

Haha. Guess so although my youngest has a request in for a baby yoda 

[maurici 1,028]

On 11/11/2020 at 21:04, corsechris said:

I often see the assertion that the Prusa is in a different league to everything else, but I don’t think I’ve ever seen an explanation as to why? Linear bearings are nicer than V rollers for sure, beyond that, what other significant differences are there? That’s a genuine question by the way, I honestly don’t know,

 

I do certainly accept that out of the box, a Creality is going to need a modicum of patience and mechanical sympathy to set up, but it certainly isn’t hard to do. I also accept that quite a large section of the 3D printer market probably don’t have that patience and mechanical sympathy! Wouldn’t expect anyone here to lack those attributes though.

 

I also get there might be an element of distaste for things like the Ender as they are, frankly, a knock-off.

 

I gess pretty much depends on the user experience you have when you start.

 

My ender, was printing about 65 miuntes after having walked through the door... and was doing 24h+ prints on its second day with me.

Upgrades started being cheap, but now my ender is well over £600. However, In its current condition is far superior than an Stock prussa, and I would not change it for a prussa... not even with money my way. Aside, doing my printer to my specifications have helped me A LOT to learn about it, that certanly helps when facing a challenging print or trying to troubleshoot a problem.

 

The problem is that so many people find a non perfectly square frame in a creality, (or any other quality gremnlin for this matter) and they don't know why doesn't works, and spend months trying to make it work decently and smoothly to finally sell it out of frustration.

That with a prusa doesn't happens. they print out of the box, and are upgradeable too to a point.

 

In fact, if you see all the makers and youtubers, they allways have a prusa. If their mods/upgrades/projects go wrong, they allways have the trusty workhorse to print.

 

Probably, if my ender 3 had had a frame cut on friday evening, my opinion right now would be significantly different.

 

 

 

[Steve (sdh2903) 3,449]

So I went for it with yoda. He turned out pretty good to be fair. Although on the lower extremities I did get some stringing. I did wonder how on earth it'd print his fingers. 

 

Is this to be expected with the nature of the print or are there settings I should tweak?