First 3d printer - Ender 3 pro

[Pete.]

I just took delivery of one of these yesterday - a Creality Ender 3 Pro. Came well packed with clear simple instructions (pictures, actually), all the tools you'll need to build and use it plus a SDcard in a tiny USB reader, which comes with the user manual and other software.

I had to adjust the z-axis motor mount with a small packing spacer cut from card plus I drilled the mounting block to get better adjustment to make the screw align properly with the z-axis rail. A minor niggle but worth mentioing. Apart from that and having to solder a cold joint on the DC power lead which made the wire come off the connector it went together well and is surprisingly rigid for what it is.

Operating instructions are sparse and since I literally know NOTHING about 3d printing except what I've learned in the last day I had to take a look online to clarify some of the settings. Thankfully, there's a huge amount of online support. I had read online that they come bundled with Cura slicer but mine didn't, instead it came with Crality's slicer which is specific to their machines (but can output other types of Gcode). I couldn't use Cura anyway as my PC is 32 bit, which also means I couldn't use Fusion 360 as I planned. Currently I'm using sketchup to draw 3d items and exporting them as .dae files for the slicer.

I printed some test prints to prove the bed levelling was good. I found that the bed plate was not truly flat but apparently that's because it was cold and they flatten out when heated. I also found that the default heat of 45 degrees for the bed and 195 for the nozzle were too low for the PLA and the tests prints were not sticking. I turned them both up 10 degrees and the alignment tests came out great so I kicked off a test print from the card. That came out far better than I was expecting so I was very pleased.

Attached is a pic of the machine busy working on my first own-made print, and the test print, a high-res dog that was already on the card ready to print.

Pete.

[Pete.]

My very first printed design. It's a replacement for the brass table coolant drain for this surface grinder, or at least it would be if I had drawn it right. I'm going to re-model it to fill in the gaps and print it again.

Absolutely nothing wrong with the printing side of it. The machine printed an excellent raft that came away cleanly, and the part is well defined with nice sharp edges and dimensionally good too.

[Brass_Machine]

Pete,

Congrats on the Ender 3 Pro. They are awesome little machines.

Eric

[Pete.]

Pete,

Congrats on the Ender 3 Pro. They are awesome little machines.

Eric

Cheers Eric,

I see that you also have one. Do you print much on it? I can see this one running almost constantly if I'm honest, at least for now. I hope the 2kg of PLA I ordered turns up soon as I've nearly used up the sample spool that came with the printer.

[awemawson]

Excellent Pete, glad you got it going. If you run out of PLA over Christmas I can probably find you a spool.

Will it handle ABS and PetG filaments?

[Pete.]

It's ok Andrew, they are delivering it today apparently. Thanks for the offer though.

It will print ABS for sure I dunno about PetG but I don't see why not. Have to check out what temps are required. I'm going to keep knocking out parts in PLA until I've got used to the whole thing.

I've discovered that orientating the part is quite important for good prints. I drew my part in one orientation but it didn't print so well until I turned it 90 degrees.

[Pete.]

3rd time lucky (with my design, not the printer. I filled the gap and made the bolt flange a bit thicker. It'll be sealed with sealant and screwed on by the original holes.

[PekkaNF]

Thank you for showing. This is really interesting. I have been considering very long time getting some sort of 3D printer. My cold feet syndrome stems from a) Need for multiple plastic materials, although I know that standard PET would be smart starting point, but soft and translucent materials would give more use. b) Worried about 3D design program and CAM learning curve.

Wonder how much of an insvestment in time vise this sort adventure is.

You make it look easy.

[awemawson]

Pekka, I had all those concerns before I jumped in with both feet and found that the water wasn't too deep or cold !

I specifically got and taught myself Fusion 360 which I find excellent, (and almost easy!) for three D modelling, but as Pete has discovered, it needs a 64 bit version of Win10 to run - I created a machine (ex corporate) specifically for is, and added a decent graphics card.

[Pete.]

Thank you for showing. This is really interesting. I have been considering very long time getting some sort of 3D printer. My cold feet syndrome stems from a) Need for multiple plastic materials, although I know that standard PET would be smart starting point, but soft and translucent materials would give more use. b) Worried about 3D design program and CAM learning curve.

Wonder how much of an insvestment in time vise this sort adventure is.

You make it look easy.

Pekka the only skills I had up 'till yesterday was the ability to draw basic 3d with sketchup and (very) basic 2d with draftsight. Now you know that, you'll understand that is IS quite easy to just buy a printer and go. The slicer software is almost automatic, for my sort of basic purposes. I'd recommend that you just go for it.

[PekkaNF]

Thank you guys. I have a laptop running with Fusion, but I am nowhere any good with it  - yet. I need some continuous ti e with it, planning to get back to it when it gets a little easier at at work.

[Brass_Machine]

Cheers Eric,

I see that you also have one. Do you print much on it? I can see this one running almost constantly if I'm honest, at least for now. I hope the 2kg of PLA I ordered turns up soon as I've nearly used up the sample spool that came with the printer.

I do. A few mods you should do to it... Replace the stock springs on the table, better bowman tube and connectors and go with the aluminum pieces on the extruder stepper (replace the plastic)

I was printing almost non-stop... but I started modding it. I am in the middle of replacing the main board.

It will print PeTG as well...

Eric

[mc]

The Ender's are good machines for the money.

