I am looking to buy a 3D printer which will be used in my small business size of about 20 people. We sometimes need little parts made for holding littles pieces of equipment and after seeing a similar lab to us use 3D Printing to make little holders for their antennas, we are looking at buying one ourselves.
What can you guys recommend? So far I have seen this video which suggests the Bambulab P1P, or the Prusa mk3S+ Kit.
I think we will most likely buy the Bambulab P1P as this guy suggests. However he did say that its not great for fixing. “Fixing or replacing parts does not appear to be anywhere near as user friendly or even possible in some cases”
How hard is it to build the Prusa mk3S+ Kit yourself in case we decide we want to have the Prusa given it is more easily fixable? We would prefer the Bambulab as it prints faster and is slightly larger, but might not get it due to the fact its not as easy to fix stuff.
I have have had a Bambu X1C since probably February or so and I have printed hundreds of prints at this point and it has been really reliable, basically set it and forget it at this point. I have printed PLA, Nylon, PETG, TPU, wood and metal fill, carbon nylon and PLA and all of the prints are excellent quality, no complaints.
For what it’s worth, it’s actually easy to fix and take apart, they have an excellent wiki as well. They also sell most of the parts so you can just buy them if needed, I have purchased probably 5 or 6 hot end assemblies over the time I have had the printer and they are really easy to swap. I have only had one fan die and they replaced it no questions asked and it took like 10 min to install only because I didn’t ready the directions haha.
I also have a modified Prusa mk3s+ that I use sometimes but these days it’s half as fast and I spent twice the time messing with it over the Bambu, it just works and cranks out prints. The hotnends are really easy to swap on the Bambu too, way easier than the Prusa, even with a revo hotend.
No matter which you choose though, definitely recommend OrcaSlicer for the Bambu and the Mk3s.
ETA: to sum it up I guess I would say if your interest in the hobby is in the things you want to make, get a Bambu. If it is more about tuning and modding and optimizing a printer get a Prusa. That’s my 2c at least.
Thanks. I think we will go for the Bambu P1S looks like. What is an orcaslicer? Also do you know can you print metal on the Bambu?
That looks like a really sweet printer, if I were getting another printer right now that’s probably what I would get. The only thing Bambu needs now is a reverse AMS hub so you can share a set of AMS with two printers haha.
As for metal, you can’t really print metal directly on any hobby printers yet but there are a ton of metal impregnated plastics that work well. I have tried a few of them and the Protopasta metal filaments probably has the highest metal content. I haven’t tried heat treating it yet but just the regular prints are noticeably heavier and you can polish them so they are pretty neat, the iron filled one is magnetic and even rusts! They have samples on their site too if you want to test them. Make sure you get a hardened steel hotend for the P1S though as they are very abrasive.
OrcaSlicer is just another slicer app. OrcaSlicer is a fork of BambuSlicer which is a fork of PrusaSlicer which is a fork of Slic3r and some others if I remember right. BambuSlicer is good but OrcaSlicer is better, they added a bunch of other printer support and it even has calibration prints built in! This is a video with information on all 3, there are other videos as well. The biggest thing for me is the UI in Bambu/Orca is much better organized and easier to use I think.
Happy printing!
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OrcaSlicer is a slicer program: a piece of software that turns a 3D model into a series of commands for the printer. Its main competition would be PrusaSlicer (which is not limited to Prusa printers) and Cura.
As for metal printing, it looks like Bambu makes a special faux-metal filament (looks like but isn’t metal). Other than that, it can probably print the same metal-infused PLA filaments as any other 3D printer.
So to run the Bambulab I have to use my own 3d modelling and then a slicer?
Also I dont really get metal filament. People say you can get a metal-plastic filament and after you’ve modelled it you melt away all the plastic. Wouldnt that require the metal to be melted ? (2000+ degrees celsius)
Well, you can also download models from a number of websites rather than creating them yourself (Thingiverse is probably the largest and most mature site; there’s also Printables, Cults3D, MyMiniFactory, and a few others). A slicer is kind of required, yes; my printer shipped with get-started software that included a slicer, but it isn’t a Bambu and I have no idea what that company might provide.
As for the plastic/metal filaments, It’s Complicated. I’ve seen one variety that invites you to send the printed pieces back to the filament’s manufacturer, who will then anneal it for you in an industrial furnace that can probably get hot enough to melt bronze, copper, or iron (~1200C for iron, ~1000C for the other two—very few metals need a full 2000C!). Tin should melt, or at least soften, in an ordinary stove (<250C melting point), so you could successfully melt a tin-filled filament at home. And melting most of the plastic out while leaving behind just enough to act as glue can be done in theory. However, many metal-filled filaments are not intended to be annealed ( Here’s a product page for FormFutura copper-filled filament—you’ll note that the post-processing suggestions do not include melting out the plastic). These types are more “for the looks”.
If you’re looking to print physically strong parts, you may be better off working with PC or nylon than trying to get metal out of an additive printer. Full-strength metal parts are best produced by a subtractive process, for example on a CNC machine.
Thanks for the info. Yeah I dont think we will be printing anything with metal. I just heard theres some process that does that but I am not sure how that would work