“It Came From Within The Brown Truck” - Now In 3D!!

[sshire]

So much for my theory

[b.lindsey]

Stan, I would argue that the desktop (home or small business) 3D printers are currently the growth area of the technology. As soon as the quality, build times, resolutions are equal to the larger floor standing units of the earlier years, even industrial customers will go that direction as well. Comparing $500-1000 against $30,000 plus is a no brainer once everything else is near equal...and they are getting to that point rapidly!!

I think Stratysis, et al see the handwriting on the wall already.
Bill

[Dave Otto]

Stratysis already bought MakerBot in 2013 in an attempt to enter the home market.

Bill

I don't remember all the details but I think the cube thing was also 3d Systems entry into the home market. That was about the same time they acquired Alibre CAD. 3d systems has been a major player in the rapid prototyping market for many years; probably more than twenty. They recently purchased Gibs CAM  who are one of the major players in the high end CAM software business.

Stan, I'm sorry I didn't mean to hijack your thread.

Dave

[Pete49]

This conversation is interesting as after a lot of research I ordered the same unit here in Oz for $699 which I thought was a good price and working on exchange rates isn't that bad at all. (included free shipping i.e. built into the price) . Should be here for my birthday or earlier 
My idea was to be able to make parts for casting among others and I had followed a couple people making their own such as Carl and a guy on mad modder but decided it was going to be difficult. Now well who knows what will happen
Pete

[sshire]

Hijack away. I was hoping this would happen as any 3d print info is new to me and valuable.

[gldavison]

So how many Filament Cartridges have you used printing the items shown at the beginning of this thread? 

[sshire]

The spool is 1 kilo when full.
Nautilus gears - 11 gm
Twisted vase - 11 gm
End mill - 44 gm
Reciprocating rack - 95 gm

So about 16% of a full spool.
1 kilo of 1.75mm ABS filament = 400 meters
Approx 60 meters.

That was a great question. I hadn't thought about how to figure usage until now. If I had paid attention to the LCD and noted remaining filament at the beginning and end of the print, that would have helped. I also think I remember seeing (either on the LCD or in the software, an approximation of filament used for each print.)

I'm sure that the machines used in industry track every stat on a print. My Epson 9800 printer (44" wide) pumps out pages of stats. Square inches of paper used, each ink color by cc, load time, wait time, inches (or cm) per minute, etc)

[jschoenly]

I sit about 10 feet from a Stratasys Fortus machine which I believe was ~$100k 3-4 years ago when bought.  It does really nice work, don't get me wrong.  However, I've compared models we've built here with models a friend built on a ~$600 machine (one of the solidoodles, no heated bed).  The output is what I would consider to be "2 to 4 times nicer" (if you take that as a comparison), but it's certainly not 166 times better as the cost compares.

I have a B9 Creator SLA printer which is a different technology and in a higher price level, but the home tech is really coming along.  I really enjoyed seeing these results Stan and even had me getting tempted to buy one of these if I had the cash laying around.  Thanks for posting the pictures and starting "the next" 3-D printing discussion.  The tech, or at least pricing, keep changing at a fast pace and it's great to see some of the real world stuff.  Thanks!

[philjoe5]

Time to sell my Gojo stock

http://www.uline.com/Product/Detail/S-7295/Hand-Soaps-and-Sanitizers/GOJO-Natural-Orange-Gallon-Pumice?pricode=WY233&utm_source=Bing&utm_medium=pla&utm_term=s-7295Q&utm_campaign=Janitorial%2BSupplies

Cheers,
Phil

[cfellows]

Doing a little more research on the DaVinci, I was a little bummed to find out it only takes proprietary DaVinci filament cartridges.  A 600 gram cartridge is about $28 on their website.  And it has built in electronics that tells you when your cartridge is empty... in some case when it's really not?  What's your experience with the cartridge thing?

