Concerns

[Skeen]

8. Are the parts going to be consumer replaceable, alike with the reprap printers? - Also is the printer going to be extensible in terms of alternative heads? - Possibility of 2 hot ends, for say, PVA support?

This printer is a commercial product with some complex injection molded parts. There may be a few things on it where you could print your own replacement parts, but many of the parts (like the build table) would be difficult to print yourself. Also, this is intended as an entry-level printer and we aren't planning on making it configurable.

I think it's a bit of a shame, to be giving up on the self replication philosophy. And having a 3D printer motivates one, to create replacement parts on it. - Out of curiosity, which material is the table made from?

Also it's quite a shame, that it isn't 'hackable' / configurable. Is the files/software going to be open sourced?

9. I'm actually a little sceptical about the x,y drive. All attempts of the same thing, within the reprap community has failed, and your solutions does not seem to address the major inherent issues?

We shared your skepticism when we first came up with the X-Y pinion drive mechanism, but the simplicity and low cost prompted us to explore it further. The first prototype convinced us that it had some potential. Since then, we've been through 4 additional generations of prototypes and have done a lot of printing. We wouldn't have brought it this far if we weren't completely confident that it was a reliable design that produced good quality prints.

Will you share the experience gained in each iteration, and maybe reflect on how the design has evolved?