I’m Jason Firth.
Late last year, I decided it was time to jump into two technologies I really wanted to play with that I’d been putting off for a long time: Virtual Reality, and 3d printing. At the time I selected what appeared to be good choices for both off of Amazon: The Oculus Rift for VR, and the FLSun Delta Kossel for 3d printing.
At the time, I expected virtual reality to be the thing with staying power and for the 3d printer to be a quick toy. What I quickly realized is that Virtual Reality isn’t really for me in a lot of ways — I’ve played many hours, but never really gotten sucked in the way I thought I would. On the other hand, 3d Printing has become a hobby I really enjoy.
The FLSun Delta Kossel was an inexpensive unit. Today you can buy it on Amazon for about $200 CDN. It was really a cheap unit, and I’ve written about my experiences with that unit.
Plutarch wrote of the Ship of Theseus: “The ship wherein Theseus and the youth of Athens returned from Crete had thirty oars, and was preserved by the Athenians down even to the time of Demetrius Phalereus, for they took away the old planks as they decayed, putting in new and stronger timber in their places, insomuch that this ship became a standing example among the philosophers, for the logical question of things that grow; one side holding that the ship remained the same, and the other contending that it was not the same.”
The printer over the course of the year has become like this. I’ve replaced virtually every component, upgraded everything in some way or another. Is it still an FLSun Delta Kossel? That’s difficult to say. What I can say for certain is it’s now a very impressive printer that tends to put out excellent quality prints.
After my year with the printer, I realized how much I’ve enjoyed 3d printing, and I wanted a larger printer that’s a bit more standard so I can start printing larger things and spend a bit less time tinkering with the printer itself.
To that end, I’ve bought a Tevo Tornado. It is a popular model of printer, lots of support out there, and overall I feel it’s going to be a good choice long-term.
My first impression: I’m really impressed with a lot about this printer. The FLSun came in a million pieces and took me a full 2 days to assemble. By contrast, it took me all of 2 minutes to assemble the Tevo Tornado when it arrived. It homed immediately and I found it simple to level the bed, contrasting the Delta’s bed which was always a pain. I’m really happy with the first 15 minutes with the thing.
Before I even get started with this printer, however, I want to replace the main board. It came with an MKS Gen L, identical to the FLSun. There’s no problem with this board for straight 3d printing, but I want a board with a processor instead of a microcontroller, having seen the limitations of the Atmel mega while using my Delta Kossel, and I want a board with built-in Wifi capability. Using Octoprint on my previous printer was a great experience, running around with a memory stick is ridiculous when I can just press one button to start a print. I purchased a DuetWifi clone board.
I’ll pass on my notes as I work with this new printer.
Thanks for reading!