[A Demon Llama!]

Does anyone own a 3d printer or has any experience with any, especially the Solidoodle 2?

I've been seriously considering buying a Solidoodle but am not entirely convinced that it will be reliable as its so much cheaper than other 3d printers. Maybe I should wait for better options or prices to drop on those things as I dont have too much spare time anyway. But those things are so damn cool and I want one.

[Imperial Historian]

I don't have any experience with that model, but we do have a makerbot in my lab. From our experience the things you need to look out for are resolution and stability.

If you want to make high resolution models, you really need a printer that doesn't just print and then allow plastic to set, as the plastic inevitably expands and runs slightly, you can print things but they don't have a smooth finish. This also ties in with mechanical strength as standard 3d printer plastics (pla and I think its aibn) don't have the strength for high stress or strain applications.

The other major issue is unattended operation, as designed our printer nearly fell off the bench a number of times, and printing got slightly shifted and messed up many more. You need to secure it firmly somewhere (as in bolt it down) or watch it whilst printing.

That said a brief glance at the spec of that printer looks OK, similar to ours and much cheaper. It really depends on exactly what you want to do.

http://store.makerbo...r.html#features

[frookenhauer]

You can build your own for $400 or so.

LINKY

Its on my to do list....

However a recent kickstarter project has created the printrbot that is marginally more expensive...but you get all the bits from the same place and they should fit together nicely.

Linky 2

Have fun

[A Demon Llama!]

Cool.

I should build my own... but I don't see that ever happening. That Printrbot looks really interesting, will look into it, thanks. I think I will wait for a while before getting one, maybe make some 3d models first, but I am almost 127% sure that I will be getting some sort of 3d printer in the nearish future.