The best 3d printer to buy right now

[broli]

In the 3d printer world there is currently a race happening between two major players in making ultra fast, good and affordable printers.

Bambu labs:
https://eu.store.bambulab.com/collections/3d-printer


Creality
https://store.creality.com/collections/fully-enclosed-3d-printer?spm=..index.products_display_nav_1.1

They both have their pros and cons but Bambu labs has the better reputation right now and is seen as being more reliable but Creality is catching up fast and quick.

However if you are only going to print in PLA (which I recommend) then the enclosure variant is not necessary and the price goes down too.

[CITFTA]

My son and I are using Creality Ender 3 Pros that have been modified with direct drive extruders and dual z axis drives.   We mostly print with PLA+ which has proven to be very strong and durable.  We are getting very nice prints.

Carroll

[lfarrand]

I have both the Creality Ender 6 and the Bambu Lab X1-Carbon. I bought the Ender 6 about 3 year ago and added the Bambu X1C a few months ago.

My experience has been that the Bambu is ready to print really good prints straight out of the box, no faffing or fiddling required. The Ender 6 took a huge amount of time, effort and expense in order to tune it and upgrade small things like manual bed levelling, adding a bed heater, direct drive extruder, gantry wheels etc. Even then the prints weren't great. It was very hit and miss. I was avoiding printing things because there was a very low success rate without considerable time input. Every time I'd print, I'd have to hand hold it and monitor progress.

Anyway, fast forward to today and I've got a 100% success rate with the Bambu. Every time I hit print I'm confident that it will print as expected. I don't need to sit around monitoring it. It's got an auto bed leveller, integrated bed heater, carbon rails, dual Z-axis and so on. It can print any plastic from PLA to Nylon.

I'd say the Bambu is worth twice the price for the time savings alone.

[JimBoot]

I like what I see with the Bambu. The only potential downsides I can see would be proprietary vs open source and the lock in to buying their filament using the RFID for multiple colour prints. I'm hearing the latest Prusa is a potential good open source competitor.
I have two cannabilised printers and an Ender 3 which has been pretty reliable even using the bowden tube.

[Thaelin]

Hi Jim:
   I just fell down that rabbit hole. I have a CR S10, 2 X Ender 3 and a Geetek that I had nothing but trouble with. Mostly was not sticking to the bed. I wound up getting a Prusa and it does well. $1300 but at least it works. Still having issue with the base layers but can do a raft and it prints well. Just a waste of fillament each time. I have come to prove out the old saying, you get what you pay for.
thay

[lfarrand]

The Bambu X1C is $1200 USD on the Bambu website. No doubt it can be found cheaper elsewhere.

Every first layer I've printed has been perfect. Using a 3D printer is now a joy and not something I go out of my way to avoid, like I did when I used my Ender 6.

It's one of the best purchases I've made and I would have happily paid twice the price.

[JimBoot]

Hi Jim:
   I just fell down that rabbit hole. I have a CR S10, 2 X Ender 3 and a Geetek that I had nothing but trouble with. Mostly was not sticking to the bed. I wound up getting a Prusa and it does well. $1300 but at least it works. Still having issue with the base layers but can do a raft and it prints well. Just a waste of fillament each time. I have come to prove out the old saying, you get what you pay for.
thay

I have the BLtouch on the ender 3 and a glass bed which eliminated any first layer issues. I'm thinking of upgrading mainly because of speed I'll have to look deeper into the Prusa. Thanks

[Grumage]

Absolutely delighted with my BambuLabs P1S.

Cheers Grum.

[TinMan]

I need one that prints aluminum 

[broli]

I like what I see with the Bambu. The only potential downsides I can see would be proprietary vs open source and the lock in to buying their filament using the RFID for multiple colour prints. I'm hearing the latest Prusa is a potential good open source competitor.
I have two cannabilised printers and an Ender 3 which has been pretty reliable even using the Bowden tube.

Yes Prusa is coming and honestly might even become the better option due to being open source. But they are catching up and soon might have their own contender in the ultra fast FDM printer space.

[broli]

I need one that prints aluminum 

Plastic is fine, as long as its the right plastic and doesn't damage us or the planet like most plastics are doing right now. Like PVA for instance, which you can even eat. Or PLA, which its degradation products are metabolized intracellularly or excreted in the urine and breath.

