On 26/04/2018 23:19, dennis@home wrote:
On 26/04/2018 17:01, Nightjar wrote:
On 26/04/2018 16:16, dennis@home wrote:
On 26/04/2018 12:34, Nightjar wrote:
On 25/04/2018 14:23, David wrote:
Having just read an interesting "What I did with my 3D printer"
thread, I
wondered which 3D printers DIYers used, and why.

A quick look online seems to show printers in the £200-£400 range
so there
would have to be a significant saving to cost in for making one off
parts.

I can understand the "Uh, duh, because 3d printing!". Just
wondering if
anyone has cost justified a purchase on the savings over buying
stuff or
throwing away something as unrepairable.

Anything I've seen in that price range seems to have quite poor
resolution. I would put them in the because I love gadgets category.



The ~£99 ones ebay have the same resolution as the £1000 ones in
general.

I was thinking more of something like the Ultimaker 2+, which is
nearer two grand.

Which is similar resolutions to the £99 one.


You only get a significantly better resolution when you go for a
resin printer using a laser and UV resins.

I would expect a 0.4mm nozzle and 0.2mm layer height even from a £99
printer and you can probably replace the nozzle with a 0.25mm one.

I've not seen any that offer better than 350-400 microns layer height.
The Ultimaker 2+ can get down to 20 microns and includes a 0.8mm nozzle.

I would hope you mean something smaller than that.

I missed out a zero. It should have read 0.08mm

0.8mm is like the volcano nozzles you can buy for ~£30 that are used to
print thick layers more quickly rather than print fine detail at higher
resolutions.

Both my sub £200 printers go down to 100 micron layers, there isn't much
point in going lower with FFF printers as it would take days to print
anything.

That is my main reason for not buying one. I would need a high
resolution for any of the applications I have been considering.

Its where resin printers take over and they start at about
£500 these days (unless you want a kit).

Looking online, engineering resins are around £200 a litre and none seem
to be WRAS approved.

It will also work with much more useful materials than PLA, such as
ABS, nylon and polypropylene.

You need a £20 upgrade to make the £99 printer work with those
materials. One of mine will print those and a few others like carbon
fibre filled stuff, the other will only do stuff that doesn't need a
heated bed so PLA, PTG, etc.

All you need is a heated bed and an all metal hotend which cost very
little from china.

I have just bought the equivalent of a microswiss hotend for £4 to fit
my mk9 extruder but I need to drill the heater block out to 6MM and tap
it 7mm which I haven't got around to yet.



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Colin Bignell