The printer: a Robo3D R1+Plus; a single extrude head printer with an auto-leveling and heated print bed with a build volume of 8 x 9 x 10 (inches) or 203.2 x 228.6 x 254 (mm). Cost: $800
The Robo3D comes with open source MatterControl printing software, which can be downloaded at www.mattercontrol.com. The interface is actually pretty straightforward but it does take time to get familiar with how it functions.
The printer came with a (small) spool of blue PLA filament, which I began using up fairly quickly after watching a few videos and reading the manual, I made the obligatory calibration circle, which comes preloaded in the library, and then moved on to more challenging models. The first was a set of kiddie toy helicopters I downloaded from Thingverse (www.thingiverse.com/thing:5225)
I decided to scale the models down by 1/2, but ended up having issues getting the tail rotor plug to print properly, so I've put the project aside for now. Here are the helicopters virtually finished.
So after about a month of using the printer, I've made a few cool items, and I feel I've learned enough to begin planning the Printer Project. I will look for a design that I can adapt to my requirements. I've been looking at the available 3D printer plans at www.openbuilds.com and have seen a few that might work well. More on that in the next post.
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