Guys, I disagree with you.  I have had mine for a month, and get almost perfect prints.  Been using Repetier from the outset.  No machine this complex is going to be perfect when used by people who do not have any experience with the process.  Sure, there are design flaws,  z-offset process sucks, but is obtainable, harness issue, no biggie, filament feeding system, mangles filament inside machine.   All this can be overcome.  Machine was probably assembled by little girls, as almost every screw needs to be tightened .  The main problem is your z offset, get that right, then you can start tweaking and refining your results.  I say this as an SD3 user for 2.5 years.  This machine is light years ahead of the previous incarnation.  I screwed up that machine almost as soon as I got it because of my inexperience, actually, no experience with 3d printing, and I assume that the same thing is happening with current new users.  I can see a lot of thought went into the design of this machine, but the designers are not 3d printer users ( the filament feeding system).  Overall, for the price, I am happy with the Press.

lightyear ahead   but they forgot metal bearings right ?

This is a prime example of pretty good design, good cost control, but overall, poorly planned and executed.

It's a pity, because I think everyone complaining here wants SD to be a successful company.
They all want the company to be successful.

Yes!

Guys, I disagree with you.  I have had mine for a month, and get almost perfect prints.  Been using Repetier from the outset.  No machine this complex is going to be perfect when used by people who do not have any experience with the process.  Sure, there are design flaws,  z-offset process sucks, but is obtainable, harness issue, no biggie, filament feeding system, mangles filament inside machine.   All this can be overcome.  Machine was probably assembled by little girls, as almost every screw needs to be tightened .  The main problem is your z offset, get that right, then you can start tweaking and refining your results.  I say this as an SD3 user for 2.5 years.  This machine is light years ahead of the previous incarnation.  I screwed up that machine almost as soon as I got it because of my inexperience, actually, no experience with 3d printing, and I assume that the same thing is happening with current new users.  I can see a lot of thought went into the design of this machine, but the designers are not 3d printer users ( the filament feeding system).  Overall, for the price, I am happy with the Press.

Sky,

no disagreement on the dollar value of the hardware itself. $400 for all this hardware is great value.
But you must confess that a full turnkey system is more than stepper motors, extruders and plastics!

Any company manufacturing a consumer product (and lets not forget, that's how SD pitched the press...), then SD need to put together better documentation, troubleshooting guides/videos and have knowledgable staff that are ready to support absolute beginners from getting the box through to reliable prints.

If they do expect customers to identify issues and fix the issues themselves, then that needs to be clearly communicated, and again, the documentation, troubleshooting guides and videos need to be in place.

The Press was late being shipped. They sat on a ship off the coast of LA for weeks. Documentation/video's could have been done in that time.

This is a prime example of pretty good design, good cost control, but overall, poorly planned and executed.

It's a pity, because I think everyone complaining here wants SD to be a successful company.
They all want the company to be successful.

Damn, maybe I need to take 2 weeks off work and go help!

/R

Skyblue wrote:

...No machine this complex is going to be perfect when used by people who do not have any experience with the process.

If that's the case, why are there so many other printers available (Up!,da vinci, makerbot, etc) that seem to have only a fraction of the issues that this printer has?  It was advertised as being pretty much plug and play which it is FAR from being.

Skyblue wrote:

...I can see a lot of thought went into the design of this machine, but the designers are not 3d printer users ( the filament feeding system).

That is a pretty poor excuse.  I purchased a 3D printer from a 3D printer manufacturer.  If they don't do 3D printing, then they should go out of business.  It's like buying a phone and it has no microphone... oh well, the company doesn't actually use phones, so why would they know they should have a microphone?

I have managed to get my printer working reasonably (still not as perfect as I'd like, but given the $#!T design, it's probably as good as it will get) after many, many hours of pulling apart and fixing all of the incorrect parts.  Honestly though, if it wasn't going to cost $150 to send it back, then I would have refunded it... it simply doesn't work as advertised.  There was no disclaimer that I could see saying that I would have to rebuild the printer to get it working.

Anyway, I'll certainly be recommending others to keep away from printers from this company in the future... I assume most others who purchased the press will be doing the same.

I think you should give it up then, check other forums to see problems from other manufacturers, i.e., Makerbot.  I choose this company because its open source.   Gave me the choice to use Repetier instead of Soliprint, try that with Up or Divinci if you really want problems.  Go ahead and buy an Up or Divinci, and be stuck with their proprietary  filament and printer host.  Good luck with your new hobby, complaining to those manufacturers...

...No machine this complex is going to be perfect when used by people who do not have any experience with the process.

If that's the case, why are there so many other printers available (Up!,da vinci, makerbot, etc) that seem to have only a fraction of the issues that this printer has?  It was advertised as being pretty much plug and play which it is FAR from being.

That is a pretty poor excuse.  I purchased a 3D printer from a 3D printer manufacturer.  If they don't do 3D printing, then they should go out of business.  It's like buying a phone and it has no microphone... oh well, the company doesn't actually use phones, so why would they know they should have a microphone?

I have managed to get my printer working reasonably (still not as perfect as I'd like, but given the $#!T design, it's probably as good as it will get) after many, many hours of pulling apart and fixing all of the incorrect parts.  Honestly though, if it wasn't going to cost $150 to send it back, then I would have refunded it... it simply doesn't work as advertised.  There was no disclaimer that I could see saying that I would have to rebuild the printer to get it working.

Anyway, I'll certainly be recommending others to keep away from printers from this company in the future... I assume most others who purchased the press will be doing the same.

Despite our best efforts, this device still truly sucks. I've had about 3 small prints work without problem (after getting them started, which usually takes about 4 tries). Without fail the print jams after some number of layers. Sometimes it is about 10 layers, other times is is maybe 30 layers. There doesn't seem to be much pattern to it. When this happens, the filament deforms a bit, the drive wheel grinds into it, and there is no more possibility of getting enough purchase to feed filament. If I catch it during the failure, I can manually put pressure and keep the filament flowing.

I see that MacGyverX has a pretty comprehensive thread on replacing the crappy hot end with the E3Dv6, which seems great. My problem is that I really don't want to pay to fix Solidoodle's design flaw. Has anybody heard about a fix from the factory? I'd be happy to replace parts on my own, but I don't want to be responsible to purchase new parts to fix a poor design from the factory.

Or perhaps I should just give into my frequent desire to throw the printer out the second story window as a dump truck passes just to get the satisfaction of watching it explode into thousands of tiny pieces. At least then there would be a good reason for it to not work properly...