Cobblebot 3D Printer

[3DPBuser]

What about the Makibot? I thought it was supposed to be the worst KS result ever.

As for wobble, can't the speed be slowed down near the top, to reduce forces?

As for injection, yea anything less than 100,000 parts is not of much use; better to print or use pre-made parts, which is what I thought this guy was doing. Each injection mold will be 5 to $30k.

How about the Gigabot? It's huge too, www.re3d.org/products-2/

As for KS, after funding, you get your money in about 30 days.

[CaptainObvious]

I will be so, so disappointed if this project isnt removed by kickstarter.

I have never seen a more blatant cash grab in the history of 3D printers on kickstarter. $322,000 off a video that shows it moving without printing anything, and a 1x1 inch cube. wow.

I dont like to be the one to say 'I told you so' but I mean really, I have no sympathy for the people that back this project and never get anything. This creator will walk away with all that money and just bail once he realises the cost of building 1k printers is around $400k, so he will just keep all the money and claim 'manufacturing delays' until people eventually realise their claims for refunds will never work.

Heres a quick shopping list of critical flaws in this printer design and the campaign

1) The cost. I'm sorry, but there is no way the printer, as is, can be built for under $299. He clearly states that the prototype cost over $1k to build and that seems reasonable. The vitamins and core components of any printer come in art around $180. Then you add things like heavier motors, the frame, LCD screens, build plates, longer rods, stiffer supporting structures for his giant machine and... the cost of actually building it which is about half a days worth of labour. I can feasibly see with all parts injection molded and with a garbage, cheap build plate, it could be bought for $299, but it couldnt be built.
2) The time line. from finishing the design of injection molding, give at least 2 months lead time to receive your parts. As of now, he hasnt even finished the design. he would be able to start building them by october at best.
3) the parts currently are 3D printed and JUST LOOK AT THEM. They are bizarrely shaped and completely not optimised for injection molding. How long will this take? the entire printer is going to need an overhaul in its design to allow its parts to even be built. Some of them are just enormous.
4) who will build these? He says hes not going to make a lot of money from this and thats clearly true since if he hopes to build them all hes going to go into a fat debt. However building ONE THOUSAND?? Where is he going to find a team of like 6+ people who will all gladly work for nothing? He has made absolutely no mention of his plans to upscale production at all.
5) Good luck printing anything that large without the worlds worst curling. The thing needs a heated bed. an acrylic plate that large will just be awful. And where exactly are people supposed to source their own 15" heated bed? that thing alone would cost hundreds! And it needs an enclosure too. An enclosure that large is going to be hundreds again! You are going to have to spend twice as much as the printer costs, just to get it to print anything bigger than a yoda head figurine.
6) The frame is wobbly as all hell. There is a clear reason why large, high quality printers have super-rigid frames. The vibrations will tear this machine to shreds. Why is the printrbot metal so good, and why are fortus series printers even better? They are as steady as a rock. His design will get more and more wobbly the higher it goes and further away from the centre it builds. The thing looks like it could sway by up to a centimetre at max extension, its just so flimsy.

But none of these reasons actually matter compared to the only one that does, which is no one will ever see their printer. From what I can see, he is going to take his design to get injection molded, they will send him back to re-design everything from scratch to be optimised for mass production. Some of his critical components will require a complete overhaul. This will take about 3 months. Then 2 months delay after that taking him to next year before actually purchasing any parts. Then he will buy a small fraction of the parts to build backers' printers, maybe 10 or so of them. The printers will be wobbly as hell and nothing will stick to the build plate. he will have $200k left over and decide the business cant possibly succeed and claim delays for the next year.

I am just so, so upset that someone can make a video of himself saying 'small printers are bad, all they can do is print figurines. you need my printer which is 20 times as large. here is a video of it printing a 1 inch cube' and get $322k. There is nothing that adds up about this campaign. NOTHING. The printer doesnt exist, his costs dont add up, he doesnt have a team. Its just one person with a great idea to ring in 1000 people on the belief that he has invented a 3D printing miracle machine on the side while working as a lawyer.

Let this campaign be the harshest lesson 3D printer backers on kickstarter will ever learn. From now on, every failed campaign will be compared to the cobblebot, and people will joke that 'hey, and least its not COBBLEBOT bad' and people will laugh and cry about the money they lost.

So, in short, it's all a load of cobblerbots?

[chbrules]

They're now saying that they're looking at making the frame entirely out of metal (upgrade option for $299 backers). I'm in it for the $799 package for the 20"x20"x20" w/ heat bed and enclosure, and the metal frame is a free upgrade if they manage it. They've also printed a 7.3" ^3 box with it (pic on their KS).

Am I basically setting myself up to lose $800 here? :/ I'd like to get out of this while I still have time if need be. I'm a first-timer. Can someone suggest a good path for me to go about this? I'm familiar with programming and some EE.

