Tag: makerselectplus

It’s been a while so it’s time for another RepRap Report! So what’s changed since last time? So much… I’ll try to hit it all.

I got rid of the BuildTak and moved to a PEI Sheet. I upgraded to the Micro Swiss All Metal Hotend which made printing ABS reliable once again.

I repaired fans, I replaced fans. And then I did it again. Once I got ABS printing up to speed I printed a DiiiCooler, which I finally installed, and still haven’t used (since I’m printing ABS at the moment.) And yeah, I’m waiting for some new extruder fans to arrive after last night’s hurried soldering session to repair another bad fan.

If all of this seems silly, well, in a way it is, and it isn’t. When you buy a thing (be it a 3D printer or a car) you can go cheap knowing that things might break or need upgrades, or you can pay a lot more for quality out of the gate, with the hope that things don’t go wrong or are of a higher quality. I knew that getting the Monoprice Maker Select Plus meant compromising so I could afford a printer (which was replacing my old RepRap Prusa i2 kit from 2011) and I was fine with that. There are many routes you can go with a printer. I’m going the “cheap” route right now, I’ve got friends who work for the “expensive but reliable route” companies, and then there’s the custom build route. They’re all legit choices.

Oh, I don’t think I ever mentioned my enclosure. It’s built from foamcore board and covered with the packing foam that the printer came in. The front window is a piece of Polycarb I got from Amazon. It works. It’s not pretty. That’s okay. Besides keeping the heat in, it keeps the cats out. Also important. I also added a set of 12 volt LED lights with an on/off/dimmer switch.

If I had to build an enclosure again (and I might need to soon) I’d probably go with foamcore again, but take some effort to make it look good this time.

I still feed the filament from a metal rod hanging above my printer in the basement. It works fine. It’s not portable, and that’s probably okay. The drybox I was working on failed, and I haven’t had the energy to revisit that project. That’s okay for now.

Besides all that, I’ve been just printing things. Nothing too exciting, but that may change soon. Happy Extruding!

Back in 2012 I completed the build of a 3D printer, and then I printed a lot of things… The printer wasn’t amazing or great, but it worked, and I printed and printed. Around 2015 the hot end failed, and I got a cheap hot end to replace it, which never worked right, and then other things failed, and I fixed some of them, but the old RepRap still wasn’t quite working right. I ended up getting an E3D hot end and even with that, there were some weird issues with the printer getting up to temperature properly.

I didn’t care too much about getting the old RepRap working again because I had access to printers at work or school (I even worked on building some printers) so I could still print things, but…

I finally got to the point that I wanted a modern, working 3D printer. I solved that problem recently by picking up a Maker Select Plus from Monoprice. What? Monoprice? Yeah, the company I’ve been buying cables from for the past 5+ years sells 3D printers. And they don’t suck. The “Maker Select Plus” is (pretty much) a rebranded Wanhao Duplicator i3 Plus, which is based on the Prusa i3 MK2. Confused yet?

If you get emails from Monoprice (which come more frequently than Harbor Freight emails) you’ll get some discount code or coupon or sale alert. Take advantage of those and you can save a bit on a 3D printer. And if you want cheap, look at the MP Select Mini 3D Printer, or wait until April 2017 when (supposedly) they’ll release a Mini Delta printer for $150!

The printer is nice, but not amazing. There’s a number of upgrades suggested, and besides a wiki there’s a Facebook group, Google group, and Thingiverse group filled with users making improvements and troubleshooting when needed. (Just remember that the Wanhao Duplicator i3 and Maker Select are basically the same, with a few small differences.)

I’m excited to have more desk space! I no longer need a computer or monitor, since I can just pop an SD card in and hit “print”, so yeah, that’s a nice improvement. I’ve only printed with PLA so far, but I’ll get around to testing with ABS and see what happens. (It should be fine, but, you know…)

Meanwhile the old RepRap lost its place on the desk, and currently sits on the floor awaiting its fate. I’ll do… something with it, I’m sure. 3D printers have come a long way in just five years. (At least in my shop!)