The best 3D printer for a figurine designer?

[curious aardvark]

it's a lot cheaper, is essentially a makerbot that's been upgraded.

If you can afford an ultimaker, then yep get one. Fantastic machines. Thought they were only single nozzle though.
Won't necessarily make better models and will cost the same as 4 ff/makerbot clones.

Basically I was thinking - good machine, great price :-)

[curious aardvark]

The thing is once you go past .1mm print resolution, you pretty much need a microscope to see the difference.

Ulimakers claim reliable printing down to 0.05mm

But you'd need to see the same thing printed at different resolutions on the same printer to try and tell the difference between .1 and .05
did you say you were in holland, near ultimaker ? (Hmm, probably another thread)
In that case pop in and ask to see some print examples. Pretty sure they'd show you :-)

Holding an actual printed article in your hand is worth 3000 internet threads.

[Dargonfly]

Thanks for the replies guys.

The thing is once you go past .1mm print resolution, you pretty much need a microscope to see the difference.

Ulimakers claim reliable printing down to 0.05mm

But you'd need to see the same thing printed at different resolutions on the same printer to try and tell the difference between .1 and .05
did you say you were in holland, near ultimaker ? (Hmm, probably another thread)
In that case pop in and ask to see some print examples. Pretty sure they'd show you :-)

Holding an actual printed article in your hand is worth 3000 internet threads.

Yes, I'm from the Netherlands; home of both the Ultimaker and Builder. So I can (and will!) go to both their 'printevents' to get a small presentation, example, and get any questions answered.
I have seen a lot of the printers at ESEF/RapidPro 2014 but it's difficult to compare them because not all of them are side-by-side and a lot of models look/are cleaned up/treated.

I couldn't really find much information about the Builder except a short article in Makezine so I wouldn't know which other printer it's comparable to. It seems pretty unique with its dual-extrusion through one extruder and the large build size (66[cm]) on the larger model. And the mono extruder version is pretty much the cheapest assembled printer I can find (due to shipment & tax.)

[curious aardvark]

the builder dual feed system looks interesting - but cheapest assembled printer ?
you're about 800 euros off ! lol
flashforge - 647 euros. Built, tried and tested.
my dutch is a bit rusty (used to be quite good - reading it anyway) - but you could certainly find one shipped from europe somewhere. Mine was shipped from the uk - so no p&p or tax :-)

Like I said - buy one now, and play with it while youy're looking for something a lot more expensive and probably not much better :-)

Have to look at that dual feed one nozzle system - would sure save time on calibrating with the dual nozzles.

(2 minutes later) LMAO - they want 178 euros JUST for the brass nozzle. Screw that I'll just calibrate :-)

[Dargonfly]

the builder dual feed system looks interesting - but cheapest assembled printer ?
you're about 800 euros off ! lol
flashforge - 647 euros. Built, tried and tested.
my dutch is a bit rusty (used to be quite good - reading it anyway) - but you could certainly find one shipped from europe somewhere. Mine was shipped from the uk - so no p&p or tax :-)

Like I said - buy one now, and play with it while youy're looking for something a lot more expensive and probably not much better :-)

Have to look at that dual feed one nozzle system - would sure save time on calibrating with the dual nozzles.

(2 minutes later) LMAO - they want 178 euros JUST for the brass nozzle. Screw that I'll just calibrate :-)

Hmm, I like your train of thought:
I personally only had looked at new printers, but a assembled and tested printer will probably have less trouble.
But what about the durability of the parts? Aren't these worn out at some point? Can I replace them easily?
Also; I cannot find which slicer this printer can use for slicing. Is it something like Cura or Slic3r? Does the software produce good results?

This route is probably a good one though; because I was thinking about being able to print the highest of quality parts too; but I don't need every parts in ultra quality, and if I do need it, I can always go to 3Dhubs and get someone close to me to print it at a high quality. (there are a lot of Ultimaker 2 in my city, and even some SLA machines in adjacent cities.)

Thank you for your good advice Curious aardvark!

[Dargonfly]

There's a package coming my way...
Should be here within a week

[Feign]

Pretty much any printer (with the exceptions being pretty obvious) will print from any slicer.

And congrats on the purchase.

[Dargonfly]

So it's here! I got the Flashforge Creator Dual Extruder and I have been tinkering a bit with (got scared shitless every time it made a new noise!) and here are my first two prints:


Since these images are large I'll just put the album here instead of linking them all:
http://imgur.com/a/0k7UA

This was after I printed some 'pasta' because my bed was too far away from the nozzle. Also, I'm using a PVP based glue stick to make it stick to the plate; seems to work just fine.

These were both printed using Makerbot software (ReplicatorG kept saying my COM port was already in use...?) with the following settings (most were standard, I just adjusted the speed:
- Material: MakerBot PLA (blue)
- Rafts: Off
- Supports: Off
- Infill: 10%
- Number of Shells: 2 for cube, 3 for Marvin
- Layer Height: 0.10mm
- Extruder temp: 230 Celcius
- Build Plate temp: 110 Celcius
- Speed while Extruding: 40mm/s
- Speed while Traveling: 70mm/s

Both pieces took 30 minutes to print; (and I have been watching with amazement the whole time!)
I'm quite happy with this, but there is still a lot of room for improvement:
- The first 1-2cm of print isn't there (no material), this gets 'fixed' by the next layer of material, but makes the bottom a bit more sloppy
- The first few layers (approx. 2mm total) don't have a nice shell
- The shell has something 'wavy' going on in the X and Y direction (though not that much)
- The topside of the cube has 'dents' where there is no infill; I watched the process and I think by having just a larger top surface this can be fixed (or more infill off course)

The Marvin did a bit worse:
- First layer of left foot didn't print (no material); same problem as mentioned above
- During printing I could see that the overhanging parts (front and more notably the back) would curl upwards(!) this would get pushed back by the nozzle every time, but this created the flat ass that Marvin has (not good!)
- The ears are drooping; same as the top eyelid (which makes it look like he is squinting)
- The parts where you attach it to the keychain also drooped a lot and is very low quality

Top surface of Marvin is rather nice. So biggest problem is overhanging parts that droop / curl. Going to the Flashforge part of this forum to look for some advice on that.

[Super Stonegiant]

I have noticed that sometimes when the printer is printing in a small spot for to long, the standard temp that works for everything else can actually be too hot. Almost like it is just re-melting the piece and pushing it around. That's why I like to have a little temp control, while printing. Repetier allows for this, Makerware doesn't. It just takes a little experimenting with temp. I will admit I haven't done much on printing figurings, but I have seen a difference of small print area to large print areas. Maybe, try printing two of those small prints, on the same print, to see if it helps.

[Dargonfly]

I have noticed that sometimes when the printer is printing in a small spot for to long, the standard temp that works for everything else can actually be too hot. Almost like it is just re-melting the piece and pushing it around. That's why I like to have a little temp control, while printing. Repetier allows for this, Makerware doesn't. It just takes a little experimenting with temp. I will admit I haven't done much on printing figurings, but I have seen a difference of small print area to large print areas. Maybe, try printing two of those small prints, on the same print, to see if it helps.

Thank you for your reply, will try this as soon as I got some other stuff fixed! Makes sense that allowing the material to cool after each layer might prevent warping.