3d printing at home setup

I posted this on another board but it's not getting any reads so I thought I would try here too.

I have been 3d printing for a few years now. I have a Davinci Pro 1.0 and an Anycubic Kossel linear plus, both are modified from stock. I like the E3D V6 hot ends.

I have been kind of toying with the idea of a third printer, but these first two have just totally taken over my home office. I have prints and parts mixed in with bills and receipts, it's getting ridiculous. I have been thinking about moving them to my garage, clearing out a spot and setting up a little 3d workstation. A mini farm. I have been weighing the pros and cons.
What about all you guys? Where do you have your 3d printers set up? Especially if you have more than one, then you must have a dedicated spot, I want to hear from you.

pros and cons of moving to the garage

pro: I can print anytime I want. Right now my printers are in my home office which is just a converted bedroom, right next to our master bedroom where my wife is sleeping so I don't want to wake her up with a humming printer. So I can't print all night long or early morning when I am at my best.

con: the garage is not as climate controlled as the house. I live in So Cal so the temperatures are not that extreme anyway. And I have a portable heater and a portable a/c unit.

pro: the garage has a double wide roll up door - good for ventilation

con: the garage has a double wide roll up door - bad for security

Quote:

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Originally Posted by sdtag

I have been thinking about moving them to my garage, clearing out a spot and setting up a little 3d workstation.

con: the garage is not as climate controlled as the house. I live in So Cal so the temperatures are not that extreme anyway. And I have a portable heater and a portable a/c unit.

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I have Multiple 3D Printers i have them stationed as satellites so to speak.

My 3D Printers a controller by a Raspberry Pi running Octoprint which can be wired or wireless Ethernet.
I control / monitor them from anywhere. using Plugins for Octoprint while viewing the print status via a Web Cam.

Octoprint allows the complete control over the 3DPrinter including an "EMERGENCY STOP BUTTON"

As far as a Garage that does not have the Perfect climate control,
I simply made a Dual 3D Printer Climate Control box from a single Sheet of Partial board Then used Plastics Sheets with hinges for doors.

Including smoke alarm, an Bathroom Fan Vent to exhaust fumes to outside by Dryer exhaust vent.

Attachment 12737

you don't need that much space.
Well depends on how many printers you have.

i've got three on one desk and a 4th on the fridge.
there are pics around somewhere.
As far as temperatures go.

you're in california - don't think you'll need a heater - dehumidifier maybe.

My workshop (garage) varies between 12c in winter up to 30c on a hot summer day. They all Print fine, regardless of the temperature.
The humidity - far more important, hovers around 45-55% which seems to work well for pla.

The ends of the rolls do get a little brittle if nothing's been p[rinted for a while. I guess I should unload when i go away.
But as my annual holiday currently consists of 1 week at the beginning of march to go to the international slinging meeting in mallorca, hardly seems worth it :-)

Thanks guys.
So far I am at +2 for moving my stuff to the garage
Dang I was hoping you would talk me out of it! haha

Oh and btw sorry if I put this in the wrong forum. I was going to post it in General 3d printing discussion, but it seems like it's under attack from China so I came here instead.

lol we clear the spam as fast as we can.
Sometimes a bot will just flood a particular section.
Just ignore it, someone will clear it :-)

Quote:

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Originally Posted by sdtag

Thanks guys.
So far I am at +2 for moving my stuff to the garage
Dang I was hoping you would talk me out of it! haha

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Though I do not have a garage, moved my 3D Printers into a Work Shop area of the home basement area.
If you have a basement you know that once smells get in here is almost no way of getting the smells out.

With almost no room left in the shop area it was quite the chore to find available space for the large 2ft x 2ft x 4ft enclosure to sit.
Added a Dryer vent to the outside with a bathroom vent fan to exhaust potentially dangerous fumes and have an Ionic Breeze to help eliminate smells.
A 3D Printer without a UPS backup, NO!, picked up a Three APC 2200 with dead batteries for free only cost was the replacement batteries $137.00 US each.
However one was DOA !!! An so we go through a lot to support our new hobbies.

I'm in So Cal. We don't have basements here. I'm not sure why, earthquakes maybe?
All our houses here are on a slab of concrete poured right on the ground. No giant hole to dig.
Some of the older houses in So Cal are on a raised foundation, but still have no basement.
So, back to the garage. I know it is probably the right thing to do but I'm fighting it. I like having my printers and arduinos and stuff in my office. But I don't have any room left to add a third printer, so again I'm torn.
I bought some plastic storage containers to try and organize my mess a little. Organized chaos!
still fighting it...

thanks Alice.
Where do you keep your printer(s)?

I am looking to purchase a good 3D printer.

alice was a spam bot :-)

Bear in mind that you can always stack printers. People tend not to think vertically.

