Ultimaker 2 Dual extruder upgrade - Creatr XLabs

[sam-bianchi-bazzi 1]

Hello everyone!

My name is Sam and I'm the owner of Creatr, an italian start-up in 3D printing. We are official resellers of UM in Italy and love them!

We too have been waiting a lot for the UM2 dual extruder kit but finally decided to design our own!

And today we're presenting the UltiMaker Dual extruder upgrade kit from Creatr! This upgrade is for both UM 2 and UM original. It's really simple two mount and has all the components included.

Here are some photos of it:

The kit is its final testing phase and will hopefully be ready before Christmas

You can have more details here:http://creatr.it/2UM2 or email at hello@creatr.it

--

TECHNICAL PART:

We're really proud of what we have managed to achieve. The kit is all in alluminium for best heat transfer and cooling. Nozzles are in bronze and optimized to reduce retraction blobs. Since it is full metal this kit can print also special filaments like policarbonate and High temperature resistent materials (we've reach stable operating temperatures in excess of 350°C with termocouples)!

Included in the kit will be an easy to follow guide on how to upgrade the firmware to fully support this.

PS The photos was when we where printing with ABS and HIPS so we did not need any fans. The kit has also two sidemounted fans to cool the part (when needed)

Let us know what you think and if you would like to pre-order it!

Best.

Sam

 

[DidierKlein 698]

Hi,

Thanks for sharing, it looks like an interesting kit.

Do you have any videos showing it in action?

 

[sam-bianchi-bazzi 1]

Yep, we're making the official video of it. We'll upload it as soon as possible!

 

[3poro 9]

Seems very interesting! A few questions

 

1. I have seen comments about all-metal extruders having trouble with PLA. Have you encountered any problems with PLA?
    
   
2. Does your dual extruder reach the same speed and build volume as the UM2 stock extruder?
    
   
3. What has been the primary use case(s) you have prioritized in your R&D? Soluble support material? Two colors? Different nozzle diameters? Something else?
   

 

Some photos of printed models would be great

 

[Dim3nsioneer 471]

Maybe not the least important question: Will it be open source?

 

[ultiarjan 1,161]

- Are the nozzles compatible with UMO / E3D ? whats the tread size ?

- Can you share close up photo's, exploded view drawings ? what parts are you reusing, what parts are new ?

- What will be the price ?

 

[izo2 0]

very interesting !

printing polycarbonate is also an excellent update.

does it run with the same cooling system than the original ? i don't see the fan on the picture

 

[DidierKlein 698]

PS The photos was when we where printing with ABS and HIPS so we did not need any fans. The kit has also two sidemounted fans to cool the part (when needed)

 

[SandervG 1,204]

I think it is important to underline that even though Creatr is an official reseller of Ultimaker, this upgrade is not an official Ultimaker product.

After having said this, I am also curious to see some prints!

 

[Daid 289]

 

1. I have seen comments about all-metal extruders having trouble with PLA. Have you encountered any problems with PLA?

 

 

My standpoint on this area is that every full-metal-hotend for 3mm filament will jam with PLA. So far nobody has proved me wrong on this one.

Other then that, cheers I hope this will help people who really want their dual-extrusion machine.

(Note I also added dual-extrusion UM2 firmware in the next Cura release. So that should help some people who want to experiment with it. But it's not officially supported)

 

[Labern 734]

350deg would be a huge improvement for me to be able to use high temp filaments but it will still have to be able to print with PLA.

Definatly need more info.

 

[sam-bianchi-bazzi 1]

Seems very interesting! A few questions

 

1. I have seen comments about all-metal extruders having trouble with PLA. Have you encountered any problems with PLA?

    

2. Does your dual extruder reach the same speed and build volume as the UM2 stock extruder?

    

3. What has been the primary use case(s) you have prioritized in your R&D? Soluble support material? Two colors? Different nozzle diameters? Something else?

 

Some photos of printed models would be great

 

Exactly, we're still having some jamming issues when printing PLA. But we're pretty sure the next version of it will solve this issue

The dual extruder cannot reach the same build volume while using both extruders, however we're really proud to say that the extruders have a centre-to-centre distance of just 18mm. So the build volume in the x direction will not be significantly reduced. However when using in single extruder mode you will be able to reach the stock build volume.

We have been prioritizing soluble support material: in particular ABS+HIPS but we're working hard on other combinations too! We're getting our first results in multimaterial parts but still requires huge software upgrades. Same with multi-nozzle diametre.

 

Maybe not the least important question: Will it be open source?

 

Not it won't since we would we devastated if all our hard work would be copied and sold in cheap-crappy low cost versions.

 

- Are the nozzles compatible with UMO / E3D ? whats the tread size ?

- Can you share close up photo's, exploded view drawings ? what parts are you reusing, what parts are new ?

- What will be the price ?

 

The nozzles will be compatible with E3D nozzles since they use same thread size. No exploded view drawings since they are proprietary. More photos and videos are coming We're reusing the top, middle and bottom bracket, fans. Rest will be changed. Price is to be defined but around €250. Including optimized feeder to greatly limit under-extrusion.

 

very interesting !

printing polycarbonate is also an excellent update.

does it run with the same cooling system than the original ? i don't see the fan on the picture

 

Yep, poycarbonate too! Same sidemounted twin fan, just a different bracket. Yes in that photo we did not mount the bracket and fans since we were testing with ABS and HIPS.

 

I think it is important to underline that even though Creatr is an official reseller of Ultimaker, this upgrade is not an official Ultimaker product.

After having said this, I am also curious to see some prints!

