Monoprice Mini Delta Review

[curious aardvark]

Was my birthday last week - I'm now officially an old fart, kinda lol

One of the things I've been lusting after since I first saw it at tct 2017 is the mono price mini delta.
It's a super cute, compact little printer that has some great features.
It only has a small print volume: 110x120 mm But does pack some really cool features.
https://www.mpminidelta.com
Hows that for a website :-)
Beats the non-existent manual and information I didn't get with my other 4 printers !

Wifi - just set that up - took about a minute.
You set it up for usb connection, then send two gcode commands: M550 'your-ssid' and M551 'wifi-password'.
That connects it to your wifi network.
Alternatively you can put those commands into a gcode file, load onto the sd card and run it from the print menu. Now that's easy !

An ip address then shows up on the lcd screen, type that into your browser and this screen appears:

mini wifi.JPG

pick a gcode file and it uploads it - presumably to the mini sd card. Takes a few minutes, but there is a way to speed it up I'll try later.

So I am currently doing my first ever wifi print on a 3d printer :-)

I've downloaded profiles for simplify3d, and changed tham around a bit lol.

So while my trolley key prints, lets roll back a couple of days.
The printer comes very well packaged.
Three pieces of polystyrene hold it all together.

Once out of the box, you remove the polystyrene holding the print head in place and she's ready to go.
This machine is genuinely plug and play.

I plugged her in, inserted the minisd card she came with and pressed print.
And low and behold she started to print a chinese waving cat !
First auto levelling the build plate. The plate has three sensors by each bed connector. So it levels by pushing down on the bed with the print nozzle, first retracting filament.
Very clever.

I have come across my first issue.
The power supply is woefully underpowered, 12v and 5 amp.
My workshop is cold in winter - currently just 15c.
Because of this the heated bed takes a VERY long time to get t 60c.
In fact i gave up and reset the print to 50c.
It's also fairly noisy. It is my first delta with bearings rather than wheels - so maybe that;'s normal. I'll wipe the rods with some lithium grease in a bit and see if that quiets her down a bit.

Looking at it working I reckon the bowden tube could be a few cm's shorter as well.
But when all's said and done - this is a genuine plug and play machine.
Oh yeah it doesn't come with any filament, so if this is your first printer make sure you also order some pla.

I'll add pics later - but once I've got her dialled in I have high hopes :-)