My mini delta sits on top of my normal sized delta.
Attachment 12806

You could make a simple legged shelf (table) and use the vertical space in your office :-)
some 2x4 a piece of plywood and 8 screws (2 per leg, screwed down through the plywood). job done.

do you use the mini delta much?
I was considering one of those but I am also thinking about a standard printer but with 2 extruders.
I think I could use 2 extruders.
I'm not too sure about the 2 in 1 out designs, or even the 3 in 1 out. I am thinking about 2 separate hot ends 2 in 2 out e3d v6's spaced 25mm's apart.

until the hotend jammed I was using the mini quite alot for small detailed items. Currently waiting on the time and inclination to take it to bits and fix it.

If you're going to get a dual extruder - and they really aren't s useful as you think - then save up and go for an idex system. Independant Dual Extruders.
Takes much of the hassle out of it.

That said I do use my klic-n-print very occasionally for a dual, print. But mostly for having both normal pla and flexible pla available without having to change spools over.
I have used it for dual colour flexibles, but if i was buying a dual extruder system today - it'd be idex or nothing.

Never did dual prints on my old flashforge creator. Ended up ttoally removing the right extruder and replacing with plastic model of motor - otherwise the endstop didn't get pressed :-)

Now this looks interesting: https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:3297964

Thanks for the link, that does look intriguing.
But wow I am surprised at what you said about dual extruders in general, not as useful as I think.
idex - I did not know that term, thank you, I think that is exactly what I want.
haha well that is what I thought I wanted before I read your post. haha Now I am thinking about it again. But I do like the printer in the link, thank you for that.
For a while I was working on a dual extruder effector for my Anycubic linear plus, but then I had second thoughts. I ditched the Trigorilla board and I went with an MKS board running smoothiware about a year ago. I love it, the printer prints great now, no more delta dome. But I think adding dual extruders to a delta is asking for trouble (even with Smoothiware) so that why I am thinking about a 3rd printer now.

printer is in extra bedroom that is more or less storage and next to my home office, other extra bedroom.. Would not use it as much if it was in the basement or garage..

yeah exactly
thats why I am resisting my move to the garage.
plus it is just more comfortable in the house, carpeting, a/c, etc.

the thing about fixed side by side dual extruders is this:

1) Unless PERFECTLY levelled one head will always catch on the print at some point and bugger it up.
I actually sand off any protuding filament from the nozzle I'm not using for aprint to make sure there's nothing there to catch.

2) you need a REALLY good purgewall for dual material prints. this is used to collect dribbled filament from the head that's just been used and clean up the head that's about to be used. you end up using a a lot more plastic and almost doubling the print time. I have never managed to get simplify3d to work with dual extrusion.
I use flashprint, which works fantastically well :-)

3) calibrating dual printheads is a real pita. The only way I know to do it is with replicator-g, and it doesn't work that well. Fortunately my klic-n-print has so far managed to work without it being done.

4) 2 or 3 into one systems look good, but bear in mind you have to have the same print temperature for each material. with a proper seperate extruder setup you can have two completely different materials with different print temps. Although mixing things with widely varyong temps is not a good idea, as the hotter one will melt the cooler one.

So because of all this - you rarely use the dual print option.
My first printer was a flashforge creator - before flashprint and simplify3d existed, so I was forced to use makerware desktop as a slicer. it works well for dual prints, but is the single most difficult and obstreporous slicer to adjust and setup out there.
The klic-n-print went largely unused (won it in the first and only 3dprintboard.com competition) - despite being the better printer - for quite some time.
Now the creator is ill and in limbo until I get the inclination and time to fix her. And I'm now using the knp a lot more, mainly because of how easy flashprint makes it :-)

So taking all that into account, idex takes all the hassle out of it. essentially you're just dealing with two single extruders, which are (presumably) calibrated seperately.
Not cheap - but worth the investment.
If I had the money and deskspace I would get one of these:
https://technologyoutlet.co.uk/produ...x-2-3d-printer

If I won the lottery I would get one of these with the hi-temp nozzle option: https://www.lpfrg.com/products/leapfrog-bolt-pro/
Out of the hundreds of machines I've seen at the tct shows over the last 5 or 6 years, this is still my all time favourite.

wow thank you very much, I was kind of wondering about a lot of things you just said.
ok I'll shut up now. Going back to the drawing board and rethinking everything.
Maybe I'll just clean up my mess and be happy with my 2 single extruder printers.

I actually am pretty happy with both, I was just looking for a new project and had always wondered about dual extruders. I think I'm off of dual extruders now but I might start thinking about a 2 into 1 for the delta.

The printer on Thingiverse is a bit much for me. I can put together a kit no problem, but I don't think I want to dedicate that kind of time and energy for gathering everything on my own. Not yet anyway.

And I do ok but there is no way I would spend 8 grand on a printer. This is just a hobby of mine.

Thank you so much for all your time and energy and insights. You probably saved me a bunch of money and frustration.

we aim to please :-)

I will add that if you're making models that frequently use a lot of supports - then a dual setup is worth a try as you can use one extruder for soluble supports. Which will make removing supposrt much much easier as you just srop them in asink of warm water.

