I am looking for some advice on a delta-style printer. Ideally, this should be under $1000 US.
Some models I’ve been looking at:
SeeMeCNC Eris
Deltaprintr Delta Go
Bluefrog Planner
Dagoma Neva
So far, I’ve seen some really negative reviews of the Delta Go – but then, there have supposedly been some updates/improvements to this printer in 2017. I can find almost no reviews of the Bluefrog Planner. The Eris looks promising, though it has a relatively small build plate. (There’s also supposedly a heated-bed upgrade for the Eris in the works, if not already out.) The Neva seems to have gotten some great reviews.
Any suggestions? Any affordable delta printers I missed? Do any of the printers I listed stand out as much better than the others? I’d like to be able to go down to 50 microns layer height (the Bluefrog Planner and I think the Eris can do this), but it’s not a deal killer. The Neva has a 180 mm diameter build area, which is pretty nice for the price point! And so on.
@Adam_Steinmark I prefer a minimal amount of assembly. Mostly I don’t have a very good space for doing this. I have a workshop which lacks air conditioning (and I live in Arizona). Self-assembly of a kit means I’m automatically to blame if anything goes wrong. And so on.
It’s honestly not that bad. Clear off your kitchen table and that should be enough space. I bought my first printer assembled because it was the same price and I regret it because I learnt so much about it by upgrading and modifying parts. You really get to know your printer by building it yourself. It can even be better than an assembled printer because shipment could have caused parts to loosen (seen it before). Oh and if you live in Arizona with no AC make sure not to overheat the motors and electronics.
I’m not sure I’d ever get a delta. I don’t really see any advantage over cartesian.
Edit: Although there is a delta coming out in 2018 (forget the name sorry) where you can swap out the hotend end effector for a SLA build platform. I think it had an LCD under the removable build plate and you put a resin tank on top where the build plate was.
They’re fascinating to watch.
They can be faster than Cartesian due to the lighter head, and still possibly faster than COREXY depending on the build. I would think that my DICE is faster than this simply due to frame rigidity.
@Adam_Steinmark I said the workshop had no AC, not the rest of the house. I do most printing in my office or the guest room. I’m looking to replace one of the smaller printers in the office, in fact.
I have 5 printers, one of just about every kind of mechanics. But when I need something printed… If it fits on my Delta it prints on my Delta. The speed and surface finish from a Delta is great.
I have a Seemecnc Rostock. It was a fun build. It wasn’t a trivial build but I did it over a few evenings and weekends with my. at the time, 10 year old. I don’t have the experience to vouch for its quality but I haven’t had any issues.
My two cents. Deltas are for having fun. Cartesian/CoreXY printers are for getting stuff printed. Deltas can be absolutely great printers, but the odds of having painful quality or drivetrain troubleshooting issues are about ten times higher. (Admittedly, reputable kits or pre-assembled Deltas are a lot less likely to have problems than self-built Deltas.)
If you want a low-hassle Delta, it must have a Z probe for auto-calibration. If you want to print fast with good quality (particularly with an LCD attached) you also really want a good 32bit control board. I strongly recomment a Duet with RepRapFirmware, but you can also get great results with a Smoothie compatible board or a Due/RADDS with Repetier. (Nice thing about RADDS is that it runs multiple firmwares so you can experiment if you want.)
@Ryan_Carlyle In my experience if the print bed isn’t large (My Kossel’s is 20cm diameter) then you don’t need auto-calibration. Now I have my Prusa I don’t use the Kossel all that much, but before that I used it most days, month in, month out with no re-calibration required. You just watch the first layer and if it’s starting to be less than perfect you adjust the relevant screw (with the print still going), and next print will be spot-on. But even that I only needed to do every month or so. No more hassle than the fine-Z-adjust needed on a cartesian printer from time to time.
@Mark_Wheadon I have a delta with a probe and a delta without a probe. Assuming your arms are built well and your towers are in the right places, yes, you can get very good results without probing. I completely agree that it’s not too hard if your bed is small (eg arms farther from horizontal). But if you have ANY meaningful fab/build error on a Delta, there’s a high probability you’ll never get level, square, dimensionally-accurate prints out of it without a good autocalibration routine.
Even then, there are problems auto-cal can’t fix, like uneven arm rod lengths.
Aren’t Kossel deltas always sold as kits?