reprap kit complete hardware minus electronics for less than 300$

Re: reprap kit complete hardware minus electronics for less than 300$

Jean-Louis Bourdon — Wed, 05 May 2010 03:22:55 -0400

Hi

I issued a Paypal request for the cash I paid James, and to its credit. he refunded me completely.

I am sad that my Mendel won't come this way. I am also angry that I wasted so much time believing my kit would arrive anyday since I was led to believe it was in the postal system for the last 5 weeks

Re: reprap kit complete hardware minus electronics for less than 300$

Kelly — Tue, 04 May 2010 17:46:46 -0400

Lets review the facts a bit.

When James originally posted the ads for his kits there were red flags discovered right away that people were questioning. As time went on, more and more red flags were popping up.

Of these red flags the most notable were these three.

First, these kits were being sold with no proof that they would function and James kept dodging the issue by posting videos of other machines running, assembly videos that had nothing to do with his machine actually running and when he finally posted a video of the machine printing out parts it was blurry to the point where it was difficult to tell if it was printing anything useful or just making a mess.

Second, buyers were reporting several problems with the kits that did arrive. Missing parts, parts that break easily, holes in the wrong places and molded parts that were of very poor quality.

Last of all, Communication has been a key issue that James seems to be ignoring. Several buyers have mentioned this problem. At this point communication is of vital importance because of the complaints being lodge in James' direction. These issues need to be addressed. And yet, he remains virtually silent.

I do not believe that James has purposely put himself and others into this awkward position. I feel that he has somehow gotten in over his head which would explain the virtual silence if he's not sure how to solve the issues.

In the future it may be best to avoid buying Reprap devices, kits or parts from anyone who sells them under sketchy or questionable circumstances. In particular, when buying "complete kits" make sure there are videos of the machines printing out parts before purchasing one

Re: reprap kit complete hardware minus electronics for less than 300$

Jean-Louis Bourdon — Tue, 04 May 2010 13:20:06 -0400

Guys,

Since I read deeper about what's happening, and Since James persist in being silent, both through email, or through the forums, and also seeing he prints labels and "declares" dispatched items sometimes several weeks before shipping, (which I think is just dishonest)

I am considering contacting Paypal and complain about James to:

1) ask for a refund.
2) ask suspend/terminate his account, and put him out of business/forbid him to use this service and buy lots of thing online, forever.

Obviously, this would have more weight if several of us contact paypal at the same time. so I'd like to coordinate that before starting any action.

I have nothing against long lead time, after all it promised to be a great service to the community, even if they are longer than original planned, but I will not accept being kept in the dark, or potentially lied about items shipped when they are not.

This is my warning for him to come clean.
post of list of customer with order status (which was removed from his website) send us tracking number.

Jean-Louis Bourdon

Re: reprap kit complete hardware minus electronics for less than 300$

Jean-Louis Bourdon — Sun, 02 May 2010 02:39:33 -0400

My problem is that James was going to ship to the wrong address

when I ordered, I knew I would have probably moved by the time he produce my kit so I asked him to confirm before shipment

the day I got my flat in Derby, I receive a Paypal confirmation of shipment to my old address, in Bristol...

I emailed James to remind him he had promised me to check before sending, and he tries to find if I can have my parcel redirected. I just didn't see how it could be possible. So he said he canceled this shipment and send it to the correct new address. I never received the new tracking number even after several emails

SO

1) UNTIL I RECEIVE MY PARCEL, I WOULD ADVISE ANYBODY NOT TO PLACE ANY ORDER

2) I WILL WAIT A BIT MORE (already more than a month) AND LOOK AT PAYPAL REFUND OPTION IF ANY.

3) WHEN/IF THE KIT ARRIVE, I'LL LE THIS FORUM KNOW

4) I WILL BUILD IT AND LET PEOPLE KNOW OF QUALITY ISSUES

Re: reprap kit complete hardware minus electronics for less than 300$

SebastienBailard — Sat, 01 May 2010 18:15:04 -0400

James, I believe you should put your sales "on hold" until you've taken care of your standing orders. I'm very worried that you are critically overextended.

New users, as a RepRap forum admin, I do not suggest you place new orders with James until his current customers are happy.

Good luck, James. I wish you well with these matters. :S

Re: reprap kit complete hardware minus electronics for less than 300$

Kelly — Sat, 01 May 2010 14:03:04 -0400

James has been very sketchy lately, this recent lack of communication reminds me of a child who suddenly becomes very quiet because they know they did something wrong.

Re: reprap kit complete hardware minus electronics for less than 300$

Jean-Louis Bourdon — Sat, 01 May 2010 10:55:03 -0400

Hi

anybody in contact with James?

