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7 hours ago, Torg said:

hmmm I will take a deeper look into the ender 3 pro - are their companies to buy it from that support it better?  Also,  glass plate is a needed extra vs the magnetic plate?  Anything else that is a must if I were to go with the Ender?  

-d

I got my 5plus direct from company with zero issue. However, being a member of various groups, I see a group of people complaining about issues, with the most prevalent recommendation being Amazon (domestic, return, etc). I do not recommend supporting those asshat industrialists.  

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I got mine off Amazon, and honestly, I haven't gone through the seller. I just go to the internet for solutions to problems and fix them myself. Also, the glass bed is nice, but hardly necessary. The build-tak style surface that comes with the magnetic surface works like a champ, and it's cheap to replace if it gets screwed up. I just bought a glass bed, but I could have just as easily gone with a replacement magnetic surface.

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I highly recommend www.reddit.com/r/ender3 for ender3 specific debug and questions.

I personally like Hatchbox PLA. Most good brands are about the same in terms of overall quality, but they all are slightly different. It's more important to pick a brand, learn it's quirks, and then stick with it.

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On 4/30/2020 at 9:25 AM, Casiarius said:

Last night in a moment of weakness I ordered my first 3D printer, an Ender 3 Pro.
While I am waiting for it to arrive, does anyone have a recommendation for what sort of filaments I should get, and where to get them?

I prefer Hatchbox. Avoid Eryone like the plague, it's absolute trash. As @Kelbesq said, it's better to pick a filament and stick with it.

On 4/30/2020 at 11:48 AM, Ish said:

Anyone know anything about the FlashForge Adventurer 3? I’m seeing a lot of positive reviews, the price seems right, and well... I confess the idea of making D&D minis and dungeon tiles with a printer named “the adventurer” has a certain appeal.

I don't know much about that one, but 150mm square is a small build plate. If it were resin, that would be one thing, but for an FDM printer, you may as well get an Ender 3 or a Prusa i3 for half the price and get a 230-ish mm build plate. Both of those produce excellent quality prints, and are very easy to tune, tweak and customize. Manual bed levelling is a pain, but once you get it set (especially if you replace the bed springs) it's pretty good about staying put for a while. That FlashForge looks like it uses proprietary software and filament, which is never a good thing in my eyes. Having wifi on the printer is nice, but that can be accomplished on a Prusa or Ender for about $40-50 with a Raspberry Pi and Octoprint, which is open-source and probably more full-featured. 

I'm sure the FlashForge is great if you just want something straight out of the box with no real options to tweak and you're willing to be brand-loyal for filament and software, but given my druthers, I'd go with a Prusa or Ender.

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In my research I have started to look into the Prusa Mini as a viable option for my needs of an FDM printer.  7" cube printing area seems like it would be enough - anyone else look at this machine?  Prusa being behind this option makes me feel better lol.

 

-d

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  • 2 weeks later...
On 4/30/2020 at 10:25 AM, Casiarius said:

Last night in a moment of weakness I ordered my first 3D printer, an Ender 3 Pro.
While I am waiting for it to arrive, does anyone have a recommendation for what sort of filaments I should get, and where to get them?

I've been having some good success with Yoyi brand PLA.

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I probably should have started this hobby before the pandemic and its global supply chain issues. Creality got back to me just today to say that my printer has shipped, more than two weeks late. On the bright side, all the accessories I ordered for it like the aluminum extruder, are already here, so I can incorporate them into the initial assembly.

I currently have two spools of PLA, one from Hatchbox and one from AmazonBasics. A lot of PLA has been sold out unless you want strange colors or wood.

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The FlashForge Adventurer 3 that I just got (and am loving) often gets dinged in reviews because the onboard spool holder for PLA and/or ABS is designed only to hold 0.5 kg spools versus the 1.0 kg spool that seems to be the industry standard... and FlashForge charges about as much for one of their 0.5 kg spools as everyone else is charging for a 1.0 kg spool. On the plus side, this means that the FlashForge spool I ordered along with my printer arrived on time and without any supply chain shenanigans... on the downside I seriously overpaid. 

My plan is to jury-rig an external spool holder in the near future and switch to using a different brand of filament. In the meantime, I'll just work with what I've got.

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Arrrgh! 

Everything that I printed using the sample spook of translucent red PLA that came with my printer came out just fine... But having exhausted that roll and switched for a regular spool of white PLA (both from FlashForge who makes the printer) every print job I’ve started has refused to stick to the bed and turns into a blob on the end of the nozzle.

Thoughts? Ideas? Scathing mockery?

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Ahh-ha!

I think I’ve figured out what was going wrong. The replacement spool of PLA that I order is, in fact, a spool of ABS. My printer will work with both materials, but it won’t work if I set the printer settings for PLA and not ABS... Them extra 50° Celsius matter.

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No auto-level, but leveling it myself is pretty easy. That was the first thing I checked. I also cleaned the print bed and tried the hairspray trick... Hairspray helped a little.

But then I looked at the box to make sure the filament width wasn’t too big for the printer. I had ordered it directly from the manufacturer specifically for this model of printer, so I didn’t think that would be an issue... But I wanted to double check. That’s when I noticed the box was clearly marked ABS. [insert facepalm.gif]

I did a quick test print with the settings adjusted for ABS, turned out perfect. Just a few little wisps of stringing, but nothing to worry about (and having now printed this particular model four times, I think the stringing is as much a fault of the sculpt as it is my printer).

I’ve got it plugging along on a piece of terrain now (fifteen minutes into ten-hour print job) And it’s chugging along perfectly. 

I also double checked my Order Confirmation e-mail, I did order PLA. Someone in their fulfillment department most have goofed. Not the biggest problem in the world, since this printer will handle both materials just fine and I’m concentrating on making terrain right now anyway so ABS is arguably the better material for the task. Nevertheless, I’m gonna send Customer Service an e-mail about it.

 

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The only thing about ABS that I would caution is to make sure it's well ventilated. The jury is still out on how harmful ABS vapors from a home printer are, but I'd rather err on the side of caution. That said, I've only ever used PLA, so my knowledge is limited to what I read on the internet. Which, as we all know, is always 100% accurate and truthful. Nobody on the internet could ever be wrong, could they?

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I’m not sure PLA vapors are good for you either. They might not be kill-you-dead levels of toxic, but it’s probably a good idea to avoid as much deep breathing in of freshly melted filament as one can.

Plus, even if ABS is not super-toxic, it does stink to high heaven... So I’ve got a fan nearby pointing out an open window. The Adventurer 3 is an enclosed unit, it isn’t airtight obviously, but it does cut down on the noise and the fumes.

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I’ve been working on a table for Frostgrave (and any other game that can be played on a 37” ruined faux-medieval cityscape) and am at the stage where I need to print a butt-load of True Tiles.

They’re going to form the “frames” that I will plug “terrain modules” into: ruined buildings, cemeteries, statues, et cetera.

Thing is, I’m going to 68 of the blighters... and it takes my printer about four hours to pump out two of them (I’ve only got ABS on hand). Even at low resolution, it’s just a slow process.

Any of you fine gentlemen have an idle 3D printer? I’d be great to be able to “crowd source” some of these tiles. I will happily provide you the STL file (it’s a freebie, so don’t worry about that) and compensate you for your time and filament. 

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