I got this at the last sale. Fantastic 3D printer. Easy assembly and perfect prints without any modifications.
I don’t know much about 3D printers, but have been wanting to get one to make miniatures and terrain for tabletop games.
Is there a spec I should look for to know how good the resolution(?) is?
Thanks in advance!
There are various folk who are able to do this with degrees of success.
This person is using the stock .4mm nozzle.
Same guy, with video.
https://www.reddit.com/r/PrintedMinis/comments/8kmvnb/oc_3_weeks_of_mini_printing_on_the_ender_3/
This guy’s pretty solid.
This is the standard model for cheap Chinese 3D printers because they open sourced the hardware design. It has a fairly good “community” for answering questions and you can actually buy parts and upgrades. This is really a kit which you have to construct fairly carefully and I would classify it as “moderate” in complexity. This is about the right price range–you would not have a hard time matching or beating this deal.
I have the Ender 5, and it’s great. If you like to tinker, the Ender series is a good fit. Tabletop terrain and minis print well, but keep in mind 3D printers require a good bit of tweaking to get prints to their best. Don’t be discouraged on your first several prints, they’ll be bad. It’ll take several tries to get the calibration right, and you will need to level the bed often.
The filament it comes with isn’t very good. So use it for a few prints to learn the printer, then replace it with good filament. Hatchbox is recommended a lot and it’s around $20 a spool.
Like @johnellenberger said, the community is very helpful and have done some wild modifications. Check out the Ender 3 subreddit for tips and useful upgrades - several you print yourself on your new machine!
The Ender 3 includes 0.4 mm nozzles, but replacement nozzles ranging from 0.2 to 1.0 mm are inexpensive, available through Amazon among other places. Smaller nozzles enable printing with greater detail, at the expense of time.
Check out UV Resin printers for miniatures. I’ve been eyeballing the ANYCUBIC Photon for $260 on Amazon.
When I was looking at Ender-3 Pro’s back in Novemeber, I was told to lean towards Creality’s version.
Are there any major differences between Creality’s and SainSmart’s Ender-3 Pro?
thanks!
They’re open source machines so pretty much all the same. I will say that Sainsmart has pretty good customer service and replacement part policy. They also have a Facebook group that their reps actively comment on when people have issues.
I scored one of these from Woot! over Thanskgiving and it has been running non-stop since it arrived. Be patient with the assembly (and watch the Tomb of 3D Printed Horrors assembly video!) and you’ll have a solid, fun machine. Be prepared to spend at least the price of the printer in filaments and let everyone know they’re getting baby Yodas next Christmas.
This will arrive with almost enough filament to print 75% of the included test model. Buy filament ahead of time so you don’t have to be sad when the sample is gone.
No difference between this and the Creality aside from branding. My SainSmart’s mainboard even has the Creality logo on it.
I have Ender 3 non-pro (~ $165) and I agree with Dcord319, follow Tomb of 3d Printed Horrors assembly (youtube). Included and available-download instructions suck.
Woot’s listed pro version seems to have a few good upgrades worth the price, including an improved nozzle and a flex-magnetic bed pad. Get this if you’re new to the 3d game.
recommendations for filament? I know @aylovett above mentions hatchbox, i see this printer says it is compatible with “1.75 mm PLA, TPU, ABS, PETG” PLA seems to be the most common, so I guess, just start there?
I found the assembly video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=me8Qrwh907Q, so i’ll start there as well. thanks much!
This or pay $209 on crealitys website for their pro from China?
Does this have the same features as creality ender 3 pro? Run away protection?
I’m tossing around the same right now.
from what I learned today, they are manafactured by creality3d regardless of who sells them. in this case SainSmart does the QC and resale. so you would go to SainSmart with any questions/issues. and just from what i’ve seen around, SainSmart actualy does some preshipment QC to make sure you get a good product. ex: Reddit - Dive into anything
I also was told to stick with creality3d since they are the original manufacture, but it seems like there are resellers who simply toss it in the box and hope for the best (alibaba guys) and resellers like SainSmart who actually care a bit…
( maybe, we will see how it goes : ) )
I ended up picking it up. I hmm’d and haw’d for a while… debated waiting for an unknown amount of time for another ~$160 deal to pop up. In the end, I figured if I wait I’ll probably regret the decision and just skip it or I’d wait a few weeks, end up spending more because I want it now. I’ve been on woot for a long time now, but haven’t ordered much (if anything) since the Amazon thing happened, so I’m not sure of what all protection is in place, but the quicker shipping was nice to see.
I highly recommend starting with PLA. It’s the most forgiving and requires a lower temperature than the others. PLA is UV sensitive however so I would not recommend it for anything you’re going to use outside. It also doesn’t fair well in a hot car.
PETG is next and prints well with a higher melting temperature but it’s more durable. It prints almost as easily as PLA.
I’m not sure how well the ender3 does with TPU out of the box. TPU is flexible and the filament path needs to be well contained.
ABS can be a pain to print and is not a good filament for someone starting out.
I personally use hatchbox for almost everything. It’s maybe a dollar ot two more per kg but it prints very well.
I’m not sure how well the Ender3 machines will handle nozzles larger than 0.6mm or so. Larger nozzles allow more plastic to flow and that requires more heat in the hot end to keep everything nice and melted. In my experience the size of the heater block and the wattage of the heater cartridge become a factor, especially at 1.0mm.
Resin printers do produce better detail for miniatures, but please do your research before investing in one. There is a lot more overhead in handling of materials, post-print processing, etc. The miniatures come out great, but just know what you’re getting into.