UM3 upgrade questions

[neo-ninja 1]

Hi Everyone,

I am thinking of upgrading one of my machines to a UM3.

Is there anything I should consider?

Does it still use the same teflon etc? (I have quite a few spare) I cant find the answer to this anywhere. My worry is that my machines are running 24/7 365 days a year. Some of them are on 8k+ hours. I change the teflon between 200-1k hours. Teflon currently is around £15. But if on the UM3 i need to buy a hole new AA piece at £100 that makes it very pricey.

[SandervG 1,521]

Hi,

I'll move your thread to modifications and hacks, you may get more replies there.

From what machine do you want to upgrade to an Ultimaker 3? The print cores have a pretty long lifespan. If you do not wear down the nozzle you should be able to use it for a very long time.

[neo-ninja 1]

Hi,

I'll move your thread to modifications and hacks, you may get more replies there.

From what machine do you want to upgrade to an Ultimaker 3? The print cores have a pretty long lifespan. If you do not wear down the nozzle you should be able to use it for a very long time.

 

I currently run UM2 and UM2+ i find the Teflon needs to be changed anytime between 200-500 hours. I have had them last longer but it can be as short as that.

Does the print core not use teflon then? How long are people finding they last for?

What other parts wear? Currently on my machines the teflon is really all i am changing, occasionally other bits have gone wrong but some of them have been running at close to 10k hours.

There is almost no information i can find about it online.

[SandervG 1,521]

In reply of your initial email, are you planning on modifying your existing Ultimaker into a 3, or upgrading your range of printers with an Ultimaker 3?

The first one could be quite a challenge (but doable. @UltiArjan has made a fancy modification to his 'calimero').

We currently don't have an amount of hours set as a standard yet. This would follow from the experiences from our users using then. Obviously its function has been thoroughly tested, but there are too many variables in an average user's workflow we did not feel comfortable setting a number out there yet. Perhaps some users can shed some light on their experiences. @Korneel, @Ultiarjan, @dim3nsioneer?

I can tell that it has been tested to last longer than a teflon coupler on the previous generations.

It uses teflon, but it is installed differently. Therefor it is way less subjective to wear.

What other parts wear, in a print core? This depends for example on the materials you use. The most obvious part which would show signs of wear, would be a nozzle when using an abrasive filament.

And something which is not part of the print core, but the silicon pads underneath the print core, which are officially part of the printhead. They can degrade due to long exposure to heat, but are pretty cheap and easy to replace.

[Dim3nsioneer 558]

I can't say much about lifetime of the UM3 printcore teflon inliner as I did not yet had to change a core due to degradation. However, I might not be the one with the most print hours on his UM3 and I do not print abrasive material.

Printing with advanced materials like PC, which I like a lot, gives you certainly a harder job at cleaning the cores on the outside (nozzle) and makes also regular cold pulls a bit more significant. The silicon pad @sandervg wrote about are indeed done relatively fast when printing materials at 250-260°C. Of course you can relatively easy and inexpensively replace them but at some point a pad from a more heat resistant material would be welcome...

[korneel 176]

In reply of your initial email, are you planning on modifying your existing Ultimaker into a 3, or upgrading your range of printers with an Ultimaker 3?

The first one could be quite a challenge (but doable. @UltiArjan has made a fancy modification to his 'calimero').

We currently don't have an amount of hours set as a standard yet. This would follow from the experiences from our users using then. Obviously its function has been thoroughly tested, but there are too many variables in an average user's workflow we did not feel comfortable setting a number out there yet. Perhaps some users can shed some light on their experiences. @Korneel, @Ultiarjan, @dim3nsioneer?

I can tell that it has been tested to last longer than a teflon coupler on the previous generations.

It uses teflon, but it is installed differently. Therefor it is way less subjective to wear.

What other parts wear, in a print core? This depends for example on the materials you use. The most obvious part which would show signs of wear, would be a nozzle when using an abrasive filament.

And something which is not part of the print core, but the silicon pads underneath the print core, which are officially part of the printhead. They can degrade due to long exposure to heat, but are pretty cheap and easy to replace.

so i have 8 UM3s right now, and run all of them 24/7. so far no real issues with that, I also started out years ago with UM2s, then Um2+ now UM3..

as far as maintenance cost, it actually went down quite a bit, I've had print cores that have done 3500+ hours and are still going strong.. it's not an official Ultimaker statement, I know, but so far, I think i've replaced 2 or 3 print cores, 1 because it was simply done (at around 2800 hours i believe) and 2 because I had to do a carbon fiber print for a customer and i did not have the ruby nozzle yet..

so for me, the upgrade from um2+ to um3 certainly made sense..

[neo-ninja 1]

In reply of your initial email, are you planning on modifying your existing Ultimaker into a 3, or upgrading your range of printers with an Ultimaker 3?

The first one could be quite a challenge (but doable. @UltiArjan has made a fancy modification to his 'calimero').

We currently don't have an amount of hours set as a standard yet. This would follow from the experiences from our users using then. Obviously its function has been thoroughly tested, but there are too many variables in an average user's workflow we did not feel comfortable setting a number out there yet. Perhaps some users can shed some light on their experiences. @Korneel, @Ultiarjan, @dim3nsioneer?

I can tell that it has been tested to last longer than a teflon coupler on the previous generations.

It uses teflon, but it is installed differently. Therefor it is way less subjective to wear.

What other parts wear, in a print core? This depends for example on the materials you use. The most obvious part which would show signs of wear, would be a nozzle when using an abrasive filament.

