Time & Skill to build a Rep Rap?

[JacobysOne]

I'm just curious. I've been finding interest in the RepRap as of late. The price seems right. I'm just curious what level of skill and what kind of time it takes to build a Rep Rap printer. I really want to give it a try but I'm not the most handy person in the world, if you know what I mean.

[MeoWorks]

Time it'll take to build and calibrate directly relate to your skills. You will need basic skills like handling tools, soldering, basic understanding of electronics, organization, and the ability to follow directions (you have no idea how many lack the last one).

I came from a tech heavy background, working a lot in laptop and desktop repair/building and it took me about 5 hours to assemble the Prusa i3 and another few days to really tune it in.

Don't let that scare you though, anyone can build a functional RepRap if given the correct tools and directions. Best advice is to stay organized and take your time.

[Jo1212]

Where are you located? Depending on where you're located, there are allways people (like me) who will be willing to help.

[Clark]

I'm just curious. I've been finding interest in the RepRap as of late. The price seems right. I'm just curious what level of skill and what kind of time it takes to build a Rep Rap printer. I really want to give it a try but I'm not the most handy person in the world, if you know what I mean.

The biggest skill you need is patience. Time all depends on the speed you move and the available time you have to dedicate. Getting everything squared, and the firmware set up correctly. If you don't take your time and pay attention to details, you'll pull your hair out. I bought my Prusa I2 from someone who threw it together and then went out and bought a Makerbot because he didn't feel like tinkering with it. IMHO, it just wasn't a stable build. I have since done a complete disassembly and rebuild along with a base plate and a new wiring harness (putting the finishing touches on that now). 90% of that was done with my Leatherman Charge and bit kit plus a soldering iron. The ability to use a rachet set, screw driver, a soldering iron, calipers, and a multimeter (mainly for trouble shooting) is all you really need if you buy one in kit form. If you plan on cutting the rods yourself, a cut off saw or hack saw. Some shrink wrap or liquid electrical tape and zip ties any your ready to build. The firmware setup can seem a bit intimidating at first but there are plenty of tutorials to guide you through it, and plenty of people that are willing to help you with any questions or issues. Reprap style 3d printers have become popular class projects for high school and even middle school students. Don't reinvent the wheel. Find a video series on youtube that documents the assembly of the printer kit you purchased and do it as they do. Once you have it together and running you can then start changing things on it.
-Clark

[Marcus]

As said, it really depends on several things;
For example I and three others build seven days, 5 hours each day, on a poorly documented reprap mendel kit (Not prusa), and we had a large work Shop to drill, cnc and so on.
The Printrbot kit took me two, three hours - alone. And even if I upgrade, I have the essential bits to do so (board, motors, extruder, and a printer too make the parts).

[Lindros_bigE]

The Printrbot kit took me two, three hours - alone. And even if I upgrade, I have the essential bits to do so (board, motors, extruder, and a printer too make the parts).

That's actually quite impressive. Took a few buddies of mine about 40 hours LOL.

[DrLuigi]

I would recommend a Makerfarm Prusa I3.
Printrbot is nice for a small printer, and pretty slow,
But bang for buck Makerfarm provides alot more, for same/less money,

It took me 10 hours to complete it aprox and get it to printing (Well i did it nonstop in one day, together with eating and going to a store or 2)

As skills goes i don't think i had more then a caliper, Philips screw driver , wrench, and solder iron and basic eletricity (Last one, well not realy anymore due the spoon feeding guides that make it realy easy for anyone)

[Tom]

I have a Seemecnc H-1 that I built from their kit, took one week to assemble then the rest of the summer tuning it. I only ordered the most basic kit with no upgrades so there was naturally problems with quality. Try to stay away from china too

[Keith]

I built my machine over the space of a couple of weeks. I bought a plastic part kit from Nophead back in 2011, it was the first iteration of the Prusa. I went to my local engineers supplies shop, it's very local, for all the threaded bars, nuts, bolts etc etc and picked up a Arduino Mega 2560 and RAMPS 1.4 from eBay. It was just matter of construction and a few extra bits and pieces from Maplin and other local stores to complete the machine. I'm sstill running the original Mendel but my next step will be a Delta style machine, I don't know whether to go the whole hog and design one from scratch or to build a Rostock. One way gives a heap of satisfaction from designing but the other saves so much time and hey, why re-invent the wheel. Although the idea of our hobby is to expand on original ideas so I'm stuck in the middle.

I must agree with Tom again, avoid China on eBay for your parts, there are a lot of undesirables on there, I should also balance the scales by saying that there are also a lot of genuine companies in China too. On the bad side I was looking for a laser cutter and found a lot of different Chinese sellers selling the same unit but all had different eBay usernames, I think they were all the same company as they were all said to be despatched from Portsmouth in England but if there was a problem the machine had to be returned to China at the buyers cost. The thing that attracted a lot of buyers was the cheap price usually around the £300 area but shipping was £500, they would never tell me why it cost so much to ship it by courier about 500 miles in the same country, of course it was a scam to avoid eBay fees which I reported and it stopped shortly after.Anyway the point is watch who you buy from, a lot of chinese RAMPS, driver boards pretending to be black Stepsticks but have 1u copper on instead of 4u, extruders, etc there are plenty of poor stuff to be aware of.

Sorry I went off topic slightly at the end there.

[JohnA136]

I have to agree, the Prusa Mendel i3 is a great printer for the price, easy to build and simple to calibrate. We ran a workshop a few weeks ago and everyone there had their i3 built and printing in a day and a half. Spent the second part of Sunday calibrating.