Whoops, Tiko just imploded. They’re shutting down and looking for an investor to bail them out after fulfilling ~4100/16000 Kickstarter units.
I predicted this from the start, but when I got MY Kickstarter unit, I figured they had actually pulled it off.
Ha another Makibox disaster. Proof that the race to the bottom isn’t always the best.
Especially if you’re racing to the bottom without experience and on the backs of pre-orders… every part of that is begging for trouble.
Can you link to a write up about this?
@Justin_Nesselrotte https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/tiko3d/tiko-the-unibody-3d-printer/posts/1809879
o wow I didn’t realize they were also trying to develop their own software?
@Ryan_Carlyle how does your Tiko perform?
I still don’t fully understand why small startups want to completely write their own software. It’s a huge cost to do so.
@Justin_Nesselrotte what these Kickstarters don’t understand is that by offering massive discounts on first round items, they are shrinking their funds for the most expensive production run of the entire project. Couple that with a constant drive to write their own code and there’s the issue. If they were smart they would’ve contacted a group like smoothie and seen if they could use their code to be modified to fit their needs. Perhaps they did that, but the rest of the interface just isn’t something that’s needed in first round. Develop the mechanics, make it work with open source slicers (which it supposedly does) and then after money is flowing work on the code. Just my .02
Nah I totally agree with your view point. It feels very much like the “sell it at a loss, make up for it in volume” ideology.
There was nothing promising about the Tiko project. I thought it was telling they didn’t show a close-up of the part being printed, it was always shown a bit distant and a bit defocused. They said up front, in euphemism, that the mechanism was rubbish but they thought they could use software and firmware tricks to make up the difference.
@John_Helmuth damaged in shipping. Some of the glue holding the body together came apart. Wouldn’t be hard to fix (should just need to be reglued) but it came with a pretty poor quality test print on the bed, so I was going to give them a chance to work on the software a bit before messing with it. Now I’ll probably just tear it down to see how exactly they built it.
The hardware DOES WORK in the sense that you can get 3d prints out of it. I think the temp sensing, drivetrain backlash, and lack of print cooling fan are likely to be the only meaningful issues with the hardware design, if you’re expecting an entry-level mass market printer. I can’t speak for what the software is doing. Precision realtime motion control is much, much harder than most people think.
I backed Tiko thinking it would probably implode… I mostly just wanted to see how they would try to build a $180 delta at scale (or what counts for scale in this sector). I think a more experienced team that tried to do less from scratch may have been able to pull it off.
Yet people complain that even a $200 printer is expensive when they can “buy” a $49 one.
Anyone know did they promise developing own software from the get go? Or after campaign funding?
One more reason to never trust something that sounds too good to be true. Broken business model. Kickstarter has gotten the reputation of being a place to get things cheaper , to kickstart a viable company, there must be margin in pricing. In some ways it’s sad but also confirming that people who design things aren’t always good business people. I think the age of kickstarted + 3D printers has been over for a while now. I’ve considered going back to the well for marketing reasons but it feels dishonest… I guess if you admit its marketing it’s ok- promising to fulfill to backers first so they pay for the luxury of being the first… a loss leader for marketing sake.
Tiko reminds me of the not so funny joke “we sell each one at a loss, but we will make it up in volume”
Brook