3D Printer choice

[Keivan]

Hi All

im in the market to buy a 3D printer and I narrowed it down to two there is Ultimake 2 and then there is Lulzbot taz 4.
was wondering if any one can help me to get one over the other. they are both excellent printers from what I have read.
any suggestion which one would be a better choice?
I m properly going to use the printer mostly for wearable props like helmets and other cools things

best
K

 

[khitomer]

Check out James Bruton at xrobots.co.uk, he uses the Lulzbot and produces some amazing work.

 

[o2b4wln]

I have the Lulzbot 3 and absolutely love it. Combine it with Simpify3d,( http://www.simplify3d.com ) and you'll never regret your investment. The large build plate and great community forum makes it a great piece of hardware to own.

They now offer 2 types of dual-extruders, one that prints standard filament and the other that prints ninja-flex, a flexible, rubber-like filament.

You mentioned that you'll be printing props so I would highly recommend purchasing Simplify3d, one of it's best features is that it allows you to pick where to put supports. This is invaluable when printing objects with lots of curves and raised parts.

Good luck with whatever you choose.

Take care,
O2b4wln

 

[Creative Models]

What is the price range to get the both the printer and program package. And is there a good place online to purchase them.

 

[o2b4wln]

What is the price range to get the both the printer and program package. And is there a good place online to purchase them.

3D Printer:
https://www.lulzbot.com/products/lulzbot-taz-4-3d-printer - $2,194.95

Slicing Software:
http://www.simplify3d.com/ - $140.00


Ultimaker is approx $2,500 and I believe uses it's own software. It's a great printer but when I was looking into purchasing one they had to ship it from abroad and that drove the price up by an additional $250. I believe they now have a US distributor. It's supposed to be a good printer but I believe the build plate is smaller than the Lulzbot and that's one of the reasons I chose the Taz.

Of course, I bought my printer in January 2014 so I'm sure there are other printers out there with bigger build plates and better performance but I'm very satisfied with my printer.

 

[Keivan]

Thank you O2b4win
for your input. can you print ABS with your Lulzbot as well? is there any warping?

K

I have the Lulzbot 3 and absolutely love it. Combine it with Simpify3d,( http://www.simplify3d.com ) and you'll never regret your investment. The large build plate and great community forum makes it a great piece of hardware to own.

They now offer 2 types of dual-extruders, one that prints standard filament and the other that prints ninja-flex, a flexible, rubber-like filament.

You mentioned that you'll be printing props so I would highly recommend purchasing Simplify3d, one of it's best features is that it allows you to pick where to put supports. This is invaluable when printing objects with lots of curves and raised parts.

Good luck with whatever you choose.

Take care,
O2b4wln

 

[o2b4wln]

Thank you O2b4win
for your input. can you print ABS with your Lulzbot as well? is there any warping?

K

You can, it can print pretty much any type of filament. If you want to print ninja-flex you have to purchase a separate extruder. My printer is in my home-office so I don't print ABS since there is a lot of off-gassing from that material that's toxic.

If you look at the lulzbot forums (or any 3d printing forum) there is a special abs 'juice' that people use that helps the abs stick to the heated build plate.

-O2b4wln

 

[Keivan]

that guy is Awesome.

Check out James Bruton at xrobots.co.uk, he uses the Lulzbot and produces some amazing work.

 

[cunningham]

I too am interested in a printer - is the Makerbot products any good? I saw the documentary and was a little turned off of the company, but putting that aside, how do they compare with Lulzbot?

 

[o2b4wln]

I too am interested in a printer - is the Makerbot products any good? I saw the documentary and was a little turned off of the company, but putting that aside, how do they compare with Lulzbot?

I've heard good and bad about Makerbot, they tend to be on the expensive side and have proprietary parts and software.

The build plate isn't as large as Lulzbot. I feel that having an open source platform makes printing your own upgrades much easier vs. purchasing the parts from the manufacturer. Lulzbot actually posts the files for their parts that you can upgrade.

So it really comes down to how much you're looking to spend, the size of the build plate and the ease of upgrading by printing your own parts.

 

[cunningham]

Thanks for the advice, you answered my concerns completely.