Chuck

[sshire]

Chuck
The first thing that folks did, was to reset the chip with an Arduino.
http://voltivo.com/blog/da-vinci-reset-eeprom

Once that's done, the reset cart stays at "Full" while the external spool of "whatever" is rolling along. I printed an external spool holder that hangs on the back.
 I'm happy with the SainSmart ABS from Amazon, but anything will work.
This is supposed to be good also

http://www.amazon.com/HATCHBOX-1-75mm-3D-Printer-Filament/dp/B00J0H8EWA/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&qid=1420694351&sr=8-3&keywords=ABS+filament

They are basing their business model on expensive, proprietary filament carts.

It would be like a mill with a proprietary spindle bore so you had to buy the manufacturer's ends mills. Duh!

[GailinNM]

Stan,
You are going to end up costing me more money (again) !
This printer looks good for the money.
I had been doing some research on this before you started this thread and here are some links that you probably already know about but they may be of some interest to others.

Good forum on the DaVinci printers and software
http://voltivo.com/forum/davinci

A long, and crude, review of the printer but with helpful hints
<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hlLcecDXces" target="_blank">http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hlLcecDXces</a>

How to replace the firmware on the printer with Repetier Host firmware.
Lots of advantages and disadvantages to doing so.
<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3wDlD2u5tVc" target="_blank">http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3wDlD2u5tVc</a>

Using the Repetier sofware
<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IqlKAtOJgWQ" target="_blank">http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IqlKAtOJgWQ</a>

Repetier Host Software
http://www.repetier.com/

Hardware accessories
http://www.wctek.com/shop/12-da-vinci-3d-printer-accessories

Be sure to read the Voltivo forum entries about XYZ firmware allowing XYZ to disable your printer by checking the print cartridge to see if the eeprom has been tamped with.  This was introduced after firmware revision "J" and some users have had their printers turned into a $500 brick. Lawsuits are being talked about.  Recommend blocking XYZ in your firewall to prevent automatic updates and access to your printer through the internet.

Still looks like the best printer for the money right now.  I will probably get one along towards spring after I finish up some other long term projects.
Gail in NM

[sshire]

Thanks Gail
I have been lurking on the Voltivo forum. I also have a tag at the end of the USB cable that says, "Turn off Wifi before connecting."
Also, Little Snitch is checking for XYZ communicating with the printer. Not sure if the bricked printer is the result of XYZ or a poor attempt to install Repetier, although I suspect the latter.
I'm having a ball with it. Start a print then woroine an engine while it's printing.

[GordonL]

I have not been following 3D printing too closely but a friend of mine is really interested. His problem is that he does not want to take the time or effort to learn a 3D cad program and is just hoping for some magical software which will program his wishes without effort on his part. As I understand it the options are: 1-learn CAD 2-Use parts already developed by others 3-Use a 3D scanner.

It looks like this printer is also available as a scanner for an additional $300. I assume that this would allow you to take an existing object, scan it and reproduce it in the same or different scale.  Am I missing something or is this really simpler than I think it is? Is there a software solution easier than CAD?

[sshire]

3D scanners (the low cost ones) aren't there yet. I've watched a number of YouTube reviews and they all seem to come to the same conclusion: Yes, they produce something that looks like the scanned object. No: Not detailed enough and, if accuracy is important, not close enough. 
There are very simple CAD programs that are easy to learn. SketchUp and TinkerCad come to mind.
They aren't going to have the kind of features that Inventor or Solidworks have, but are a good intro to learning CAD and 3D printing. After working with SketchUp, I had enoiugh of an understanding, that the switch to Inventor was easier.
Let's say I need to print a rectangular part that is 4x1x.5 with a 1/4-20 threaded hole.
Greatly simplified, the process is:
Draw a 4x1 rectangle (we're working 2D here)
Give the 2D part the third dimension by extruding it to a .5 thickness.
Make a hole.
Pick the thread size from a drop down (the simple cad programs won't have thread tables)
Export the drawing to a 3D printing file. This has an .stl extension.
Send that file to the printer.