And something which is not part of the print core, but the silicon pads underneath the print core, which are officially part of the printhead. They can degrade due to long exposure to heat, but are pretty cheap and easy to replace.

When i say upgrade, i actually just mean sell my UM2s and buy UM3s.

I find the Teflon currently lasts me 200-800MAX. before it needs a change, depending on the print, material etc..

It sounds like from your messages with PLA filament that a print core should last a very long time. But is it more on average then 800 hours?

My worry is I currently run LOTS of printers, I can buy new teflon for around £15. Changing it is very easy. For the UM3, a new print core is around £125 which means for the upgrade to be worth it I would expect it to last at least 4000 hours.

What I am finding very frustrating actually is the complete lack of information on this site about the print cores. Is it because the machine is still so new that not many people have experience with them? In which case I feel like Ultimaker should be doing more to test and explain how long they on average last or at least give a rough idea. At the moment i actually find it quite misleading as its never mentioned anywhere...

I have seen 3dsolex is selling upgrades that seem to have changeable teflon but it is a bit unclear how they work too.

[neo-ninja 1]

In reply of your initial email, are you planning on modifying your existing Ultimaker into a 3, or upgrading your range of printers with an Ultimaker 3?

The first one could be quite a challenge (but doable. @UltiArjan has made a fancy modification to his 'calimero').

We currently don't have an amount of hours set as a standard yet. This would follow from the experiences from our users using then. Obviously its function has been thoroughly tested, but there are too many variables in an average user's workflow we did not feel comfortable setting a number out there yet. Perhaps some users can shed some light on their experiences. @Korneel, @Ultiarjan, @dim3nsioneer?

I can tell that it has been tested to last longer than a teflon coupler on the previous generations.

It uses teflon, but it is installed differently. Therefor it is way less subjective to wear.

What other parts wear, in a print core? This depends for example on the materials you use. The most obvious part which would show signs of wear, would be a nozzle when using an abrasive filament.

And something which is not part of the print core, but the silicon pads underneath the print core, which are officially part of the printhead. They can degrade due to long exposure to heat, but are pretty cheap and easy to replace.

so i have 8 UM3s right now, and run all of them 24/7. so far no real issues with that, I also started out years ago with UM2s, then Um2+ now UM3..

as far as maintenance cost, it actually went down quite a bit, I've had print cores that have done 3500+ hours and are still going strong.. it's not an official Ultimaker statement, I know, but so far, I think i've replaced 2 or 3 print cores, 1 because it was simply done (at around 2800 hours i believe) and 2 because I had to do a carbon fiber print for a customer and i did not have the ruby nozzle yet..

so for me, the upgrade from um2+ to um3 certainly made sense..

OK wow this is what I am looking for. Thank you very much. You might well have just sold me on the upgrades!

[korneel 176]

In reply of your initial email, are you planning on modifying your existing Ultimaker into a 3, or upgrading your range of printers with an Ultimaker 3?

The first one could be quite a challenge (but doable. @UltiArjan has made a fancy modification to his 'calimero').

We currently don't have an amount of hours set as a standard yet. This would follow from the experiences from our users using then. Obviously its function has been thoroughly tested, but there are too many variables in an average user's workflow we did not feel comfortable setting a number out there yet. Perhaps some users can shed some light on their experiences. @Korneel, @Ultiarjan, @dim3nsioneer?

I can tell that it has been tested to last longer than a teflon coupler on the previous generations.

It uses teflon, but it is installed differently. Therefor it is way less subjective to wear.

What other parts wear, in a print core? This depends for example on the materials you use. The most obvious part which would show signs of wear, would be a nozzle when using an abrasive filament.

And something which is not part of the print core, but the silicon pads underneath the print core, which are officially part of the printhead. They can degrade due to long exposure to heat, but are pretty cheap and easy to replace.

so i have 8 UM3s right now, and run all of them 24/7. so far no real issues with that, I also started out years ago with UM2s, then Um2+ now UM3..

as far as maintenance cost, it actually went down quite a bit, I've had print cores that have done 3500+ hours and are still going strong.. it's not an official Ultimaker statement, I know, but so far, I think i've replaced 2 or 3 print cores, 1 because it was simply done (at around 2800 hours i believe) and 2 because I had to do a carbon fiber print for a customer and i did not have the ruby nozzle yet..

so for me, the upgrade from um2+ to um3 certainly made sense..

OK wow this is what I am looking for. Thank you very much. You might well have just sold me on the upgrades!

once you buy the printers, make sure to mention that to @sandervg so I can get my commission

all joking aside, i disagree with your comparison in your previous post..

so if you upgraded to a TFM coupler instead of the teflon, you should not have to change them ever again in combination with the spring replacement.

for me, the biggest cost is downtime. i replaced nozzles every 500 to 1000 hours, which created downtime. i had to replace the feeders which created downtime. i had to add octoprint to monitor and schedule print jobs.. i could not easily switch glass plates because the bed leveling would be off.. in short, the UM3 for me is an even bigger workhorse that can just keep on printing. once a print is done, take out the glass plate, new one in, next print. boom.

if i am in doubt about a print core, immediate switch with a working one, and once i have some time, i'll troubleshoot it..

if you have the means, i would upgrade to UM3s immediately. you won't regret it.

[nallath 1,124]

if i am in doubt about a print core, immediate switch with a working one, and once i have some time, i'll troubleshoot it..

 

This is exactly what we designed them for. Glad to see it works like that in the real world