Thinking about getting into 3D printing?

digitalscream

Don't even think about spending £500+ on a printer like the Bambu Labs P1P/X1 or the Creality K1, or even the Prusa Mk4.

Just get the Elegoo Neptune 4.

Mine arrived yesterday, and I've done a few test prints on it as well as some pickup rings for @roberty - it's absolutely insane. It prints easily as fast as the Bambu printers for anything other than crap quality speed prints, and it costs $275. I ordered mine on 30th June, having paid about £220 for it.

It's got proper networking support too (ie it doesn't rely on cloud services or any proprietary apps or other tech like the others), and it supports almost any webcam out there - so you can put it in the back room, fire models at it from your PC over the network, and feel like Tony Stark when you wander in there 20 minutes later to a real thing sitting waiting for you.

Bonkers. It's like living in the future, maaaaan.

Emp_Fab

You don't have bed levelling issues ?  Bunged-up nozzle ?  Temperature and feed rate issues ?  Every 3D printer I've seen has always been surrounded by aborted deformities like the lab in Alien Resurrection  

digitalscream

Emp_Fab said:

You don't have bed levelling issues ?  Bunged-up nozzle ?  Temperature and feed rate issues ?  Every 3D printer I've seen has always been surrounded by aborted deformities like the lab in Alien Resurrection  

Nope. Nothing. In fact, not only have I not had any issues, the prints have come out essentially perfect - even down at 0.12mm layer height and insane 280mm/s speeds, with no visible ringing at all. In fact, at that resolution you can't even see the layer lines without using a camera and zooming in.

All the temperatures worked exactly as expected, the nozzle is absolutely clear, and it has both manual bed adjustment for coarse corrections and mesh auto-levelling; I only used the auto-level once when I first turned it on.

In fact, the only "problem" I encountered was that the bed adhesion is too good - you can't detach prints at all until the bed temperature has dropped below 50C.

It absolutely has no right to be this good at this price. I don't understand why so many of the bigger YouTubers are completely ignoring Elegoo (well, apart from the fact that they're all being paid by Bambu and Creality).

Emp_Fab

Now I'm tempted.  Trouble is, like a lot of people who buy them, I don't really have anything I need that can be printed!

digitalscream

Emp_Fab said:

Now I'm tempted.  Trouble is, like a lot of people who buy them, I don't really have anything I need that can be printed!

You'll find things, believe me. There are loads of things that are printed in our house now - from self-watering plant pots (made waterproof with epoxy) to extensions for the legs on the desk I made for the wife. Even printed a facemask for the other guitarist in my old band, for his solo stage show.

Additive manufacturing (as opposed to subtractive, like woodwork) is a completely different mindset - the idea that you can just make almost anything you can conceive of is very difficult to integrate into your approach when you've been stuck with cutting and bolting things your whole life.

octatonic

digitalscream said:

Don't even think about spending £500+ on a printer like the Bambu Labs P1P/X1 or the Creality K1, or even the Prusa Mk4.

Just get the Elegoo Neptune 4.

Mine arrived yesterday, and I've done a few test prints on it as well as some pickup rings for @roberty - it's absolutely insane. It prints easily as fast as the Bambu printers for anything other than crap quality speed prints, and it costs $275. I ordered mine on 30th June, having paid about £220 for it.

It's got proper networking support too (ie it doesn't rely on cloud services or any proprietary apps or other tech like the others), and it supports almost any webcam out there - so you can put it in the back room, fire models at it from your PC over the network, and feel like Tony Stark when you wander in there 20 minutes later to a real thing sitting waiting for you.

Bonkers. It's like living in the future, maaaaan.

Thanks.
I was looking at one.

Where did you order from?

digitalscream

octatonic said:

digitalscream said:

Don't even think about spending £500+ on a printer like the Bambu Labs P1P/X1 or the Creality K1, or even the Prusa Mk4.

Just get the Elegoo Neptune 4.

Mine arrived yesterday, and I've done a few test prints on it as well as some pickup rings for @roberty - it's absolutely insane. It prints easily as fast as the Bambu printers for anything other than crap quality speed prints, and it costs $275. I ordered mine on 30th June, having paid about £220 for it.

It's got proper networking support too (ie it doesn't rely on cloud services or any proprietary apps or other tech like the others), and it supports almost any webcam out there - so you can put it in the back room, fire models at it from your PC over the network, and feel like Tony Stark when you wander in there 20 minutes later to a real thing sitting waiting for you.

Bonkers. It's like living in the future, maaaaan.

Thanks.
I was looking at one.

Where did you order from?

