Ive been planning on trying to build a 3D printer after seeing the BBC article about these a while ago. The only problem i have is deciding which option is best for me to go for. I live in London(UK) and from looking at ebay the reprap parts for the mendal are selling for £350+, which when combined with the electronics is more than I can manage. I have been looking at the alternate versions avalable with the Isaac or the laser cut ply and the cupcake version from techzone as well as the ones on the wiki and i wan advice about wich one is best to go for as far as cost, durability, ease of aquisiiton of componets, metricness, performance and ease of assemblage goes with the different variety of 3D printer, any advice would be much apreaciated.

you might have to do what i did, and just get creative with what you can find. and buy what you need

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[mike-mack.blogspot.com]

The cheapest option for people not owning a CNC mill is probably the Wolfstrap (about € 70,- for mechanical parts and vitamins) [reprap.org] , [reprap.org] . This should be sufficient to build your own set of Mendel parts, if not more. Once done, you can re-use all the stepper motors, electronics and extruders for your "right" Mendel.

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Generation 7 Electronics	Teacup Firmware	RepRap DIY

The London Hackerspace has a makerbot. RepRap map shows 3 functioning RepRaps in your area.

Hunt these people down, and ask for help. I can never turn down a local who wants access to my printer.

The good thing about a local is mendel takes 60 hours to print, but also about 60 hours to put together. You assemble and print at the same time and it really isn't that bad.

Check the Reginal user groups. Check the Maps. Check the Hackerspaces. and last resort, check the colleges.

There is no reason to buy the sets off Ebay unless you can't make friends with someone local.

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repraplogphase.blogspot.com

For 3D printer its better to go buy from ebay. This is because as per my personal experience ebay gives you everything at very competitve prices.

And my personal experience from ebay, is it is always wise to shop around.

David

Are there any places seling the gen3 electronics in UK or EU? only place i have been able to find his the techzone sight.

> Are there any places seling the gen3 electronics
> in UK or EU? only place i have been able to find
> his the techzone sight.

http://www.iprint3d.org/ in Belgium springs to mind. Don't know what they have in stock though.

Not intended to be an ad for anyone listed below, just my personal experience and recommendations.

I bought a set of Isacc CNC'd parts from the Fleming Bros. Very happy with the quality. In addition, Brett and Todd have been very helpful, postsales with information. I got the hardware from McMaster Carr, the centerless drill rod from onlinemetals.com, and the bearings from the the www.thebigbearingstore.com. In hindsight, I'd probably have gone to a sporting goods store for the 608 bearings and bought some ABEC5 skate bearings. Ebay is good, as paypal offers resolution services, but most of the folks I ordered from took paypal. Extruder milled parts came from reifsnyderb, nice quality. Got a heatercore from makergear.com, and the electronics from a combination of makerbot and what would now be botmill.com. The Wade's extruder I bought I got from one of the guys in the forums. Originally I got an Adrian's, but gave up on it after going through the difficulty of finding the splined drive nut in the US. He was nice enough to swap me back for a Wade's which I am very happy with. I chose to assemble most of my boards and got the components from mouser and digikey. Word of warning, some parts are hard to find at the moment, and the backorder on them from these suppliers can take you into late fall. If you are not a glutton for pain, as I am, I'd buy the boards ready-made. Good luck! I'd say altogether, I've got close to $600, or £875. Bottom line, if you are going for convenience over the experience of sourcing everything yourself, you might be better off to just buy a kit. I have had fun going through the process though.

Good luck!

John Vermillion
Isaac repstrap in progress, #5 of 1st series
Strafford, NH USA

The guy who printed my extruder was beverageexpert. Very nice guy, and his stuff looks terrific. The holes lined up nicely.

The best option in my opinion is a Wooden Mendel. You can get the Mendel to work and then re-use the hardware and electronics in the RP Mendel.

I am slowly building a wooden repstrap. Trying to stay as close as possible to the Mendel parts.
The best options in my opinion would be:
- Electronics, I bought mine from Techzone I think they offer a competitive price, around $200. A cheaper option might be to buy a 3 axis or 4 axis CNC controller from eBay and try the EMCRepStrap route. The 3-axis and 4 axis controller sell on eBay for around $66 to 75$. The controller should at least save you from buying 3 stepper controllers, some people have been able to use it to control the extruder stepper motor as well. It requires a computer with a parallel port.
- Hardware, belts, PTFE: $ 170.00 but I have more than I need. McMaster-carr, excellent service, competitive prices and second day delivery.
- Bearings: $ 45.00
- Stepper motors: alltronics.com, from $7.95 a piece. Excellent service.
- Thermistor and misc electronics: mouser.com
- Parts: built them from wood, just time and patience.
- Gears: spd-si.com: ordered stock pulley that I plan to cut. $31.65, I am still shopping for the bigger gears:1 for Wade's Extruder and the two for the Z axis.
- Wade's extruder: built from wood, did not test it yet.
- Extruder head: planning to use welding tips $1 / piece

The good news is that the RP parts seem to be coming down in price recently as more sellers enter the market. So you might not need to spend as much to get the parts.

Good luck
Tayeb

The best option in my opinion is a Wooden Mendel. You can get the Mendel to work and then re-use the hardware and electronics in the RP Mendel.

Hmmm ... How does Wooden Mendel compare with WolfStrap?

Also, after you use the hardware and electronics to make an RP Mendel, what do you do with the wood bits? Use them to make another wooden mendel?

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 06/23/2010 11:28PM by SebastienBailard.

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-Sebastien, RepRap.org library gnome.

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Remember, you're all RepRap developers (once you've joined the super-secret developer mailing list), and the wiki, RepRap.org, [reprap.org] is for everyone and everything!

>> The best option in my opinion is a Wooden Mendel.
>> You can get the Mendel to work and then re-use the
>> hardware and electronics in the RP Mendel.
>
> Hmmm ... How does Wooden Mendel compare with
> WolfStrap?
>
> Also, after you use the hardware and electronics to
> make an RP Mendel, what do you do with the wood bits?
>Use them to make another wooden mendel?

My wooden mendel is not yet up and running, but if you do a decent job with the wooden parts, there is no reason at all to exchange them with plastic. Well, perhaps only if you don't like the look of it. But I can not get myself to take it apart when I've spent so much time on it!

The benefit with a wooden mendel as I see it, is to be able to change parts if they break (doubtfully if you use hardwood). And of course change wooden parts out with plastic if they are not up to par. I think I'll need a printed x axis gantry to go above acceptable print quality.

So, my advice would be:
If you just want to hack together a wooden RepStrap to get a RepRap, WolfStrap is the way to go.
If you want to build a wooden RepStrap you would like to keep, use and be able to upgrade in the future, and you have the tools and skills, Wooden Mendel is for you.

Also, I don't want to be demotivating, but don't underestimate the required skills and (sometimes expensive) tools to build decent wooden mendel parts. I had most of the required tools, as well as a skilled friend with a fully equipped workshop to help me out with the more difficult bits. You can clearly see what parts he made. It was fun, but I don't know if I would do it again. Of course, I don't know how well it will work in real life yet, so this statement is based on my experiences so far, and is subject to change.

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-Nudel
Blog with RepRap Comic

I don't realy think that the wooden option is the one for me, as far as tools go, bar a large saw, i dont have anything for working with wood.

SebastienBailard Wrote:
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> Also, after you use the hardware and electronics
> to make an RP Mendel, what do you do with the wood
> bits? Use them to make another wooden mendel?

Do the same you'd do with the WolfStrap bits. Burn them and celebrate your new Mendel with a barbecue