I am very interested in 3D printing and I want to get into it. What would be a good printer for a beginner that is also of reasonable quality.

I don’t want to make anything huge but I don’t want to limit myself to any size that’s unreasonably small.

Edit: Wow, you guys were all so helpful. While I haven’t made my decision I have a lot more to go off of, I’m gonna do a bit more research into it based on what you have all said.

  • whynotzoidberg@lemmy.worldEnglish
    01·
    1 year ago

    It’s a bit dated, but I had an excellent beginner 3D printing experience on my Flashforge Creator Pro. The OG.

    It’s a bit slow, but very consistent out of the box. It was also pre-built, which was nice.

    It was heaps easier to get going compared to my Anet A8. But I learned a lot on the A8 by putting it together.

    • aard@kyu.deEnglish
      0·
      1 year ago

      I started with a Flashforge Dreamer - which is relatively close to the Creator Pro. Bed leveling was annoying from the beginning - though after adding some locking nuts at least stayed leveled for a while.

      With PLA I was getting good prints without much effort - though quicky ran into limitations with flashprint, build volume size, other materials. I did some PETG printing, which was a pain - extruder slipping on the material, so compensating with overextrusion which somewhat worked, but gave nad tolerances.

      It is now my experimentation printer -rebuilt with microswiss hotend and extruder and flashed with marlin.

      • whynotzoidberg@lemmy.worldEnglish
        0·
        1 year ago

        That was probably one of those most succinct cons list about the Creator Pro / Dreamer I’ve heard. My experience mirrors yours.

        What was your second printer?

        • aard@kyu.deEnglish
          0·
          1 year ago

          Prusa mk3s+ with mmu2s and a mini.

          Mini pretty much immediately upgraded with the Bondtech IFS extruder - great extruder, but won’t buy Bondtech kits again as their documentation is horrible. Mainly had the mini for flex and abrasive initially, as I didn’t want to mess with nozzle changes on the less accessible mk3s, and didn’t want to mess with flexible with the MMU. Upgraded it earlier this year to Revo hotend - had a bit trouble due to another delay with their hardened nozzles, but figured out you can get Revo nozzles from China with pretty much the same tolerances for 5 EUR each, so was just running through them until I finally got my obxidian nozzles.

          Mk3s ran stock with MMU for a while, printed the TZB extruder in PC-CF earlier this year, switched to TZB-firmware, and also moved it to Revo - didn’t have much issues with MMU before that, but things are very noticeably faster now, plus even very flexible flex just works.

          Not sure if I’ll upgrade it to the MK4 - the load cell setup is intriguing, but I don’t want to give up the Revo setup, so I’ll probably wait and see if mods will come up allowing me to use both.

          • whynotzoidberg@lemmy.worldEnglish
            0·
            1 year ago

            Thank you!

            After my recent PETG jam on the Creator Pro, due to extruder slipping and a consequential jam, I’ve been looking at options for another machine.

            Maybe the MK4 is in my future.

              • whynotzoidberg@lemmy.worldEnglish
                1·
                1 year ago

                You rock. But don’t think you’re talking me out of an MK4, either. ;-)

                Edit: For anyone finding this, and considering the MicroSwiss lever kit for their Creator Pro: STOP.

                It’s /NOT/ a good solution based on many reviews (b/c single screw is used for tension and pivot mechanism, and the top plate is too tall / obstructs filament).