 

Yep Quick note: proud resellers! Photos and videos coming soon.

 

My standpoint on this area is that every full-metal-hotend for 3mm filament will jam with PLA. So far nobody has proved me wrong on this one.

Other then that, cheers I hope this will help people who really want their dual-extrusion machine.

(Note I also added dual-extrusion UM2 firmware in the next Cura release. So that should help some people who want to experiment with it. But it's not officially supported)

 

Right with PLA. Great news about UM2 firmware in next Cura release. Guess you'll have to wait and see

 

[Dim3nsioneer 471]

Not it won't since we would we devastated if all our hard work would be copied and sold in cheap-crappy low cost versions.

 

If it works it will copied anyway by some far east companies wether it is open or closed source. Welcome to the real world...

 

[ultiarjan 1,161]

Ultimaker; is it even legal that they want to bring a closed source upgrade to market? Do you guys accept this from your own reseller?

I'm not going to buy it like this...

[izo2 0]

when you plan to ship it ?

i personally prefer full metal hot end and don't print pla...

at least hope will have the choice, because printing polycarbonate is really awesome.

edit : sorry didn't see you write"christmas "

 

[pm_dude 26]

How would a user fix a clog nozzle?

MakerBot already have enough problem with warranty voids and policies like "you must not try to open our extruder" to prove its not the best way to go.

Flex3Drive is involving people into creating models to fit on more printers and I don't think it prevent them from selling it.

I'm not against closed and proprietary stuff but in this type and stage of technology I see it as a downer.

It will still be an awesome achievement if it can work well with most material.

 

[IRobertI 437]

You might want to put in big bold letters that your upgrade doesn't work with PLA since that is the most common material used. It would save both yourself and your customers some headache.

Not a fan of the non open nature either to be honest. Seems a bit strange to produce an upgrade for a fully open printer that in turn was based on other open printers. And like Dim3nsioneer says, if they want to copy it, they will. The factories in China are amazing at what they do hehe.

I'd also be interested to hear more about the feeder that you just mentioned in passing.

 

[izo2 0]

i'm sincerly think you'll have more advantage to keep it open also.

even for buisness, you can't stop clone production.

but same here i respect the choice.

it always easy to say when is not your work...

 

[Anders Olsson 136]

Interesting development, a video would be nice!

I am also happy to read Daid's post, now I just need to get the remaining parts for the second extruder :smile:

My quite extensive tests with full metal hotends really confirms what Daid wrote, PLA and a full metal hotend is not a reliable combination.

When it comes to polycarbonate (PC), I have been printing it with my modified UM2 and I also did extensive destructive testing on the prints.

PC is not completely trivial to work with.

I had to dry the filament in an oven at 130C for a few hours to get reasonable transparency and adhesion. I don't know how often this has to be repeated.

I never managed to get the prints as strong as I had hoped.

When printing at 300C and the buildplate at 110C they were not bad, but I still had hoped they would be a bit stronger (better layer adhesion).

Professional machines like Stratasys has a heated chamber which stays at 120C (I think ?) when printing PC.

I think that is the key to really good layer adhesion.

So, don't hesitate to print PC, but be prepared to put some effort to get reasonable prints and don't expect the prints to be as strong as a solid piece of PC.

 

[LePaul 296]

I'd really like to see how this works in action ....video? Photos of prints in 2 colors?

How precise are the two colors? I do not want the "marbling" you seem to see in other printers with dual extruders mixing colors instead of being separate colors in the print.

You've enticed us! Let's see it in action

 

[nallath 668]

Dim3nsioneer, on 24 Nov 2014 - 10:30 PM, said:

Maybe not the least important question: Will it be open source?

Not it won't since we would we devastated if all our hard work would be copied and sold in cheap-crappy low cost versions.
Why? The same thing happend to Ultimaker and I very much doubt we lost any sales because of it. We definitely did not loose any sleep over it. Throwing it open source is actually being bold enough to show vulnerability.

[sam-bianchi-bazzi 1]

Dim3nsioneer, on 24 Nov 2014 - 10:30 PM, said:

Not it won't since we would we devastated if all our hard work would be copied and sold in cheap-crappy low cost versions.

Why? The same thing happend to Ultimaker and I very much doubt we lost any sales because of it. We definitely did not loose any sleep over it. Throwing it open source is actually being bold enough to show vulnerability.

 

I see many of you are of open source nature and would like our project to be so, too. I will discuss it with the team and give you an update!

All the users responses are great! We'll keep you posted on updates on it. Regarding printing PLA. We have not released it yet mainly for that reason. We're getting better and better results with each version and we think we have almost figured that problem out.

Keep checking this thread

Sam

 

[sam-bianchi-bazzi 1]

How would a user fix a clog nozzle?

MakerBot already have enough problem with warranty voids and policies like "you must not try to open our extruder" to prove its not the best way to go.

Flex3Drive is involving people into creating models to fit on more printers and I don't think it prevent them from selling it.

I'm not against closed and proprietary stuff but in this type and stage of technology I see it as a downer.

It will still be an awesome achievement if it can work well with most material.

 

A clogged nozzle would be fixed in the same way a clogged nozzle would be. We have no problems if users take our hot end to pieces. No worrenty is voided for that!

Regarding closed or open source we'll see Maybe all the users can convice us to take the decision to go open source.

 

[DidierKlein 698]

I truly think you have all to gain with going openSource. As said if someone wants to copy it being openSource or not will not make them think twice It could profit your product (having more people involved in upgrades or changes) and the whole community.

 

[SandervG 1,204]

What he said ^