Comment

Comment on Advice choosing my next 3d printer

phrogpilot73@lemmy.world ⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

I have an Ender 3V2 that I converted to direct drive with linear rails and CR Touch, and was pretty happy with the reliability of it. I’ve been wanting to build a Voron forever, but the amount of hours to build/cost of a kit (I can’t print ABS) was a barrier to entry.

I just picked up a Sovol SV08, which is a derivative of the Voron 2.4 (there are some proprietary parts on it, but $579 vs. $1000-1200 for a kit, I’m OK with that). I’m pretty happy with it thus far, although it did require some initial tinkering. Here are the highlights:

Core XY
Enclosure Ready
Fast (printed something that took 26 hours on the Ender, and it took less than 4 on the SV08).
Finicky for the initial z-offset. Heat soak the bed for 30 min at 65 degrees, then run the automatic z-offset.
Got super frustrated why I couldn’t figure out the inconsistent extrusion/shitty prints. Tightened the tension screw on the extruder. Problem solved (rookie move).

Time will tell if it’s a long term printer, or more of a tinkerer. However, they open sourced it all - and there’s already a ton of mods. Printing the housing for the BTT 5" touchscreen, saving me $50 over buying a touchscreen from Sovol. It might be worth a look.

source

Sort:hotnew top

IMALlama@lemmy.world ⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
2.4 owner here. Happy to hear some feedback on the SV08, it looks like a pretty good deal.

Fast (printed something that took 26 hours on the Ender, and it took less than 4 on the SV08

I’m surprised you saw that much of a speed improvement, but I guess I ran my old i3 clone somewhat fast. My print times were a bit faster on my Voron, thanks to cranking speed and acceleration, but the biggest time savings came from taking advantage of the much better hot end and using a 0.6mm nozzle with thicker line widths (I can cover nearly 2.0mm with two perimeters) and thicker layers (0.3 on most prints these days).

Finicky for the initial z-offset. Heat soak the bed for 30 min at 65 degrees, then run the automatic z-offset

Were you homing z with the bed cold? If homing z involves touching the build plate, I could see this. You could probably just adjust your start g-code to accommodate this. One of the nice things about the 2.4 is that the z end stop is bolted to the frame, so as long as your print routine is consistent you can dial it pretty easily.

That said, just wait until you enclose your printer. The frame will grow in z fairly significantly as it heats up. I’ve not let my printer heat soak, printed a number of sequential parts in one print, and watched the first layer squish getting worse and worse with each sequential part. Eventually filament won’t even stick to the build plate, so you need to tweak z-offset.

source
- phrogpilot73@lemmy.world ⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  
  I’m surprised you saw that much of a speed improvement, but I guess I ran my old i3 clone somewhat fast. My tuned/reliable profile (on Prusaslicer) on the Ender 3v2 was 40-60 mm/s and acceleration 200 mm/s^2. The stock profile (on Orca) for the SV08 is 200-300 mm/s and acceleration of 20000 mm/s^2. That’s probably why such a dramatic speed increase.
  
  Were you homing z with the bed cold? If homing z involves touching the build plate, I could see this. The auto z-offset on the SV08 heats the bed to 65, then does a QGL, followed by cleaning the nozzle, then the z-offset calibration (using the inductive probe), followed by a bed mesh, then a test print. Most of what I’ve read is that the heater is not the most efficient at heating the bed up completely. That’s why everyone (Sovol included) recommend heat soaking for the initial z-offset. After I did that, I’ve had no problems with first layers.
  
  source
- papalonian@lemmy.world ⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  
  That said, just wait until you enclose your printer. The frame will grow in z fairly significantly as it heats up. I’ve not let my printer heat soak, printed a number of sequential parts in one print, and watched the first layer squish getting worse and worse with each sequential part. Eventually filament won’t even stick to the build plate, so you need to tweak z-offset.
  
  Jesus, is that what’s going on… I enclosed my Franken-printer (well it was already enclosed but now it’s less shitty) and my first layer kept growing, I figured it was an inconsistent BLTouch…
  
  source
  - IMALlama@lemmy.world ⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
    Aluminum’s expansion coefficient is 0.000023m/C. Using my Voron, let’s say the z extrusions are 530mm long and my extrusions go from 22 °C to 55 °C. This means they grow 0.35mm. That’s in total, so the effect at the print head isn’t 0.35mm, but let’s say my gantry rides 25% of the way up. That’s 0.0875mm, which is roughly 3x the z-offset of my last print.
    
    source