Does what I'm looking for exist? [Looking for a 3D Printer]

Hello RepRap community -

I'm interested in dipping my toe in the 3D printing world, and I've been doing some research into the best way to start out. I've found a lot of very interesting possibilities, but I haven't been able to figure out whether I can hit all my goals yet with a current offering, so I'm wondering if anybody has any advice.

While I'm excited for myself, I'm hoping that this is something that will get my kids excited as well. Because I don't know if it will capture their imaginations, I would like something fairly cheap. Ideally <$600, but definitely <$800. I'm not super concerned about expandibility, as for that price point, I'm OK just getting a second, more-capable printer if they get hooked. I want the quality to be good enough that the prints aren't crap, but it doesn't have to be best-in-breed.

I've been a professional software developer for 20 years, and I've worked on 3D surface modelling and low-level hardware-control programming, so I'm OK if I have to (get to ) do some software hacking. My electrical skills are probably adequate for most of what needs to be done (e.g. I modded my Atari 2600 to output composite video instead of RF). That said, I'd be just as happy with an assembled machine as a kit, as I'm more interested in spending my time on figuring out printing and building something, and I definitely I don't want to spend the time sourcing all the parts, so I'm looking at either a kit or an assembled unit. If I do get a kit, I definitely want an assembled hot end.

My friend recently built a Printrbot LC, and while he is still figuring out how to get the best out of it, that certainly seems to meet all of the aforementioned requirements. So the last requirement is that I'm not very good at waiting, and it seems that Printrbot is a little overwhelmed with orders. The LC isn't even orderable, and the other Plus and Jr have 4-6-week lead times. I'd like to find something that I could get quickly.

Finally, having dealt with open-source software for a long time, I know that while you can always figure stuff out yourself, it's good to have an active community to answer questions for you. The MakerBot Prusa seems to be a candidate, but its Google Group is not at all active. Maybe that doesn't matter because it's a Prusa and you can get whatever you need in this forum, but I don't have the experience yet to answer that question.

So, to summarize:

Hard requirements
<$800
Assembled hot end
Ship within a week
Active community

Nice-to-haves
<$600
ABS capability (e.g. I'm OK with PLA-only for this one)
Fully assembled

What's your advice?

Thanks.

Andrew

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 01/06/2013 12:12PM by acertain.

Nophead's Mendel90 kits. Don't know about the shipping time though. 499 GBP + shipping.
[hydraraptor.blogspot.de]

A friend of mine just built one of these kits and I was pretty impressed with how complete it was
[forums.reprap.org]
I'd prefer if the XCarriage and Extruder were printed in ABS but for the price it's pretty good.

Having said that, if you like what your friend has, you might be better waiting, would make dealing with spares and failures easier, none of these kits are instant gratification, most people are going to take 15+ hours to assemble one, assume there are no issues, my friend above is just to the point of printing and he's probably had the kit for 5 weeks.

The Ecksbot by eckertech [www.eckertech.com] might be at the top of your price range but is a solid, easy to assemble kit with a fairly active developer.

-Rob A>

Prusa mendel from any of the several quality vendors around, for people new to reprap who plan on getting into the hobby.

Prusa Mendel has to be the best bang for your buck, there are better printers but they cost more. Buy a kit and build it yourself if you can - it will pay off in the long run when you have to calibrate/modify it.

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Richmond, New Zealand
Thingiverse ~ YouTube

Thanks for all the info.

I agree that there is some upside to waiting for the Printrbot, though the fact that I can't even order it and they haven't responded to my tweets, leaves me wondering how long waiting means.

So I gather from the replies that the fact that the MakerGear (I meant MakerGear above, not MBot, clearly) forum isn't very active shouldn't concern me because most issues should be generic prusa issues that could be addressed somewhere such as here?

Andrew