Thinking about buying a M2

[moejt]

I know its been beaten to death but here I am.

I am buying a 3d printer today! No more putting it off! But I just cant decide between the Makergear M2 and the lulzbot Taz 5. I've heard amazing things about both.

I'm mainly planning to build prototypes for some designs/inventions with maybe some commercial side work for a little extra cash (but that is for another day) thus I really want something reliable that prints well. I've got a full time job, a wife and toddler with another one on the way. I want to keep tinkering and repairs to a minimum - Enter the M2. Its not that I cannot manage to tinker and repair, I'm a mechanical engineer (I tinker enough at my day job), I simply do not have the time. What precious time I do have I would like to spend bringing my ideas to reality. Out of the box printing (while not reality from what I have read) is what I am aiming for. I've read some things that say the Taz 5 is not as good at this? But then comments and reviews are so subjective.

The Taz 5 with its extra print size is almost to tempting to pass up. But on the flip side the Makergear community is either drinking the cool-aid or the printer is seriously the one to rule them all! How can I ignore 138 reviews on amazon with a 4.9 rating... Seriously, not a single 1 or 2 star review out of all of those? On the Taz 5, out of just 28 reviews, 15% of them are 1 stars... But thats not to say that it still doesnt have 4.5 stars. There seems to be a few complaints about the Taz 5 and needing to constantly "tinker" with the leveling ect. Honestly I'm leaning more towards the M2 because some of the negative reviews on the Taz 5 are scaring me away.

Here are my questions:

1. Has anyone ever wished they had the larger print size? My current parts/designs are 1"x10"x1" so I am already pushing the build area of the M2 and I cannot say in the future if I will need the extra size or not. I may end up getting the Taz 5 to never use the extra envelope.

2. I've tried to find info on the dual extruder but I've only found minimal. I'd like to keep my options open for the possibility to use soluble support material. Anyone have any experience with the dual extruder on the M2 vs the Taz 5? Does anyone recommend the dual extruder for either even?

3. Why is Makergears website so... awful? Its very hard to find technical info and its hard to determine what version of parts the printer even ships with. Why does it come with the V3b extruder instead of the most recent V4? I'm tempted to go with the Taz 5 on principle alone.

P.S. - This is my first 3d printer and I have no experience (lots of research though). However this isnt really a concern for me. I was also originally looking at the airwolf HD2x since it comes all setup for dual extrusion but I have since realized I'd probably be over paying for nothing of value.

[insta]

Wow, sorry the question sat in the queue for so long.

1) Always, but then again I run a 3D print service and get people's random prints of all shapes and sizes. I almost never get a 10.5" print, it's either going to fit on the M2 or it's an 18x24" part. Learn to love the solvent welds, no matter what. The TAZ5 isn't *that* much larger than the M2.

2) The dual-extruder is available through MakerGear as a supported user-installed upgrade. Going from a modern 24v M2 to a dual-extruder M2 will take you on the order of 4-5 hours the first time. One of my five M2s is dual extruder, and I use the dual-extrusion capabilities for about 5% of the prints. Of that 5%, about 80% is water-soluble (PVA) supporting PLA. The remaining 20% is HIPS supporting ABS. I've never done a dual-color print. I did a few solid/flex hybrid prints a while ago, which is a really neat concept that works astonishingly well, but haven't designed my own parts for that process yet.

3) MakerGear is a group of engineers, not graphics designers. They focus their energy on making and shipping the printers That said, I believe new M2s are finally shipping with the V4 PTFE hotend.


I know it's cliche, but the reviews aren't wrong. There are occasionally 1-2 star reviews on Amazon, but they're usually the user did something dumb, didn't contact (or didn't work with) support, modified the machine a bunch, then left a negative review on Amazon. Rick will work with them to get their problem solved, and the user will pull the review. It happens once maybe every 3 months, for 1 person. MakerGear probably ships 20 machines a day, so ... do the math?

all this said, and at the risk of earning some ire from Rick, the Taz is a fine machine as well. I've owned Lulzbot products in the past, they offer great support, and also give back to the community as well. That said, my print shop has 5 M2s, and 0 Lulzbots.

[jsc]

Just a comment on dual extrusion: I have a beta dual extrusion. I use it mostly to keep two different filaments (PLA and PETG) loaded up at all times; I have experimented with multicolor prints and soluble supports, but in practice it ends up being necessary approximately 0% of the time. It is nice to have as an option, but I wouldn't miss it if I didn't have it.

As for large parts, yeah, IPS Weld-On #4 is the secret sauce to huge prints.

[insta]

I have had exactly 1 commissioned print that required soluble support material. It had a zipper-edge on one side, and the teeth were too thin for breakaway material. Only zero-gap PVA did the trick.

[kartcrg]

I was actually between the same two printers before I went with the M2 3 months ago. From an engineering standpoint, I decided to invest in quality linear motion components and great customer service / user base over stuff that doesn't impact results like touch screens, thus the M2 purchase. I'm a product designer and use it for prototyping and honestly couldn't be happier. While the printer itself might not look impressive next to some of the competitors, the parts it produces are consistent and excellent: viewtopic.php?f=6&t=2710

[dklassen]

Simply stated, the M2 was the perfect choice for me. I'm the kind of person that can't stop with just one, I always want another and usually something different. I love verity. Problem is when I started looking for my third printer I can't find anything I'd consider better than the M2 in that price range or even higher. Sadly I still only have two printers. What else to by when you already have the best..

[lem]

What else to by when you already have the best

Buy another one.

[bignordique]

I've had my M2 for about two months now.

I consider the printer to be a machine tool. Good
machine tools are solidly built to achieve consistency and repeat-ability.

The Lulzbot frame is built with extrusions and gussets. Some 3d printers frames
are even made of plywood! The M2 has a very solid frame and so far in my experience is
very consistent and repeatable.

Only problem I've had with the M2 is the filament drive stepper motor shaft broke
after about 3 weeks. And while its a real bummer when your shiny new toy breaks, Makergear
support had me back squirting molten plastic in about 5 days. They were great.

As long as I'm at it, I'll reflect on my 3d printer experience... learning curves, lots
of learning curves to climb.

My software tool chain is OpenSCAD/Slic3r/Pronterface. Went this route because I figured
I would try it and if it didn't work I could always fall back to the Symplify 3D.
I've found the open source path works pretty well. Slic3r crashes
occasionally, but its tolerable.

I've found that driving the slicer program with its myriad of knobs is a high art. Knowing how
to set up the slicer for the particular object/material is what makes a good 3d printer operator.

Designing objects for 3d printing takes practice too. You have to learn what the printer can
really do and how to employ OpenSCAD to construct your objects.

Good luck.

bignordique

[dklassen]

What else to by when you already have the best

Buy another one.

If my paid print jobs keep ramping up like they have I might very well do that.