home business - 3d printing - most versatile printer?

[weldingrod]

We also haven't talk about the temperature usage. It's one big thing in there.
Glass transition blows!

yeah I'm concerned about making a part out of filament that is going on a boat or the dashboard of a car that sits in the sun all day, and the part is warped by the sun. No good. Seems a printer with a wider range of materials looks like a better option. I really appreciate all of the advice.

I think I will hold off on buying any used printers for 10,000k which have more capabilities, i.e. larger size or resins, etc. I will wait on anything like that until I have an actual design that merits the business case to use such a tool.

I will start looking into the FFF (fused filament fabrication) options then as a tool to get me started.

Regarding size 13x6x6 does seem alot more appealing for flexibility and I can envision a few items that I may run into a need to do something larger than 8.9" length at some point.
I saw the flashforge creator pro, about $1349 doesn't seem too bad comparatively.
What do you think about the dreamer? seams to be a similar machine....it maxes at 9.1" length and has wifi capability for the same price. It as a 100-200 micron range, vs 100 to 300 of the creator pro.

Another option I'm looking at with a larger plate (volume) is the Lulzbot Taz 4, don't know much about it I see it is limited to one print head, although I'm not sure I need to print more than one color at this point. It seems to support also a broad range of materials, and also can get down to 75 micron resolution. Any thoughts on that one? the software seems fairly user friendly based on reviews. I have read about others which also have larger volume and dual or triple print heads with good reviews, but they require buying proprietary cartriges to get the materials. (I'll skip those).

The ultimaker 2 seems to get down to finer resolutions. 20 micron and I'm not too keen on the makerbot closed source type stuff. Thanks for the insight.