Aluminium too creates fine dust particles which have their own side effects: https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/space-junk-is-polluting-earths-stratosphere-with-vaporized-metal/
Aluminium on the other hand is half the weight of copper has he same conductivity and electrical resistance and is also easy to work with and more importantly its 1200 times more abundant than copper (we literally throw it away) making it an ideal resource to use as a conductor.

I believe if you want to 3d print something you should always think about its ecological impact. We should avoid the habit of creating more or new fine dust and smog that kills us in new ways. Whether its break dust or gear dust.

[kloakez]

Hi, I have Prusa mk4 and I wouldn't recommend it. For that money I'd buy a BambuLab P1S/P1P or even X1C. It is like choosing between a kickstarter product someone is making from their garage that has a good community that can debug problems with you and a finished somewhat refined product that works out of the box. The P1S is faster, it has its own enclosure, it takes less space and consistently turns material into 3d printed products with less waste. I've had constant troubles with the mk4, stringing PLA and PETG, support sent me a new thermistor that solved nothing. I am not able to get smooth surfaces in any material. Yes, it is open source, but that only means that you can easily get fixes of the bad design, or turn the printer your favourite color. Without an enclosure, it is very difficult to print ABS/ASA materials (unless you have a controlled environment with 40C) and then when you get the enclosure, operating the printer gets very awkward (you have to take it apart, put PSU out, if you want less awkward, pay for an upgrade connector) and even then it doesn't solve the printing issue completely.

Just yesterday, I printed some 35x30x25 mm bobbins in ASA, 2/4 are warped and only 3/4 are usable. Sure, some take it their pride finding out how to properly print stuff. I don't, I want good prints. If you like tinkering stuff to perfection, this might be the right choice for you.

I like Prusa and the idea behind it, but the mk4 just feels dated and just plainly missing features similarly priced products have and I have constant problems with it.

[F6FLT]

...
Aluminium on the other hand is half the weight of copper has he same conductivity and electrical resistance
...

Let's say it's a credible alternative, but it depends on the application. Its resistivity is 2.85 µΩ. cm, whereas copper is only 1.724, so it's 60% more resistive than copper. In high-voltage lines where it is used, a larger cross-section than copper is required.
Its weak point is that you can't solder it with an ordinary soldering iron. I've always had great difficulty with this, the difficulty of making contact, in experiments with aluminum foil.

[lfarrand]

Let's say it's a credible alternative, but it depends on the application. Its resistivity is 2.85 µΩ. cm, whereas copper is only 1.724, so it's 60% more resistive than copper. In high-voltage lines where it is used, a larger cross-section than copper is required.
Its weak point is that you can't solder it with an ordinary soldering iron. I've always had great difficulty with this, the difficulty of making contact, in experiments with aluminum foil.

Soldering to aluminium is easy, but the problem is the oxide layer that forms rapidly in contact with air. Some people recommend applying a thin layer of oil, while attempting to scratch the oxide layer, before soldering to it. I found that this was very tricky in practise, especially so when dealing with fragile material such as thin foil.

I bought some of this aluminium flux (Aluflux) and I can't recommend it highly enough. Simply apply the Aluflux to the aluminium and solder. It works every time. I've soldered copper wires to thin aluminium foil without any problems.

[Thaelin]

  Looks as if I need to eat a bit of crow on the Prusa.  After a good lot of video's later, seems as if the Bamboo P1P makes it look a bit sick. Still cannot use PETG on the Prusa but it is said that the P1P does well with it. Much stronger parts and does not degrade over time. Just needs a bit of ventilation going if a long print.
  So guess I will now be getting one of those too. Under commercial use the MK4 just didn't stand up for quality, quantity and fail rate.

Big thanks out to Jim for bringing up the brand for me to look at.

thay

[lfarrand]

When printing PETG on the Bambu you need to turn down the volumetric speed to about 10mm3/s, otherwise you'll get too much stringing. With this setting my PETG prints come out perfect.

I use OrcaSlicer to slice my prints which works very well and is a bit better than Bambu Studio.

[Thaelin]

  Keep that in mind for sure. Just to be safe, you said 10mm3/s as in cubed not squared?  Will have to check if I can use the slicer as I only use Linux and one EMac which has Cura on it. I have all kinds of problems with Cura like Brads gears load way off the bed area and have to be moved and rotated to get it to print.
thay

[CITFTA]

  Keep that in mind for sure. Just to be safe, you said 10mm3/s as in cubed not squared?  Will have to check if I can use the slicer as I only use Linux and one EMac which has Cura on it. I have all kinds of problems with Cura like Brads gears load way off the bed area and have to be moved and rotated to get it to print.
thay

What distro of Linux do you use?  I also use Linux and Cura and have not had any problems with Cura.  i have used Cura with Linux Mint, Zorin and now using it with Asmi.

