3D Printer Recs

[bigmike585]

Morning!

One of the kids is wanting a 3d printer for Christmas. I know nothing about such things. I'll do some research but I thought I'd ask the tbh crew first bc y'all know stuff (usually).

Does anyone have any experience with these things? Are there any 'must haves' when it comes to this tech? Are there models to stay away from? Are there certain accessories that are a must?

The kid will likely be making mostly artsy items or small toys i'd guess.

If there is anyone that has some more in depth knowledge of these machines please post up. If you've got a lot of info or opinion but don't feel like typing out an essay, feel free to just give me a ring and we can chat for a few minutes.

Looking to keep the price sub $300ish.

Thanks!

Mike
nineseven-nine_4_9two-5eight6eight

[jeremy360]

Ender is a great brand. I have the Ender 3 (v2). Have put literally miles of filament through it. Its basically the Chevy 350 of printers. Tough, great support, parts everywhere, upgrades for a liter date, etc. Theres bigger and better and fancier, but its a solid machine with tons of capability. I'm happy with mine and dont see needing an upgrade for anything else in the near future.

[LeverBow]

Creality Ender 3 is going to be hard to beat for a first printer. The V2 has the silent motherboard and is worth the price for the reduced noise alone. The printer will come with pretty much everything you need, it will have a small amount of junk filament so you will need to order some as well. Esun PLA+ off amazon is good filament. Ultimaker Cura is the slicing software that I use, it seems to be the most common. Youtube has a ton of videos going over the Ender 3, its the most common entry level printer.

[jlinville]

Prusa make great printers also. My son has a Prusa mini and he builds lots of really cool stuff. He's wanting another one with a larger build plate. So, I'm looking at a bigger Prusa and also Bambu printers. Prusa is what they have at his school, so he is real familiar with their slicer software.

[bigmike585]

Wonder sounds like a good brand, thanks! I’ll look at the Prussian as well.

[Cactus rancher]

I have owned all three mentioned in this thread already. If price is your primary concern go with the Ender. However, you may get what you pay for. The ones I have had requires lots of maintenance and tinkering to keep them going. There are tons of mods and parts are generally cheap but by the time you get them up to par with some others it would be cheaper to just buy the others. Prusa is on the other end of the spectrum. They are the most expensive of the three but they just work and they work well. There have a very loyal following and great tech support. They used to be shipped from overseas and there is usually a delay getting one shipped. The MKS3+ is the older model and price has come down with the release of the MK4, which is faster but not as fast as Bambu. With all that being said, until the last year Prusa was a slam dunk if you have the budget. However, in the last couple of years Bambu has come on the scene. They are priced in the middle, not open source for most parts, have ok customer support. Their P1P model will do most everything people want and the price is very good for what you get. They are screaming fast compared to the other two. Quality of prints is almost as good as Prusa and good enough for just about everything. So far they are very reliable but have been on the market a lot shorter time. Parts are almost all from the company but they are available quickly and generally cheaply. It pains me to say it as a long time Prusa fan but the Bambu is the game changer here. If I were to buy one for my kids today it would be a Bambu. There is just no comparison when it comes to speed. A print that Ender and Prusa may do in 6 hours, Bambu will do in 2. You can look on youtube for 3d printer Benchy speed test comparison and there should be videos showing a relatively small print done just for speed.

[kmitchl]

I have an Ender 3. I think all of them require some periodic fiddling to get the best performance but for starting out it works for me.

[jlinville]

I have owned all three mentioned in this thread already. If price is your primary concern go with the Ender. However, you may get what you pay for. The ones I have had requires lots of maintenance and tinkering to keep them going. There are tons of mods and parts are generally cheap but by the time you get them up to par with some others it would be cheaper to just buy the others. Prusa is on the other end of the spectrum. They are the most expensive of the three but they just work and they work well. There have a very loyal following and great tech support. They used to be shipped from overseas and there is usually a delay getting one shipped. The MKS3+ is the older model and price has come down with the release of the MK4, which is faster but not as fast as Bambu. With all that being said, until the last year Prusa was a slam dunk if you have the budget. However, in the last couple of years Bambu has come on the scene. They are priced in the middle, not open source for most parts, have ok customer support. Their P1P model will do most everything people want and the price is very good for what you get. They are screaming fast compared to the other two. Quality of prints is almost as good as Prusa and good enough for just about everything. So far they are very reliable but have been on the market a lot shorter time. Parts are almost all from the company but they are available quickly and generally cheaply. It pains me to say it as a long time Prusa fan but the Bambu is the game changer here. If I were to buy one for my kids today it would be a Bambu. There is just no comparison when it comes to speed. A print that Ender and Prusa may do in 6 hours, Bambu will do in 2. You can look on youtube for 3d printer Benchy speed test comparison and there should be videos showing a relatively small print done just for speed.

I was leaning that way, but this post just made me go Bambu! Just told Santa to bring my son a new Bambu P1S Combo for Christmas. I can't wait to see how the multi-colored printing will go.

[Jay-J]

Where is the best place to buy 3D printers from?

[jlinville]

Where is the best place to buy 3D printers from?

For Prusa, go to https://www.printedsolid.com/.
For Bambu, go to https://us.store.bambulab.com/

[soldierarcher]

my daughter needed one for college so we went to MicroCenter and picked up the Creality Ender 3 S1. It's worked very well right out of the box. It comes with a few little things you can print on the memory card that comes with it. Otherwise you can download projects from www.thingiverse.com and other websites. And of course if you know Autocad you can make anything you want.

Here is the printer we bought on Amazon. Link