friedl_basson

Hi @UlrichC-DE - Well... it gets worse actually, I will be burning through about 3 resin vats one each pint job, so that costs needs to he factored in. Own the plus side, then I do not need to clean them 🤣 This looks really promising and the reviews seems good! I can actually buy this bundle and a second hand S5 bundle for less than one new Form 4. Then I can sell my S3 locally and would have (what seems to be) two improved machines to the one I currently have. Question is whether it is still a good investment being S5's? Regards Friedl.

It is brand new, think it was launched a month ago. Here they (both UM and FL) are about 33% more expensive than elsewhere due to shipping and our weak currency, so that make the investment a bit steeper. My reasoning for looking at FL was two fold: Speed - It wipes the floor even with it predecessor (Form 3) and just about any other SLA printer out there. Surface finish and other challenging geometries which I am finding hard to print with good results on my S3 so I thought IF we invest further, maybe it is not a bad idea to have two different technologies, so we can use the appropriate one when needed BUT it seems the FL, due to the resin and other running costs, makes the manufactured parts to expensive. Our market here is not really suitable to rely one small prototype print runs for which you can charge more, to have some sort of ROI we would need to do medium sized print runs and they are price sensitive. The reasoning for considering UM (also looked at BL X1C) was the there is little to now post processing We are familiar with the environment filament is a hell of a lot cheaper than FL resin very few other consumables really (no IPA, no Resin tank replacements etc.) But that would not give me the option of the nicer surface finishes or the other geometries I am currently unable to replicate. On top of that I heard rumors the S5 might not be in production for very long and spare parts might become a bit harder to obtain. S7 and Factor for is more than what I can justify spending at the moment as 3D printing is NOT my core business, PCB design is 🙂 The local agent claims this is a worry free process as you do not have to clean resin tanks, you simply swop them out. This of course mean you have to have multiple resin tanks 🤣 Anything other than the standard FL resin here is way too expensive and you will not be able to recover those costs. As an example, a current project I am quoting is is for 400-500 enclosures every two months. The target price is $10.45. Each enclosure (if the sliver is anything to go by) will use 100ml of resin. Here the cost resin is: Standard: $127 /L Tough: $235 /L The math is easy then, the part will either cost $12.70 or $23.50. This is not even keeping in mind that you will use 2-3 resin tanks for 500 enclosures and not sure how much IPA cleaning the parts. Both of these exceeding the target price which is currently the client's cost for having the enclosures made from Aluminium sheeting. So the decision seems easy then, just need to come to terms with it 😁

Hi - Hmm... I thought mSLA is the technology where LCD screen is used as apposed to laser. If this is the case, then yes Formlabs does indeed produce a mSLA printer in the new Form4 which uses a LCD panel similar to many of the other resin printers. About the rest - thank you for your thoughts. I realize both have the advantages and Formlabs (according to the many videos I watched) seems the have process a little less "messy" than the rest due the cartridge system as well as some filtering in the machines themselves. I am aware of (some) the advantages of both systems and coming from FDM background it is not an easy call to make to invest $6500 (and then some) into a new technology that I am not familiar with. Just trying to make the right decision here. My concerns with SLA (or mSLA for that matter) is the amount of post processing required after washing and curing and of course - whether anyone agrees or not - the pricing of the resin affects the part cost and if it is too expensive for the client, then there is no use. Well I would argue that if I stick with FDM and both printers are Ultimaker, I would not have to stock both 1.75mm and 2.85mm filament for one. Second getting to know the eco systems will be easier than using two different machines and the same parts (for most) could be used between eg. UM S3 and S5. And my OCD would not go off the rails 🤣 Thanks again for all the feedback. ps: I did download various slicers to test and simulate the same prints. In terms of speed, there is one very clear winner and that is the FORM4 from Formlabs. It out Performs anything else by a mile. The same print job that takes that printer 2 hours to complete, will take 13h+ one most FDM machines (according to the slicers). On the downside, it is also the most expensive upfront cost and most expensive per part.

