Hacker News Reader

> - IMO multi material printing has always been a buggy gimmick (mostly multi material setups are very prone to failure).

Agreed, with the asterisk that this applies more to multi-feeders (Prusa's MMU, Bambu's AMS) rather than IDEX. Which is where Prusa's going with the XL, and I'm excited about it.

> - Them advertising that the printer can print "advanced" materials like PC is a gimmick too, the main issue with FDM printers is layer adhesion and no matter what material you are using its going to suck compared to injection molding.

Flag on the play: sweeping generalization, ten yard penalty, repeat second down.

PC printing is really handy for intrinsically bespoke things like tools in the wood shop. I don't need an injection-molded run of them--but nobody's selling things I can buy that address problems in the way I want to.

> - bashing bed slingers is wrong too, they have their advantages compared to CoreXY setups (mostly simpler mechanics)

This is an effectively solved problem with modern motion system controls. CoreXY on Marlin might be a mess, but CoreXY on Klipper is clean. Aside from cost of development and manufacture, I don't understand developing new bedslingers except for cost...and the MK4 costs $1100.

> PC printing is really handy for intrinsically bespoke things like tools in the wood shop.

Can you name some examples? As a hobbyist woodworker I've used my 3D printer to print router templates where PLA was fine enough for the task.

> Aside from cost of development and manufacture, I don't understand developing new bedslingers

Another reason is that bedslingers are good enough for most users. If you dont try to print 30cm high columns with 300mm/s a simple bedslinger will do. I've printed my best minis with a slightly modded Ender 3 and I have a pretty high end CoreXY printer. I could tune the CoreXY one too to be on par with quality but for such stuff bedslinger vs CoreXY doesnt matter

> Can you name some examples? As a hobbyist woodworker I've used my 3D printer to print router templates where PLA was fine enough for the task.

I'm currently using PC to build friction-fit dust collection gear. PLA and PETG are great in a lot of cases but if you want to use bayonets to ensure a solid connective fit (whether they're themselves plastic or something like socket-cap screws), PLA and PETG both wear much too quickly.

>bashing bed slingers is wrong too, they have their advantages compared to CoreXY setups (mostly simpler mechanics)

Tangent: why was moving the bed the solution over having X and Y on independent axes? I’ve always wondered. Cost and initial reliability?

Cost is part of it. If you look at bed-dropper printers (the Ender 5 or the Sovol SV05), there's just more metal involved. Metal is expensive. It's also heavy, so your shipping costs go up.

It's also a simpler set of kinematics for the system to deal with. Most 3D printers have pretty dumb microprocessors (value engineering!) at their core. CoreXY printers use two steppers to execute any movement, and that requires more calculations. Delta printers use three steppers to execute any movement, even.

More modern printers run Klipper, which offloads the kinematic calculations to a single-board computer, and that addresses a lot of the problems you run into. Klipper also helps with bedslinger kinematics too, though, as it has the headroom to do some forward-looking optimization. The current state of printers is pretty cool.

Being able to print pc isn't a gimmick. They point this out because it's one of the hardest filaments to print. PC isn't used a ton by hobbyists but it is extremely popular in industry.