So today I printed out some PET-CF parts.
I used their preset profile hit go and walked away. Prints are fantastic and the bridging and overhangs are pretty dang good, even compared to my previous parts.
I am pretty sure I am ordering another one shortly.
Nice prints! Happy with surfaces, no ripple/VFA? Noticed QIDI Plus4 has teeth side of belts running against smooth idlers, 1.5mm teeth pitch but still?
Noticed teeth against smooth idlers on Prusa Core Oneā¦
And Creality K2 tooā¦
K1 and K1 max as well.
Best of all my printers, but there is still faint VFA.
This is bittersweet for me. It is what I have wanted for countless hours while troubleshooting one of the many printers I made (two were Ryanās design). Itās awesome to see things really mature like this. But I miss the difficulty of shopping and designing and tuning.
I built desktop computers for friends and eventually for a small business in college. I loved a lot of it. But it was stressful when they didnāt work. I ended up getting a job in software development and we all just bought laptops. I havenāt built a PC since then. I look back at the memories fondly and I learned a lot. I know I will always have a computer and I look closely at the specs of any machine. But I doubt I will build a PC anytime soon.
I had one project in my career that was really hard. We spent tons of hours in hard conditions (for software engineers) and we got something that worked. I switched to a remote job and had a much easier day to day after that. I would never go back. But I missed the challenge.
This may be the same end of an era. It isnāt just about price or capabilities. I think the trouble is that the remaining improvements in 3D printing are outside the grasp of most individual contributors. The next improvements are in large scale manufacturing, software development, or design optimization. The improvements take hundreds of hours to make small improvements. Thatās the area where a few healthy companies can compete and win.
There will still be a healthy amount of improvements coming from the community. But itās losing momentum.
I hope Iām wrong. I really enjoy this 3D printing style of building together. I am just seeing a lot of signs that this is where we are.
The qidi is very tempting. I still have a new bed and hotend assembly on my radar. But I havenāt found the right combination of parts that satisfy my wants. The main reason I am not just ordering this right now is I donāt have a good home for my gridbot. I love it too much to take it apart. But it isnāt polished enough to give to a beginner.
I was reading Reddit the other day and the topic was about VFA and the way belts are cut. Apparently they are cut in a spiral and the teeth are NOT perfectly perpendicular to the belt. This might be one of the reasons that the interaction of belts teeth to pully teeth is reduced as much as possible.
I can totally see where having multiple teeth in the path could affect the smoothness.
My Q1 Proās with the QiDi Filament were some of the best looking PET-CF parts I have ever printed. The bridging for sure was better than I was getting on any other of my printers. Considering your parts are all designed to fit on a smaller bed you might take a look at one of the Q1 Pros. Can get 2 of those for the price of one Plus4 (well close to it anyways). My 2 have been running just about around the clock since I got them and have not missed a beat yet. @CarmenJ been wearing them out printing hueforge pictures 
This part right here really hits home. I have never sold a printer of mine, I gave one away but I had to offer a lot of help. I know I could hand this qidi off to anyone and they could very easily get a print. So a few days ago I put one of my V2 printers up for sale for $50, a very enthusiastic dude showed and just wanted it to try out and tinker withā¦but he was very well versed in 3D printing. I sort of assume it was just bought for the parts, the board, hemera, and steppers are easily worth $50.
I have 6 V4ās I think I might give it a shot at selling them as a package. Someone might be interested in a very inexpensive print farm. If they donāt go I will keep them for the foreseeable future but having three different printers in the farm now makes file management kind of bummer.
I do feel we have pushed commodity parts pretty dang far. This Qidi has 1.5mm pitch belts, I could not buy those for a decent price even if I wanted to. To keep pushing the limits and keeping reasonable prices I do feel it will take a larger entity to start making more custom parts. The hobby side has lots and lots of custom parts unfortunately the prices are just insane.
I am more than 10 years in, it was fun but I really donāt mind my printer just being a tool for a while. I rarely give my chop saw a second thought when I make something, it is pretty nice to finally do that with the printer.
Careful that rabbit hole is very very deep. Mike, JJ, and myself have spent a ton of time, money and effort trying to even figure out what it isā¦no clear conclusion. Sometimes it is slicer settings, sometimes it is hardware, sometimes it just isnāt there. I would love to get my hands on a high speed camera and see exactly what is actually happeningā¦is hardware or is it filament/slicer/firmware related.