[chbrules]

That is a viable option to increase stability.

However something THAT large made of metal? for only $799?

Think about it. the printrbot metal is like 1/20th the size using all metal, and is $540. how can he get such a large amount of metal, for so cheap.

This doesnt solve the issue of the build plate at that size. I swear, the creator just goes 'oh ill solve this problem by designing this bigger, we will buy it later'. Where can you even buy HBP that large. a 214x214 one costs $45, how much do you think a 520x520 one will cost? its going to be insane. I dont think such a thing even exists and when Jeremiah goes to ask suppliers theyll say, yeah we can custom make 100 of them for about $300 each. And getting a small volume of parts precision cut out of metal? good god its going to be in the order of $50-$100 per part, his printer has dozens of these.

I am 100% dead certain that this printer can not exist at that price point. Do a little research yourself and youll see how expensive things are. The heated plate will literally be hundreds of $ at that size and the metal parts could total anywhere up to $1000.

this project has no hope.

Good points. I backed out of the KS pledge. I'm looking at the Printrbot, Solidoodle 4, and the Da Vinci 2.0. Any recommendations?

[curious aardvark]

I see so many crowdfunded 3D printers, and have known several that have been dissapointing. Makibox took 15 months and the structure is still questionable at best. Part of that delay was "mission creep", I think trying to do a pellet extruder when it wasn't promised or even development work started yet. Buccaneer reneged on the heated bed and was supposed to deliver Feb 2014. I know some people got them by the videos, but I'm not sure if they're actually done shipping the rewards yet.

There's been a couple 3D printer cancellations lately, before the campaign finished, and that was a good thing in both cases.

Yes, he finally showed the machine printing a calibration cube, one that's a bit flawed at that. I doubt he built the Dalek or Yoda using that machine if he's later showing off the build of a calibration cube as proof the machine works.

These people are trying to outdo each other on price. And that's deadly for people that don't appear to have business, engineering or logistics experience. Most of these situations, I think you're most likely buying a box of frustrations, assuming you even get the box.

speaking as someone who will never get their makibox (was told it had shipped in march - turns out it's still in a warehouse in hongkong) and has moved on to a flashforge, that not only turned up in 3 days but is way better than I had hoped, can't agree more.

You simply can't produce machines like this, for that kind of money without setting up a proper factory environment.
A lot of these kickstarters are hobbyists who think they can design a printer and make lots of money.
Little thought is given to who's going to build the machines, pack them, do the taxes etc.

That's where makible fell down. They didn't factor in all the extra labour, plus all the costs of replacing the really dodgy hotends and ended up using the money supposedly for shipping to pay wages and buy in extra parts.
They turned their office space into a large workshop and called it a factory.

It's a salutory lesson I've learnt. No matter how good it looks, or how enthusiastic the seller/manufacturer is about their new design. If it's not being offered at a practical price - and $200-300 just isn't enough - the whole business model just can't work.

There are makiboxes out in the wild that are turning out some really nice prints. But they've pretty much all been extensively modified by their owners.

I paid more for the flashforge, but it's a proven, practical and robust design. okay maybe a few years old now - but it works, consistently and has so far printed every thing Ive thrown at it.
Innovation is fine - but it needs to go hand in hand with business savvy and a practical approach to manufacturing and distribution.

[14thcarrot]

Someone did some calculations in the comment section, if they use clone parts, the cost is about 200 usd. So if the bot can print, I wouldn't call it a scam. Maybe even a good deal since I think they might be able to deliver although there will be delays.

[3DPBuser]

Also I was reading elsewhere that since the Y axis slides on the X axis which slides on the Z axis, you get flexing that is multiplied.

[14thcarrot]

If you only print smaller parts in pla, it'd still work. It will be slow, prints will be messy and ugly but it'll work. He's only asking for 299 anyways.
What I don't like is that he outright lied about things. On the 50 micron accuracy, here is no way in hell that printer can produce details that fine, anyone with any real world knowledge about 3d printers will know. Too bad the people in their comments section have absolutely no clue. He said that IM will be finalized by August 2nd, which is another lie. The parts look nothing like IM ready and by the looks of the prints, they're still tweaking the "design". Delivery by October? The backers won't see this thing maybe for another year, another lie. 150mm/s printing speed, a major selling point in the pitch, again will never be achieved in the real world.
Despite the lies or should I call it false optimism, if people want to buy a ridiculously cheap, low quality printer, I think that's perfectly ok. But they should know that the bot will not be fast and will not produce high quality prints even after weeks of tinkering. Now they're misled by the fancy tech specs that will never to achieved.

[KMToydarian]

Well, It's a done deal now. I put in my 299 and we'll see what happens. I took a chance and am putting some faith in them. Might not be yhe polished output they thought it would be, but for 300 I may get a kit I can tinker with.

[3DPBuser]

What drew you to it?