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Topic: Keep upgrading or replace it?

Is anyone still using the Solidoodle Press? I did the E3Dv6 hotend upgrade and got a couple good prints off of it after that. And I ordered the parts to do a heated bed upgrade (I was having adhesion problems and hated waiting 10 minutes for the bed to warm up). The parts have been sitting around for 6 months or more while I'm busy with work and life.

So I'm wondering if I should attempt to replace the heated bed or if I should just go all in on a new printer (or both…). I don't have a whole lot of space or time to spare but I value my hobbies. Being completely enclosed is a nice feature of the Press since it stays tidy but the enclosure also really gets in the way when trying to work on it. Open source software and hardware are also pretty important to me. Are there better printers out there for me that don't cost 4x what the Press did?

If you upgraded to a new printer what did you get? Are you glad you did it?

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Re: Keep upgrading or replace it?

IMHO this question has been pondered by anyone who  has purchases a solidoodle printer as there first printer. And likely any printer owner.
The second point I will make is that the home plug and play 3d printer does not really exists yet.
It takes time perseverance and patience to get really nice prints. and sometimes it is a trade of between speed and quality. Every printer,  every roll of filament and even every design to be printed,will have its own needs for best performance.
And it is up to the owner operator to figure out the best settings . Yes there are guidelines  that will get you close. but there are a seemingly a hundred variables to consider.

Another point is the owner needs to be the repair tech so the more you do to learn how to repair / upgrade the easier it is to fix something when it breaks.

Back to your questions.
If you like your press it makes sense to repair the failing heat bed and take the opportunity to install a better one especially if you have the parts on hand.
The press was designed to be a good looking printer for the home living space . It was not designed to be heavily modified . So your upgrades will be somewhat limited . but You can allays replace parts with better quality if you like.

A better printer? this is open ended and what will be better for you . There are lots of good usable printers on the market.   
Here is link to my favorite 3d printing store (OK the only specialty store in driving distance)
https://printedsolid.com/collections/3d-printers


I Went the way of a kit build to chase a better printer
https://cdn.shopify.com/s/files/1/0586/8617/products/2020i3front_medium.jpg?v=1431528480

https://folgertech.com/products/folger- … rinter-kit
My next printer will likely be one of these.

https://cdn.shopify.com/s/files/1/0586/8617/files/Folger-Web-1_original_large.jpg?11805295180840572543
https://folgertech.com/products/folger- … rinter-kit



You need to decide what you want in a better printer
A highly modifiable kit/machine
fast printing
Dual print heads multiple colors/material
larger print area .
Large material range
Looks
Sturdy solid frame
component quality.

and the other question is do you buy a dream machine or get basic and upgrade over time.

I know more question than answers LOL
Hope this helps
Tin

Soliddoodle 4 stock w glass bed------Folger Tech Prusa 2020 upgraded to and titan /aero extruder mirror bed
FT5 with titan/ E3D Aero------MP mini select w glass bed
MP Utimate maker pro-W bondtech extruder
Marlin/Repetier Host/ Slic3r and Cura

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Re: Keep upgrading or replace it?

Thanks for the input, I appreciate you taking the time to share your thoughts.

I don't mind doing the maintenance or upgrades myself, but I do want to have a reliable printer since my actual goal is using it to make parts for other projects. So I'm usually happy with something that qualifies as "draft" for lots of applications. Of course it's fun sometimes to push the limit and see what kinds of pretty things I can print too smile

The heated bed upgrade sounded straightforward but now I'm getting stuck at where to begin. It takes a lot of patience to sort out what to do next from the various threads here. You're right though that there's no reason not to keep moving forward, even it it is slower going than I'd like.

How did you find it building the i3 kit? Do you need different tools for programming the firmware from what the Press uses, or is it also Marlin?

