I'm an entrepreneur and I'd like to learn about the 3d printer industry.

@Samer_Najia Great. See you on Skype tomorrow.

@PrintinAddiction Oh wow, I have something like this too. That one needs a new board (I am getting rid of all the RAMPS boards I have one by one).

@Adrian_Beckett would you be able to do this by phone instead? Or do you really need to see my pretty face? Or do you need to see the printers themselves? If you are able, I would much rather phone you.

Ha ha, phone is ok. Email me your no. pls: adrianbeckett79@gmail.com

@Adrian_Beckett ​​, I am a DIYer and can give you an end-user opinion.I was considering a 3D printer to make small plastic parts for my own use. I found out that,for simple parts, I can achieve the same result for 1/10 the cost with silicon & lattice molds and epoxy resin,not to mention the space saved to house such a machine. My view is that 3D printers have a role for prototyping and for making a large number of items,particularly those with many colors and/or complex shapes. Otherwise, I am hard-pressed to see why an end-user would keep such a thing at home before the cost/quality ratio of 3D printers improves markedly. There is probably a great future for a business model similar to the kinko’s copy shops in the 1980s or what many do today with their digital pics:save the file on a USB pendrive and take it to a 3D printing shop for producing the item in the number of copies that you want. The premium that you pay for that service is definitely worth the saving in real estate space,upfront purchase cost and maintenance hassles that a 3D printer still involves. Eventually, a more reasonably-priced version of a DaVinci integrated 3D printer and scanner will come out to tempt marginal end-user tinkerers like me but we are not there yet. Just my two cents.

Thanks @Luca_Celati What about renting 3d printers? per day? per hour?

@PrintinAddiction
Turn your CobbleFlop into a WeldingRod Bot

You’ll be happy you did…

@Panayiotis_Savva I would like to, but I have the Vanguard, which is more like an I3 than a box design, which would require me to source more extrusions. It is together and somewhat solid, its the wobbly hot ends that is discouraging. I’m thinking of maybe adding a laser to it for engraving.
missing/deleted image from Google+

They check the mods done by @Tinkering_On_Steroid

The purple printed parts are his @Tinkering_On_Steroid mods, his X-Gantry is one monster piece, And only a single hot end, but I should give it a try. The printer is pretty solid with TOS’s mods, I’m just stuck on the XGantry at the moment.

@Luca_Celati i somewhat agree. I don’t think you can fabricate in bulk on a printer economically in terms of time spent unless the parts are fairly small. And my DaVinci has proven so unreliable I scrapped it. 3D printers require a lot of care and feeding and until they are as easy to maintain as, say, a regular inkjet printer, they won’t really be ubiquitous.

@Samer_Najia Dont forget daylight savings, and set your clock back :slight_smile: !!!

Ha, yes, automagically so. 1 hour to go

@Luca_Celati now with something like the fabrikator Mini you cant say it takey much Space. And it Delivers really Good results for what you pay. For people that are into modelling or cosplaying, Electronics etc. A 3d Printer is an essential tool these days.
Just print something, throw it into acetone for a night and then you have a perfectly looking psrt which you can work on even more

@Adrian_Beckett I have found out that, most people dont acctually care about what printer you are using, they care more about the final price and object (from a comercial stand point), the point here is that you are looking for a machine thats either reliabe and cost efective,
I got my self a craftbot + an e3d all metal hotend clone and buildtak on glass, and i cant tell you this, i plug the machine start the print walk away till its done,
what you need , is to found out what are the type of clients you want, students, grapic desingers or common people, then focuss on what type of service you can provide, a printer rental? Or a finished product? Or even the desing of an old lady (just saw someone who scaned his granpa and 3d printed his face, the grampa pass away a mont later)
Just my humble opinion, and yes, im an entrepenneur like you, sadly im doing only keychains for the momments :unamused::unamused:

Ps: forgot to tell, if you have cash to spare, get an stratasys, they are big and expensive but got the best resolution and colors at the momment