For role playing models it's ideal. Or for things that just have geometries difficult to print without supports.

A 2 into one nozzle for a delta is a good place to start.
bear in mind that with sufficient cooling some pla will print up to 230-240, so it gives you scope for matching whatever the second filament is.

If the 2 into 1 setup is not a mixing hotend, but a hotend and separate joiner part, printing materials with different temperatures is possible, the temperature change just needs to be done during the filament change. I've printed PETG and BVOH without problems. 240C vs 210C. It does take bit of extra time for the nozzle to change the temperature.
Also for this type of setup to work properly there' needs to slicer support for the purge tower or post process the gcode. Prusa Slic3r and KISSlicer v2 support this, but not sure if they work for all mulr-extruder single-nozzle setups. For my 4-in-1 Prometheus setup I've been wrinting a post-processing tool to generate the purge tower: https://github.com/spegelius/filaswitch. Some prints: https://www.dropbox.com/sh/lagel8zv6...-YbiFbRBa?dl=0


With mixing hotends the temperature differences will cause problems if the temperature difference is big. As curious aardvark mentioned, some materials tolerate higher temps somewhat, but it's probably a good idea to do a proper purge when changing filaments.

thank you for that.
I'm not so interested in mixing colors as I am in being able to print 2 different colors in the same print.
For example: a luggage tag. I have made these before by pausing the print and pulling out one filament and jamming in another and resuming the print. I would like to be able to print these in one operation without having to be there to pause and resume the print. And other stuff too, this was just an example off the top of my head.
Thanks for the links. More stuff that I hadn't thought about before, purging one color then advancing the next.
I can't believe I have to ask this but here I go...
What exactly is a purge tower? Is it a spot in the print where I want the filament to dribble on to so it won't dribble on random places in my print?

Purge tower or waste tower is a additional printed structure for holding the waste that happens when changing the filament. There's going to be some wasted material when changing the filament because it's impossible to pull all material from the nozzle, because some of it is molten. So the old material needs to be purge to somewhere. In slicers this can be a separate purge tower or similar structure. Here's example with the purge tower on the left and the actual model on the right: https://www.dropbox.com/s/d9xsh3mj6p...15.04.jpg?dl=0. Yeah, the amount of waste can be quite large...
Prusa MMU is a similar system to mine and it uses Prusa Slic3r to do the purge tower: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MnOWX4Ujtv8. The newer MMU2 is more advanced, but it still uses same multiple in - one out hotend setup and purge towers.

I don't understand something:
If you retract the filament to do a change and some molten filament is still in the nozzle, how does that molten filament get purged? Is it when the new color filament comes in, then the 2 colors slightly mix for a brief period before the new color takes over. Is this is what's purging?

Yes, new filament pushes the old out. Some filaments purge quite cleanly with quite small amount of new filament, some colors might require a quite long purge, like when printing black and white colors, otherwise the colors "bleed" on each other, usually the black taints the white. And when printing with solubles, I've noticed that in order to get all of the soluble material out, I need to purge something like 80mm+ of the new material, because the old and new material somehow mix in the nozzle and if there's still some of the soluble material, the resulting print will be weak on that spot.

I will add that some idex slicers will use a very small purge tower. But generally you don't see one in youtube videos.

Yeah with systems that have multiple nozzles the purge is optional, but I think I'd use one just to make sure the filament in the nozzle is "fresh" when selecting new nozzle to print with, especially if there's parts where only one head is used for a long period of time. And if the nozzle oozes, the purge tower makes sure that there's proper amount of filament ready to go.

You need also to remember about proper temperature of the room for printer. As low the temperature is then printing could be slower

i use autocad123, it is a pretty easy solid modeling program to pick up and it is free to use

it's also no longer available. Which is annoying as i have a book on it :-(

Quote:

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Originally Posted by curious aardvark

it's also no longer available. Which is annoying as i have a book on it :-(

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Sorry gave the wrong name I use Autodesk 123D Design - it can be found here https://autodesk-123d-design.en.lo4d.com/windows. However you are correct, seems Autodesk does not "officially" offer it any longer :mad:.

Still works great for me though.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by spegelius

Purge tower or waste tower is a additional printed structure for holding the waste that happens when changing the filament. There's going to be some wasted material when changing the filament because it's impossible to pull all material from the nozzle, because some of it is molten. So the old material needs to be purge to somewhere. In slicers this can be a separate purge tower or similar structure. Here's example with the purge tower on the left and the actual model on the right: https://www.dropbox.com/s/d9xsh3mj6p...15.04.jpg?dl=0. Yeah, the amount of waste can be quite large...Prusa MMU is a similar system to mine and it uses Prusa Slic3r to do the purge tower: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MnOWX4Ujtv8. The newer MMU2 is more advanced, but it still uses same multiple in - one out hotend setup and purge towers.Tutuapp 9apps Showbox

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yes it's true, the amount of waste is quite importantthanks for sharing this example with us

sounds like my workshop (also used to be a garage).