Carroll

[lfarrand]

  Keep that in mind for sure. Just to be safe, you said 10mm3/s as in cubed not squared?  Will have to check if I can use the slicer as I only use Linux and one EMac which has Cura on it. I have all kinds of problems with Cura like Brads gears load way off the bed area and have to be moved and rotated to get it to print.
thay

Yeah, volumetric speed is measured in mm cubed.

This is what the filament settings window looks like in OrcaSlicer. You can see at the very bottom there's an option to configure the volumetric speed. In my experience with the Bambu X1C, if this is left at the default value (13) then you end up with really bad stringing.



This guide explains it in much more detail: Bambu Lab X1 Carbon PETG Settings – Get Perfect Prints

Most of the above guidance applies to other brands also, so if you've got bad PETG prints then applying the recommendations above should help.

[lfarrand]

Here's a bobbin that I printed in PETG on the Bambu X1C. The surfaces are very smooth.

[Allcanadian]

Like many things I found the operator has as much to do with the print quality as the printer.

I'm still using a $300 10 year old Anet A8 clone and it works perfectly using FreeCad and Repeteir_Host. The only add on is a secondary print cooling fan for thin wall printing ie. hollow prints with a thin 2 layer wall and no infill. It's tricky because the residual print heat will cause thin walls to warp.

One trick I learned to build complex coil formers is to split the print into two pieces as shown below. This is easier to design and has no over hang or support issues. The segmented coil form shown is used to prevent arc over between turns on high turn/very high voltage coils.

AC

[lfarrand]

I'm sure it is possible to achieve great quality prints from any 3D printer, given enough time, effort and expense.

I have no vested interest in Bambu Lab, other than being a very satisfied customer. It is possible to achieve great quality prints right out of the box with a Bambu printer. This must be of great value to some, me included.

I simply got fed up with tweaking, tuning and calibrating my Ender 6 printer. I just wanted to print stuff and the Bambu does that marvelously.

[broli]

This thread was mostly a motivation letter to myself to buy another 3d printer. So I went ahead a bought a Bambulabs P1s. As lfarrand said, I dont care about tinkering with and troubleshooting 3d printers either, I just want it to get it out of the box and print and from all the user experiences and reviews I have seen this one is the best at that.
Thanks guys 

PS: Make sure you can get one when you still can, I have a feeling these will become the new toilet paper craze.

[Grumage]

Hi broli.

As stated previously we are very happy with ours. Worked straight out of the box, with minimal effort. A couple of minor issues, the cooling fan is quite powerful and has been known to lift the print from the platform on several occasions. Settings can be adjusted. We have also started using a water based adhesive to the platform as well. A sort of belt and braces approach.... 

Cheers Graham.

[broli]

Hi broil.

As stated previously we are very happy with ours. Worked straight out of the box, with minimal effort. A couple of minor issues, the cooling fan is quite powerful and has been known to lift the print from the platform on several occasions. Settings can be adjusted. We have also started using a water based adhesive to the platform as well. A sort of belt and braces approach.... 

Cheers Graham.

In the past I have used simple wood glue (PVA) and this sometimes worked TOO well. But I will be mostly be printing in PLA where adhesion shouldn't be an issue, ABS and others are not an option for me from a health and ecological point of view. I chose the enclosure version just to keep dust away from the inside.

Also see:

The study, published in the New England Journal of Medicine, followed a group of people who'd had a procedure to remove fatty material that had built up in the main blood vessels (atherosclerosis) in their necks called a carotid endarterectomy.

After the procedure, the researchers examined the fatty material, called plaques, that had been removed from the neck blood vessels of 257 people.

They discovered more than half (58 per cent) of them had tiny plastic particles in their plaques.

https://www.bhf.org.uk/informationsupport/heart-matters-magazine/news/behind-the-headlines/microplastics-stroke

Granted they only found PVC and PE in the plaques but this is astounding and shocking to say the least.

I believe the plastic problem will become so much worse when we discover the insane harm we did to ourselves and the planet. All the while our incompetent governments keep allowing big corporations to push these onto us in massive quantities. Its the smog problem all over.