I have sent him many emails in the last 3 weeks, requeting for a tracking number, and although he said it is shipped, and not a single answers! ...

Re: reprap kit complete hardware minus electronics for less than 300$

jeremyl — Wed, 24 Mar 2010 23:35:47 -0400

Has anyone gotten their X-bars or extruder kits yet? This is getting ridiculous.

Re: reprap kit complete hardware minus electronics for less than 300$

Tom — Wed, 24 Mar 2010 23:11:30 -0400

Looks like it's printing horribly to me.

Re: reprap kit complete hardware minus electronics for less than 300$

vedran — Sun, 21 Mar 2010 19:14:44 -0400

hello from croatia

i would like to buy a kit from you in any form, assembled or not-with datasheet

and complete electronics/program for modellingg

what would be the price and shipping

tnx Vedran

Re: reprap kit complete hardware minus electronics for less than 300$

Pedro — Wed, 17 Mar 2010 10:55:36 -0400

I would like to buy this kit. Could you send to Brazil? What is your e-mail address?

Re: reprap kit complete hardware minus electronics for less than 300$

Kelly — Wed, 03 Mar 2010 14:58:07 -0500

Any idea of when there will be a legitimate video of one of your completed kits printing out parts?

There appears to be three promises, in this thread alone, of videos to come showing your kit running and printing out parts. Each time there have been no such videos and only vague explanations as to why there are no videos of this exact kit.

I believe that you may be playing a game with us on the edge of a sword as it seems you could possibly be putting out a product during the research and development phase of your design instead of after it has been proven to work efficiently and is structurally sound.

I truly would like to see your product become useful and sell on the open market, but these discrepancies cause me to ponder who will get cut on the edge of the sword if the kits fail to work properly. Us as the clients or you as the seller?

Prove me wrong and I will look into your kits on a serious level.

Re: reprap kit complete hardware minus electronics for less than 300$

Rahere — Wed, 03 Mar 2010 08:25:35 -0500

A reminder for European customers: don't forget Customs will add VAT to the import price, depending on your nation somewhere in the order of 20% more.

Feed screw thinking

Rahere — Wed, 03 Mar 2010 08:17:38 -0500

I think part of your problem here is that the pitch of your leadscrew is wrong. If you look at a lathe, which uses a leadscrew for things like threadcutting, you'll see the pitch is more like 30° on a fairly large diameter, 3cm or thereabouts. That way one turn of the leadscrew moves whatever's mounted on it a fairish distance, while the large diameter allows geared-down precision. Part of the problem you'll run into is backlash, which can be solved by using a slit saddle nut to grip the leadscrew, see [www.finelinehair.com].

Re: reprap kit complete hardware minus electronics for less than 300$

james villeneuve — Sat, 20 Feb 2010 08:16:12 -0500

sounds like good advice. the cost of these things is yourtime + the parts. I think i stated i wanted to only to sell to those that have built 3d printers before. the mendel is leading edge. that means sure it is promising, but work is still going on. i have no clue what people are going to do with my design machine. several people are going to mod it for another tool head, or change the design somehow. I need people willing to put forth the effort, and those that understand the mendel is a work in progress, ask those that know. want something today that works great. go to makerbot.com I envy how easy there design is. want a better machine that you build that does bigger, get a rapman, it uses memory cards! and is the one i started on.. want something to tinker with for a while. get a mendel.......

that being said, i appropriately priced out plastic parts for schools and people that are tight with $$. those that want a complete printer on there doorstep that just works out of box. 700$ that's the cost of the printer, the special packing it goes through, and 8hrs of my time building it! :)

true value of assembled kit

Jean-Louis Bourdon — Sat, 20 Feb 2010 07:59:51 -0500

Dear NitroNorm,

I think you're missing the point, because of the state of this technology, and it's philosophy, you're supposed to, as we say in French, put your hand in the dough... It will help you service/repair/improve the machine.

I don't think any of the kit makers based on reprap have anything assembled (makerbots or bitsfrombytes)

I assembled in the past a bitsfrombytes kits... and a phlatprinter kit too. it is daunting at first but then you feel rewarded when you complete it...

if you don't want to put it yourself together, get a kit either from this thread, my favourite option, as it seems the fastest way to get a mendel, or an other reprap manufacturer.

Then hire a geek or starving student to put it together... try to get an idea how long the geek will need to put it together. How much will you pay him per hour? minimum wages? add cost of kit, then you get true value of what you're asking... to me, $400 doesn't seem reasonable. more like kit cost plus at least £100 or $200. if you pay someone peanuts, he's more likely to do an half-ass job too... it may look complete, but the cartesian bot might not be true, or the extruder head not perfect, and you have to take it apart and start over from begining...

of course you could always strike a deal by letting him have printed parts for free made by your then assembled machine... or any other parts he may want if he doesn't want a machine...

so with all that, better put it yourself together...