I watched https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kfe_84FGJ8c today and it made me want the i3 MK2. I'm kind of hung up on having an enclosure though, with the hope of ventilating to the outside eventually. But a little googling shows that there are plenty of ways to do that. The parts that are important to me:
- autobed leveling
- reasonable build volume (no smaller than the Press)
- E3Dv6 is nice since I'm familiar with it & have parts
- open source/open hardware/Linux compatibility

Maybe I'll poke at the heated bed upgrade slowly and eventually order an i3 MK2 kit as well.

4 (edited by Tin Falcon 2016-11-21 00:39:22)

Re: Keep upgrading or replace it?

Building the FT I3 took some time about Two days  a full weekend to builds and a couple weeks of a little here and there to work out the kinks.
I did upgrade to an ED3 hot end and a titan .
Easy upgrade I had to make an aluminum spacer to fit the titan .
Fairly generic kit ramps arduino controller and marlin firmware.
firmware dead easy to load but did take a little editing to make things work.
And I added bracing to stiffen things up.
An open frame no enclosure kit is not the best for abs. I print mostly PLA and am happy with it.
Tin

Soliddoodle 4 stock w glass bed------Folger Tech Prusa 2020 upgraded to and titan /aero extruder mirror bed
FT5 with titan/ E3D Aero------MP mini select w glass bed
MP Utimate maker pro-W bondtech extruder
Marlin/Repetier Host/ Slic3r and Cura

5 (edited by AOYOU3D 2016-11-27 04:40:54)

Re: Keep upgrading or replace it?

SD press printer is a failing product, because many wrong designs,
so you really don't need to spend time and money to upgrade or repair it.
Spend $200-300 buying any type of  Prusa i3, then you can make many
good prints.

See the prints from my Prusa i3 (I didn't upgrade any part):

http://soliforum.com/i/?t61TOMy.jpg

http://soliforum.com/i/?60e7rpF.jpg

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Re: Keep upgrading or replace it?

My conclusion: If you want a 3D printer to actually print things, don't waste your time on the Press. If your  hobby is re-engineering, rebuilding, and repairing a bunch of bad designs in the awkward confines of the Press case, then it's great.

I think the final insult was the non-replaceable, short life bearings.  The Y-axis bearings on mine now have so much slop worn in, it can't print. Sure I could tear it down, epoxy fill the y carriage, and rebore for bushing sleeves. Maybe I could do that without destroying the fragile. non-adjustable, non-replaceable y belt clips. And while I'm at it, replace the Z axis carriage with something that isn't floppy, an X axis that doesn't bob up and down, an extruder that doesn't overheat, rework the filament handling and cable management, and replace the tepid heat bed and somewhat marginal power supply.

I'm not completely bashing the thing - the case exterior is pretty, the lighting is nice, and the controller board, despite having the worst solder job I've ever seen in production, has given me no troubles.

In the end, the best role I can think of for the Press is "parts donor".
(Feel free to disagree. Please back that up with appropriate cash and a mailing address.)

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Re: Keep upgrading or replace it?

For SD press printer, I am just indicating a terrible design:

There are no any metal or engineering plastic bushings 
on X, Y, Z carriages, just made holes on the general plastic
such as ABS or similar one that only used for enclosure or
box.
They have very different friction coefficient, wear strength
and heat transfer property between the engineering plastic bushings
and the general plastic, so these holes on the plastic carriages
wear out quickly,  do you like to replace those carriages?

So I think it is not worth to spend money and time on SD press.

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Re: Keep upgrading or replace it?

It's funny you posted this as I have been thinking the same thing lately (might be because I am approaching finals and am constantly looking for a good reason to avoid them...which is why I am on the forums right now....so not looking forward to my tests on linear algebra and differential equations later today x.x) I know for myself personally I went out shortly after the press ordeal and bought a Wanhao i3 Duplicator and currently have over 400 hrs of printing on it.  I personally enjoy modding electronics and fixing things. I would've done this sooner but I actually needed a printer for one of my engineering assignments so I jumped shipped since I didn't have time.

