I'm in the market to buy a 3D printer, price range £300 to £1K. I've printed a lot before, but always with other folks printers. So I've a huge amount of printing experience, a small amount of printer maintainence experience (mostly unpleasant), and no experience picking printers to use.
The main sort I've used before was a Robox Dual but that is a) a bit above my prive range, b) not great value I think and c)very hard to repair and maintain, plus d) out of stock everywhere right now.
I'm after something, preferably dual material so I can use a weak material, of different colour to my main plastic, as support strut. i am ofcourse after FDM not resin.
I'm after something quite maintainable, something where if parts fail i can buy new ones from a wide variety of sources, i don't need full open source but something close ot it would be nice.
Absolutely must take filament of standard size and from any brand, and cheap filament too.
I absolutely require something that can be operated entirely with open source slicer and control software, and must not require any proprietary, or windows only, software for setup calibration or anything else. I have an absolute requirement I must be able to do everything from only a linux PC.
I'm after something compatible with a wide range of slicers.
I print a lot of gears and a lot of things with substantial overhang, hence the dual filament desirability. I'd also appreciate something which prints fairly mechanically strong parts, where the subsequent layers will melt in to each other a bit, and where I can do solid or many-perimetered parts without much warping, either in PLA (preferable) or ABS.
I'm after a build volume around 20x25cm x-y and 15cm, or a little less, on the z height.
The printer must not require any interent connection or wifi at any point during setup or operation.
I would always be printing with a layer height of 0.2mm.
Automated and safety features that let me concentrate more on desinging parts and less on worrying if they'll print are welcomed, I think heated bed is crucial and I don't know about auto-levelling, a semi-enclosed build chamber could be useful if reducing airflow and getting warm can help give stronger prints, but must be one which can be opened mid-print and where the head can be paused in realtime. (that way if an ugly glob of plastic builds up on the nozzle during printing I can pause it and tweezer it off without having to loose the print).
If I can buy from amazon that is helpful, otherwise any reputable UK seller with prices in £ and easy delivery methods.
Thank you
If this is the wrong place please advise where to ask this, thanks.