I've had one for a couple months, but still haven't done anything practical with it.
I did order the glass bed with mine, which I find some prints stick to perfectly, yet others refuse to stick :-/
I think I need to spend some more time experimenting with bed temps, to find what works the best.

I did order the metal parts for the extruder motor and silicon buffers to replace the stock springs, but I've yet to install them. I did print a filament guide for the extruder motor, which probably takes some of the strain of the plastic, but I should really fit the metal bits.

[Brass_Machine]

I got off my rear and installed the SKR v1.2 mainboard that I bought awhile ago... I can say this, the advertise it as being super quiet. It is. The fans are now the loudest things on the Ender 3.


Eric

FYI... here is a video of what I am talking about

[AdeV]

I also have an Ender 3, with the glass bed. So far, I've held of doing much in the way of mad mods - I did add a few trinkets - a couple of filament guides, some clips for the display cable, and that's about it...

I can confirm it will print PetG, I had some issues with getting the PET to stick to the bed (mind you, I have adhesion issues in general, with the glass bed...), I found a smear of stick glue (Pritt Stick to us Brits, other brands are doubtless available) really helps: Sometimes, a bit too much!

I've not printed a lot of "useful" things on mine yet, but I did print a complete Liberator spaceship model (from Blake's 7), the PetG is a translucent green for the globe on the back. A couple of the prints went awry, e.g. when the raft lifted mid-way through; and one of the globe prints had to be aborted half way through when, during an overnight print, it broke free of the bed & ended up embedding the extruder in a huge blob of plastic 

I do have some prints which I'll be doing soon which are actually useful... I also want to do the spool spindle mod, although I've not knowingly encountered any issues with the spools yet, they do move somewhat jerkily, and the filament is often fairly tight between the extruder and the spool... so having it run on bearings will be a good mod, I feel. Plus it'll take the pressure off the filament guides, which are only push-fit 3d-printed items.

Having a 3D printer is a lot of fun!

[Pete.]

Well, I'm still crocked after nearly taking my finger tip off with a wood chisel so I've been putting some work into drawing and printing parts. I find it hard to just 'come up' with ideas so I've decided to make a working model from a 125 year old patent.

I won't reveal what it is until it's finished but feel free to guess

Here are the first parts.

[PekkaNF]

Thank you guys. I checked some videos of this Ender 3 Pro and looks like me and my daughter are getting this one 50/50%. It's all your fault influence. Daughter will print some small parts for anime armor/features. Would be nice to be able to print soft tabs and joints. For me this is going to be motivation to learn Fusion and maybe later to advance to CNC machines.

Q: What else do we need to get started on Christmass holidays? Several reels of neutral color filament? Some easy filament to start and some different materials o test dice size parts?

Pekka

[Pete.]

It'll come with a small loose spool of PLA which is enough for a handful of prints, probably 4-5 hrs printing. A 1kg reel will have over 300m and last you a good while. I bought a reel of white and a reel of black but I sometimes with I had bought a colour so it would be easier to photograph.

[PekkaNF]

Thank you Pete!

1.75mm PLA?

[Pete.]

Yes 1.75.

I draw my parts in Sketchup but fusion is reportedly much better for it. When you get the printed it'll have a SD card included with instructions and slicer software on it.

If you are going to use Sketchup let me know as I have found a couple of ways to avoid tripping yourself up.

[Joules]

Nice to see more printers being acquired and used by MadModders.   Out of interest, if you want the maximum performance from your filament, pick natural as it contains no pigment.   The pigments contribute nothing to the performance of the material.  That being said, white is my preferred for outdoor applications and natural for components not on view.  I have done quite a bit of work making hybrid parts, inserting Delrin or metal where parts are in contact and need to slide or act as a sear or bearing

They are a fantastic tool for prototypes and speeding up product development, or even production parts in their own right.  I hope you all thoroughly enjoy your printers.

[Pete.]

Hey Joules,

Is there any way to print stacked parts that move relative to each other without using dissolving filament? I've tried spacing them apart but my slicer won't print supports in the gaps. I ticked the 'anywhere' box for supports but I think the gap is too small to be recognised as a gap, either that or the slicer doesn't 'see' the space between two solid models.

[Joules]

Pete, you have to start designing your own support that can break away so captive parts can then move.  Takes quite a bit of experimentation as filament that isn’t properly supported can droop and weld to the near surface.   This is mainly why I design as separates, print then weld the parts together using a temperature controlled iron.

I find quite often that auto generated support isn’t very adequate in complex designs, hence design it into the 3D model rather than auto generate.  Think tree structure and 45 degree branches or single (0.4mm) support shell if that is your nozzle size.  You just need to be able to get in and snap it away.

[Pete.]

Cheers, I kinda figured I was flogging a dead horse.

Well, here's my first 3d printed working model. It's a Balzer cutter relieving attachment. Does the same thing as a Eureka machine, if you know what one of those is. Some of the parts have printed a bit rough due to the raft leaving a cross-hatch pattern on them but other than that it's fully working on the hand-crank. I took the details from the original 1895 patent.

I wonder what old Balzer would have thought of 3d printing, back in the day?

Kinda chuffed with this as up until 4 days ago I hadn't even seen a 3d printer in the flesh. This has three gears that mesh, but one has two different DP on the same gear and the small gear has a different pressure angle to either of the big ones


 

[mattinker]

You have every reason to be chuffed!