My V5ās are the best prints I had ever had to date, until I noticed the ripple. I was extremely frustrated by it and probably did some sort of test daily for 4-5 months to see if I could learn more about it.
I am going to start filling the beds a bit more. ~10 hours or ~20 hours per job is a good target if I have large enough spools.
Iām starting to unload some of my stuff too. Iāve also mostly given old ones away, or torn them down for parts to keep sibling machines running.
I still plan to finish my MP3DP V5. Next to go will by my TAZ 5, which has been a workhorse for me but it just isnāt capable like the new stuff. Iām looking a Qidi Q1 Pro which has comparable build volume but benefits from being a 15 year newer design.
The nearby makerspace is about to unload all of thier farm of 5 FlashForge creator series, and is deciding what to get in replacement (theyāre really unhappy with the recent Bambo behaviors so may not get another X1C which is the only one they have in constant use).
Iāve decided that for most everything I do, there is no functional impact from VFA so Iām just going to train myself to ignore it.
Just getting a filament sensor will be a huge benefit for me. Iāve said for a long time that I should add one to all my machines but the A5M has convinced me that I donāt ever want a printer without a smart filament sensor.
I may keep one of the FFCPs with Flexion extruders around for printing flexible matierals, and one more for the rare dual-material print (dissolvable supports or dissimilar/incompatible with MMU filaments)
Let me know if you find a good deal on PET-CF on a larger than 1kg spool lol.
so I really enjoy when i put something together, then i understand it and can work on it easier.
That said, maybe that is why i have done soo many things to the Ender and Longer (ender clone) printers i have. Now I understand them and they work like I want/need.
But on the other hand, if you buy something and it just works, you do not need to understand it and can use it.
Problem is when it stops working. I worry that the educational aspects of 3d Printing will go away with the advent of many of these new click-n-print printers. Learning the mechanics and the theory is what makes it fun for me.
I totally get when your business is literally printing parts for kits like @Ryan, the need for continuous reliability is there. I still have my Ender V1 that I bought to print the MPCNC originally. That thing sparked a whole slew of other projects!
I was VERY much someone that would rather build than buy! So much so! But things for me have changed. And when I am trying to print something to sell to a customer, and trying to get it done in a certain time frame. Having something that just prints and prints well vs something that when its prints right, its amazing, but then when the wind blows the wrong direction acts like an animal, it can get extremely frustrating. Most of that is on me and not taking the simple route when building. Trying to use the latest/greatest/fastest stuff takes some reliability out of it for sure. But at the price tag I paid for my 2 Q1 Pros, I just cant bet it at all.
Im accumulating parts to build another v5. No appetite for a large spend in one shot, iām paying more over time. This one will be enclosed and high temperature capable and smaller. If i had a selling product, perhaps an off the shelf tool would be on order, but āI dig the build man.ā
Im actually building systems at work for small automation tasks with controllers and motors because of the build experience now. You never know what will come from learning new stuff.
I have one of the coolest demos i can never show youā¦
Well, 
, I typed that up and went downstairs to a 3 hour filament blob. Lost my cooling duct and hot end sock but saved the therm and heaterā¦on a V4 that I just repaired. I set the probe offset yesterday but forgot to double-check it today so it let go on the second layer and blobbed up pretty good.
ā¦I just wanna play with my CNCāsā¦Very tempted to not fix this one and just replace it.
That sucks. Been there. A good heat gun is helpful. Interested if you donāt repair
Well, , Finished typing that up went over to give that busted printer a stern talking to and the other one had the filament come off the spool and wrap around the holder. Luckily, the smart sensor caught that.
Today is printer appreciation day apparentlyā¦or Throw it out the window into the rain day, it is yet to be determined.
My other V5 burned through its last h2 extruder so it is down. That was maybe 1 extruder per month. I have all the parts ready for the orbiter swap but honestly I am pretty tired of dealing with printers right now.
Through that aluminum wear lever on the inside? I ground rhat spot down a little more, put a very thin stainless washer on mine and put it back in service. Works awesome.
Have a picture?
Not off hand. Ill see if i can get to the spot in my spare unit in the morning.