With that being said I think I might be making a thread shortly to document the process and what I do to remake the solidoodle press. Tear down instructions, part lists, recommended part replacements, necessary part replacements, etc. Allot will prolly come down to "what can I afford" and "what NEEDS to be done". Like off the bat definitely fixing the z-axis and bed, replacing all carriage bearings with metal components would prolly be at the top of my to-do list. Next would be debating if I should keep the motherboard or swap it out for ramps / melzi or something similar. Since I've already experienced the board to be buggy I most likely would make the change to a different board. Plus, this way you can rid yourself of their firmware. I don't really like the filament location cause when it did print (if you can call it printing) it would bind on itself plus you can't get the special filament anymore so you'll either have to wind your own filament or re-design the entire upper-filament area. The issue with upgrading the press is its sleek shell. To get to any component is a job in and of itself. This means that if I start this project I will do everything in one go as to prevent myself from having to take apart that dang shell more then once.

Would you (or anyone reading these forums) be interested in me doing something like this and then compiling all the tools and parts needed to re-vamp the solidoodle press? My guess is that if you had all the parts and components to make the upgrade you would be able to do it over the weekend with little trouble. Since I don't know what I am getting into Ill prolly space the project out across a few weekends. Weekend one, tear down and see what needs to go. Weekend two, hopefully all components have arrived by this point, start rebuilding the press. Weekend three, software, calibration, and testing. Weekends four through five, do all of the above cause nothing ever goes as planned. lol

9 (edited by seven2099 2016-12-15 23:58:13)

Re: Keep upgrading or replace it?

I'll buy anyone selling their functional Press.

I've upgrade my press spending a couple of hundred dollars and it works like a freaking marvel. I love the darn thing. So reliable now. With the way I've tuned it, I'm currently printing successfully at 300% stock speed and 150% flow rate without issue and my results are better than ever. About 300 or so hours of successful prints

Also have no adhesion problems but had to do a major overhaul and I've considered getting another one because I know I can get it to print this level of quality.

I'm in the market if you're willing to put it up for a good price. All I require is that its basic functionality is intact even if you never got it to print successfully or think its a dud.

(this means, all motors and mobo must work as well as lighting, bed heating + psu must work..etc as well.)

Let me know if you guys want to pull the trigger and sell it.

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Re: Keep upgrading or replace it?

seven2099 wrote:

I'll buy anyone selling their functional Press.

I've upgrade my press spending a couple of hundred dollars and it works like a freaking marvel. I love the darn thing. So reliable now. With the way I've tuned it, I'm currently print successfully at 300% speed and 150% flow rate without issue and my results are better than ever.

Also have no adhesion problems but had to do a major overhaul and I've considered getting another one because I know I can get it to print this level of quality.

I'm in the market if you're willing to put it up for a good price. All I require is that its basic functionality is intact even if you never got it to print successfully or think its a dud.

(this means, all motors and mobo must work as well as lighting, bed heating + psu must work..etc as well.)

Let me know if you guys want to pull the trigger and sell it.

If I wasnt about to go on christmas break and already planning on doing an overhaul on it myself I prolly wouldve taken you up on that deal. It's a very sleek machine and has a great look. I am rather curious though, what did you do to yours? I've been working on a new mounting system for the xy-axis to allow me to also do laser cutting, cnc, engraving, etc.

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Re: Keep upgrading or replace it?

User IronMan has one I bet he'd sell.  Reach out to him via PM tell him I sent you.

Printit Industries Model 8.10 fully enclosed CoreXY, Chamber heat
3-SD3's & a Workbench all fully enclosed, RH-Slic3r Win7pro, E3D V6, Volcano & Cyclops Hot End
SSR/500W AC Heated Glass Bed, Linear bearings on SS rods. Direct Drive Y-axis, BulldogXL
Thanks to all for your contributions