making money from 3d printing?

[Geoff]

Well I'm buying a printer. I have people lined up who want to buy. Hopefully I can pay this off in 6 months. Should be awesome.

I have had a bit to drink being new years eve, so have not read all the posts.. (des's wall of text just scared me lol..)

personally, I bought my printer for $1100.

It took me a few months of tinkering and figuring out how to get the best quality out of it, once I was happy with that (and it could take much less time, I was just not in any hurry) I started selling things on Ebay.
It took some time to find a good market, for me that was R/C hobby parts (i.e modelling things that don't exist already) and being the only person selling that particular item on ebay - sales are not hard to accumulate when there is little to no competition.

Selling printer parts is very competitive, often you will break even just to beat your competitor, so stick to small things you can print fast and know you can print well. I don't know exactly when I made my money back, but from my $1100 investment, without really trying too hard it's made me back well over $5000, enough to buy/build some more printers to keep up with demand and still not get into the negative.

At the end of the day, I never set out to make a fortune with my 3D printer, I just wanted to make the money back I spent on it so my wife got off my back!!! But, a couple years of selling things on the side has worked out nicely and now allows me to attempt bigger projects as I have a few machines that can be running at the same time. That's my 2cents anyway

[Des]

I have had a bit to drink being new years eve, so have not read all the posts.. (des's wall of text just scared me lol..)

Yes, at times I can have that effect on people. LOL