Direct from manufacturer:

https://www.elegoo.com/en-gb/products/elegoo-neptune-4-fdm-3d-printer?variant=40848271802416

Next set of orders shipped from the UK warehouse are for early August.

TTony

Do I need for anything specific right now?

No.



Is it a tempting new toy that might be great fun?

Oh yes ....

Sporky

I had a look, and after a couple of minutes they offered me vouchers. So it may be worth staring at the page like a slack-jawed idiot for a bit before ordering.  

WezV

I want one.   

nero1701

Sporky said:

I had a look, and after a couple of minutes they offered me vouchers. So it may be worth staring at the page like a slack-jawed idiot for a bit before ordering.  

So, just act naturally?

digitalscream

TTony said:

Do I need for anything specific right now?

No.



Is it a tempting new toy that might be great fun?

Oh yes ....

Do it.

You don't even need the expense (or the crazy learning curve) that comes with using Fusion 360 or similar - you can just use something like TinkerCAD in your browser.

I'm somewhat limited because I use Linux. I keep meaning to learn how to use Blender (it's surprisingly good for 3D printing), but every time I realise that TinkerCAD is both easier and quicker for what I need to make.

roberty

I'm glad that's working so well, sounds like a winner

For the record @digitalscream has made me some two-hole pickup mounting rings for a 40 year old Yamaha SG. The original rings are completely non-standard, three mounting holes but not Fender spaced, and the four corner holes are differently spaced to Gibson/Epiphone rings

I wanted to fit a new bridge pickup to the guitar without drilling out the original rings. So this is a really tidy solution - I can now change to any standard pickup and it is fully reversible

octatonic

digitalscream said:

octatonic said:

digitalscream said:

Don't even think about spending £500+ on a printer like the Bambu Labs P1P/X1 or the Creality K1, or even the Prusa Mk4.

Just get the Elegoo Neptune 4.

Mine arrived yesterday, and I've done a few test prints on it as well as some pickup rings for @roberty - it's absolutely insane. It prints easily as fast as the Bambu printers for anything other than crap quality speed prints, and it costs $275. I ordered mine on 30th June, having paid about £220 for it.

It's got proper networking support too (ie it doesn't rely on cloud services or any proprietary apps or other tech like the others), and it supports almost any webcam out there - so you can put it in the back room, fire models at it from your PC over the network, and feel like Tony Stark when you wander in there 20 minutes later to a real thing sitting waiting for you.

Bonkers. It's like living in the future, maaaaan.

Thanks.
I was looking at one.

Where did you order from?

Direct from manufacturer:

https://www.elegoo.com/en-gb/products/elegoo-neptune-4-fdm-3d-printer?variant=40848271802416

Next set of orders shipped from the UK warehouse are for early August.

Cheers Lee.

digitalscream

Also, I can confirm that the firmware supports any old webcam, in case you've got it sat in another room and you want to keep an eye on it for print failures - just bought a cheap Creative 1080p camera, plugged it into the USB port on the front and it's streaming at 30fps perfectly.

Snap

Genuine question to people who are into this - what is the point?

Roland

Creating things which you can’t buy easily. There’s a 3D printer on the International Space Station. 

digitalscream

Snap said:

Genuine question to people who are into this - what is the point?

Basically, this:

Roland said:

Creating things which you can’t buy easily. There’s a 3D printer on the International Space Station. 

I've made all sorts of useful stuff - in the last three or four months...

- a vape holder for the car,
- all of the custom fixings to make three open-air computers
- desk leg extenders for building the wife's desk (saved me about £200 on the cost of extra-long legs which didn't look as good)
- custom VESA bracket for a fourth monitor on my PC
- handy hexagonal, extendable parts drawers (need to make a lot more of these)
- mobile phone docks for both desks
- hose lock for the vacuum cleaner when it broke (no spares available, so that would've been a new hoover)
- custom angular face mask for a friend's stage show
- phone holder to turn an old knackered Pixel into a nanny-cam when we adopted a new dog and he wouldn't come out of his crate

It's quite amazing, once we got into the mindset of being able to make anything, how much time and money we'd previously wasted on doesn't-quite-fit-but-it'll-do cheap tat from Amazon Prime when we really needed to solve a problem quickly.

For more on-topic stuff...I've got a design in my head for a simple, quick-and-dirty-but-sturdy pedalboard. Might give it a go at the weekend.

Sporky

Also the joy of designing and making stuff. 

digitalscream

Sporky said:

Also the joy of designing and making stuff. 

I'm quite honestly surprised that you don't already have one...

Sporky

Me too!