Getting into 3d printing

[Dguerne]

Hey there everyone, I am new to the forum and to 3d printing. I have been looking around and watching videos on different printers so I have it narrowed down to a few printers I would like to get some more information on.

First though this printer is actually for a tool and die shop I work at and my boss has put me in charge of getting information and finding the right printer for what we want to do. Most of the stuff we would like to do is making fixtures for aerospace companies. We are open for doing small random stuff that is all over the internet as well. From the research I have done most of our printing will be done out of ABS.

The three printers we are looking at are:
Airwolf axiom
makerbot
cube pro

The biggest question I have right now is how important is it to have a heated print bed for abs? If its a make or break for abs that leaves just the axiom which we are leaning towards right now.
What are some good options other than those three that have comparable tech specs? Our budget is around the $5000 mark.

Any other tips and hints are welcome too.

[LambdaFF]

Hi,
If you take some time to read on the internet you will see that :
- Makerbot has a horrible reputation of bad products and terrible service
- the cube line has been discontinued with the exception of the PRO.

I would not advise you to go either of those ways.

YES, a heat bed is a must have for ABS. To be honest, I don't know what the Axiom is like. Have you given some thoughts to the following :
- using PET instead of ABS : less warp, less hassle
- looking into Printrbot & Lulzbot ? With your budget you could afford a couple machines with full options : definitely a + for a company as this ensures higher availability and redundancy.

[Sebastian Finke]

What Lambda says...

Also note that here you find support for desktop consumer printers, not professional/industrial printers. Now, you can get better results from a desktop machine if you are prepared to calibrate/fine-tune/modify your printer. Out the box it will not perform as smoothly as a pro machine.

Have you decided which process you want to use? Extrusion (FDM/FFF) or SLS or DLP or inkjet or laser sintering, etc?

It looks like you may be targeting FDM/FFF. Fine. But there are many, many good printer brands out there. Printerbot, Lulzbot, FlashForge, Ultimaker, Hyrel, to name a few.

If ABS is your desired material note that you will need a heated bed and you will need an enclosure for your print chamber. If your build area is open then it is very easy to make an enclosure.

[3dex ltd]

If you were considering a Makerbot perhaps you would consider an Ultimaker? They are good printers IMHO

[Dguerne]

Thanks for the input guys. We are pretty much ready to buy the axiom after spending a good part of the week comparing other printers. The cube pro is ruled out by not having a heated bed and the makerbots seem really limited to running just pla. Anything else we have looked into that can give us the same size and similar features have all been completely open. We could indeed make an enclosure for it, but it seems those ones come with the need to tinker and really have a need to fine tune them before getting a good print. We need the least amount of down time till we can put out a finished part. Thankfully though the jobs that we have lined up are not very complicated and I think a perfect way to learn how the machine works and still make some money.

Now the next question that has come up in our search is 3d scanners. Anybody have any experience in using them and what a decent one is for around the price of the sense from cubify?

[dunginhawk]

another vote for PETG... better than ABS in EVERY single way except getting it right the first time.. it oozes a lot so its a little tricky to dial in the retraction settings etc, but once you do, its great.

[Sebastian Finke]

Thanks for the input guys. We are pretty much ready to buy the axiom after spending a good part of the week comparing other printers. The cube pro is ruled out by not having a heated bed and the makerbots seem really limited to running just pla. Anything else we have looked into that can give us the same size and similar features have all been completely open. We could indeed make an enclosure for it, but it seems those ones come with the need to tinker and really have a need to fine tune them before getting a good print. We need the least amount of down time till we can put out a finished part. Thankfully though the jobs that we have lined up are not very complicated and I think a perfect way to learn how the machine works and still make some money.

Now the next question that has come up in our search is 3d scanners. Anybody have any experience in using them and what a decent one is for around the price of the sense from cubify?

I hope to get a Cubify Sense. My scanner needs are pretty basic though so it fine (the Sense is not HD). Also the Sense is made to integrate with Geomagic Design which is great.

[Dguerne]

Yeah we dont need anything super High end more of just to get a rough part to start with them we can fine tune it from there. Is there any decent software out there that I could get for designing my figures? I would like to give my hand a try at making mini figs for Dungeons and dragons for myself and a couple of friends. The program i use at work is mastercam is more of a engineering and technical style so its hard to make nice flowing surfaces of like people.

[LambdaFF]

Yeah we dont need anything super High end more of just to get a rough part to start with them we can fine tune it from there. Is there any decent software out there that I could get for designing my figures? I would like to give my hand a try at making mini figs for Dungeons and dragons for myself and a couple of friends. The program i use at work is mastercam is more of a engineering and technical style so its hard to make nice flowing surfaces of like people.

I think you are over-estimating the stage 3D scan is at. Even with a high end scan and expensive soft, you can't do that without putting in lots of hours. I've seen our metrology dept work on a remodel project for the army, to make a case for an old equipment. Took them way too long to be cost efficient.

[awerby]

The Cube Pro has a heated build chamber, which is better than a simple heated bed, since it keeps the whole part at the correct temperature as it's built, not just the bottom of it.

I've got a Sense scanner, and I like it. But it's best at scanning rather large objects, the size of people. If you costumed your friends as D&D figures, that would give you a good start at making small figurines, since the detail is concentrated when you scale things down. It would work much better than trying to scan miniatures and reproducing them at the same scale.

For working on the scans after I've made them, my favorite system is Geomagic Sculpt or Freeform with the haptic arm. That gives me better control of subtle organic details than anything else I've tried. You can try out Cubify Sculpt to get an idea of how the software works, but it's a lot better with the 3D stylus than with a mouse.

Andrew Werby
www.computersculpture.com