Re: reprap kit complete hardware minus electronics for less than 300$

NitroNorm — Sat, 20 Feb 2010 01:05:47 -0500

Dear James, I'm not what you would call a very handy man around tools. I've got all this tstuff in the garage, a lath and drill press i got from my dad, but the idea of building something entirly from scratch, then upgrading the nest day, is not something i looked forward to., If i could get a COMPLETE up to date Mendel RepRap 2.0 machine for under 400 dollars with all the latest gimmiks, i'd be eternally grateful.
I suppose it's just like way back when radios first came around, or computers, and you could go into a store and give your kid a kit to assemble a working radio from scratch. assembling it would be fun, but i'd like to have the entire thing first just to get started.
Take pride in the fact that this is just the begining. Like the start of the industreal evolution, the printing press revolutionised communications. This will not end with us.

Re: reprap kit complete hardware minus electronics for less than 300$

james villeneuve — Thu, 18 Feb 2010 23:20:15 -0500

kit is done, I'm posting videos of building it, then posting videos of it in use,

james

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Re: reprap kit complete hardware minus electronics for less than 300$

Robert Schafer — Sat, 13 Feb 2010 22:51:16 -0500

Please inform me when your new design is available in kit form and at what price.

Thanks

Bob Schafer

PS Love what you have done!!!

Re: reprap kit complete hardware minus electronics for less than 300$

RyanGeorge — Wed, 03 Feb 2010 12:06:54 -0500

you said something about uprgrading the electronics... why would they need to be upgraded?

Re: reprap kit complete hardware minus electronics for less than 300$

Ruyzen — Wed, 03 Feb 2010 05:30:58 -0500

Hi James,

I am currently building a Mendel myself (and also posted a THREAD ).

Right now, I am missing a supplier who could provide me with the necessary Mendel plastic parts. Is there any chance you could sell those parts?

Re: reprap kit complete hardware minus electronics for less than 300$

james villeneuve — Tue, 02 Feb 2010 09:29:19 -0500

thanks! i'm quite busy right now putting my mendel back together. i needed it taken apart to reference parts for the ones i am selling.

also please note i am not accepting any more orders till after 2/8/2010. any further payments sent before then will be refunded within 48hrs. sorry i want to get what i promised out the door!

I am at my capacity to build till then. if you see a video online with a wooded table top, i have switched to acrylic, with labeling taped beneath having logo. so you see thru acrylic and see a color logo, but it is printed, not etched/machined . reprap logo was taking to long to machine out of wood, and too much clean up work. i'll post that video soon as well.

if anyone makes cheap acrylic reprap table tops then email me we can do business. this part is too time consuming for me to do in my own shop..... thanks.

James

Re: reprap kit complete hardware minus electronics for less than 300$

RyanGeorge — Mon, 01 Feb 2010 22:48:19 -0500

If the videos good ill buy one asap :D

Re: reprap kit complete hardware minus electronics for less than 300$

james villeneuve — Mon, 01 Feb 2010 20:27:38 -0500

i will post a video sometime next week. one that shows it building parts.

my current setup is taken apart as i am redesigning the x axis stage.

james

Re: reprap kit complete hardware minus electronics for less than 300$

mattkos — Mon, 01 Feb 2010 15:49:34 -0500

James, I would be interested in one of your kits, but I have to second RyanGeorge's comment. Do you have a video of one of the fully functional Mendels printing a part?

Re: reprap kit complete hardware minus electronics for less than 300$

RyanGeorge — Sun, 31 Jan 2010 21:12:19 -0500

can you post a video of a fully functional one of your mendels printing parts?

Re: reprap kit complete hardware minus electronics for less than 300$

nophead — Sat, 30 Jan 2010 20:27:30 -0500

Steppers run hottest when stationary and use less power the faster they go as the torque falls off.

The video shows very long acceleration periods so it will need the 5D code to keep the extruder flow in sync.

Very interesting

Jaap — Sat, 30 Jan 2010 17:00:11 -0500

Mail sent to James.

Re: reprap kit complete hardware minus electronics for less than 300$

spacexula — Sat, 30 Jan 2010 14:02:34 -0500

Won't there be issues with motor heat on your design? Seems that a 3 hour print stepping at 80 rpm on a NEMA 17 stepper motor is a little extreme. I know my makerbot Z axis gets pretty warm with it's workload, which is NOTHING like this.

Re: reprap kit complete hardware minus electronics for less than 300$

Jeff Olijar — Sat, 30 Jan 2010 13:51:46 -0500

Sold. How would you like to get paid and what will shipping be to
Illinois 60112 ?