Yea I noticed that. Even something like ASA sticks like crazy 😄 For ASA if I warm the bed up to 90C again after the print, I can pull them off. hhmmm.... I am not talking about the cheaper brands of mSLA printers. If we decided to invest further into 3D printing capacity, it would either be UM or something along the lines of Formlabs. There are pro's and con's to both. For me, Ideally I would have loved to stick with UM but S7 bundle it is way more expensive than something like FL Form 4 even. With regards to the prints being cheaper, while that may be the case, this only applies (in my experience so please do not crucify me) if you can get away without using dissolvable support, with we sometimes have to do. My question with regards to the S7 and S5 is whether it is the right thing to do to invest in them as it seems (with Factor 4) UM has now (with Factor 4) also adopted direct drive as opposed to Bowden Tubes. As this 'need to increase in capacity' is due to small batch manufacturing, print speed will be crucial. We simply will not be able to print 10 hours on one enclosure if we need to do 500. The question to which I do not have the answer as I have no experience with Resin is how much post processing is needed on part after being printed blazingly quickly with the Form 4.

Hi - I decided to try the adhesion sheets in an attempt to save my build plates. The are generally out of stock at the local agents, so if they damage it is a problem. I mostly print PLA prototypes so no issues there. For functional parts I am liking ASA which a a different beast altogether. It is as it was made especially not to stock to glass 😄 Magigoo has been working good for me here, but large flat surfaces remained a challenge I had to design in some taps to hold corners in place. Funny enough, with PC I had no issues. I go not use it often, but the times I did, I applied Magigoo PC to glass, printed with default settings and no issues. PA on the other hand has proven to be my arch nemesis. I have tried so many brands and settings, with and without CF but no luck. It warps like crazy. ABS has been working well, but it destroyed my glass and there is no way getting that off she sheets. so I guess PLA and ASA is where I am ok at 🙂 I am looking at mSLA printer now as well as UM has just become too expensive for me, I cannot keep up anymore. I have too much printing to do for my single S3 and S7 or Factor 4 is more that what I can justify. Regards Friedl.

Hi @UlrichC-DE - Thank you! I managed to get all my ABS prints done. Warping was less of an issue, but I managed to destroy two build plates in the process. I generally use Magigoo for build plate adhesion with great success. Normally I would go with ASA rather than ABS, but the matter was time sensitive and this was in stock, so I had to go with ABS. I am trying on of the sheets again today with PA-CF. Would be interesting to see what happens. Personally I think using these sheets on a "per print" basis is kind of an expensive exercise. Regards Friedl.

Hi - Is this still available?

Hi - Is this still available? Regards

Hi - Is this still available?

Hi - Oh my word, so glad to see it's not me only. I destroyed two build plates in the last week and there I was thinking I was going to have a tough time getting ABS to stick to the Build Plate. I use Magigoo Original. Can the adhesion sheets used more than once?

Hi - I am having PVA issues as well. Bough a spool a while back and never got it right. Decided to give it a go again so dried it for 18 hours in a filament dryer at 50C. When printing it sounds bacon in a frying pan and seems to be all over the place. Especially when the second extruder is nearing the end of it's layer print and the PVA extruder starts heating up. I find PVA oozing out even though the PLA core is still printing. Attached some pics, not sure whether this is what it should look like. it keeps messing PVA all over the print. I am using the standard PVA profile in Cura but have dropped the temperature now by 5C mid print, will see how that goes. IMG_2880.MOV.zip

Thanks for confirming @Dustin. It has been working well for a while now.

Hi @gr5 With regards to auto levelling; I had this issue from the day I received the printer, so with 76 hours on the fan. I did reach out to Official support at the time and went through a whole bunch of tests, including disconnecting the front fan when levelling. Nothing ever solved the issue and I made peace with the fact. Miraculously, after about a year, my auto level problem disappeared as it never existed. Nothing hardware related was changed, only numerous firmware updates during that time. who know what the problem was on my side, but I can only deduce it was firmware related. Regards, Friedl

@gr5 Thank you for the tips , I will look into this for sure!!

@mrender Oh how I do wish this was the case 🙂 My Cura logs out quite frequently actually... so it was the very fist thing I check. But then on the printer itself under settings it shows that it is not able to connect to Digital Factory.