Small low cost 3d printer?

[James Fackert]

Somebody posted about a remarkably capable printer being offered for $99...

Anyone remember the maker or model?

[Kurt at VR-FX]

James - What you speak of may be the following:  $80 EasyThreed K7

A Fellow 3DP guy on here wrote to me about this printer. But, you may be speaking of another machine - that was a tad more expensive at $99.

Going thru old emails in this forum - I did see my own reference to a $99 3DP from iMakr. But, upon going to their website - I do not see it. It may have been discontinued.

-Kurt

On 6/11/2021 9:35 AM, James Fackert wrote:

Somebody posted about a remarkably capable printer being offered for $99...

Anyone remember the maker or model?

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[Joseph Larson]

Fellow 3DP guy here. I was invited to review the EasyThreeD K7 and I gotta say, it's an impressive little machine. I'll be making a full video review of it later, but lemme just break it down like this: 

• Fully functional. 
• Surprisingly accurate in the X and Y
• Direct drive and, yes, it can do flexibles

I've even tested NinjaFlex. The softest flexible I have. 

But on the other hand:

• Interface is... weird. It works, but it takes some getting used to and I still mess up loading/ unloading filament. 
• Very slow. Kind of an advantage when printing ninjaflex, but ignore any time estimates in cura. 
• Strangely inaccurate in the Z and it has troubles with small circles. They kind come out as rounded squares. 

It's a case where the phrase "for the price" takes on a double meaning. For the price you really can't expect much, but for the price it really delivers. 

Would I recommend it to beginners? It's certainly got that beginner price. But depending on the beginner I might recommend spending a bit more and getting something easier to use (like a FlashForge Adventurer 3) or something more hackable (like a Prusa mini). It could be for beginners, but in a guided environment. Maybe a remote home school scenario. But I think the real audience for this will be 3d printing fan boys excited by the idea of an $80 3d printer that actually works. Which it is. 

[TobyCWood]

The EasyThreeD K7 looks like poop to me!
Super craptastic! The X axis looks like it's less than the width of the bed. All plastic construction = minimal rigidity. Way too thin axis rods. Looped GT2 belts = backlash. The cantilevered overhanging gantry is about as insecure a design as you can make it; poop!

OTOH... I kinda feel that way about the Flashforge Adventurer 3 too! Plastic casing and frame, thin gantry ways, looped GT2 belts all closed source.

Maybe it's because of one's relative perceptions based on their actual hands on experience with real quality shop machines Vs 3DPs that are conceived of as toys which come with no assembly at all required. Plastic casings, designed for occasional toy prints, made to be used by the least skilled. Great for grammar school aged kids? Not in my opinion! Teach them with crap tools and they will not learn much. 

BTW Joe...

We're all still waiting on your comments on the "Some assembly required." CR30. Did you have a problem with it? Post to us about it! I'm sure we can get you printing with it.

[TobyCWood]

Lowest I would go...

https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32742461928.html?spm=a2g0o.productlist.0.0.5cff4740jgzZmH&algo_pvid=21df0d9b-1429-4c34-aec4-2137513dd49a&algo_exp_id=21df0d9b-1429-4c34-aec4-2137513dd49a-51

At least with this cheepee the gantry is all aluminum 2050 extrusions. Aluminum feeder. Easy to mod... which one should expect to need to do at that price range.

[Joseph Larson]

I'm not gonna disagree with you, Andy. It's crap. But again, for the price, you can't expect it to be good. And, once you get past that and actually try it out, it surprisingly delivers, and delivers surprisingly. I kinda want to stick a 12v battery pack on this thing and see if I can 3D print on the road with it. Mostly because it's so lightweight.

I've used the TronXY X1. If you're technically confident, or getting it for someone who's technically confident, they're gonna have a great time. I would not recommend it for a home school environment. It's just to fiddly. The K7 is actually easier to get up and running and, excepting leveling the bed, it just works. Yeah it doesn't work perfectly, but I would rather hand crap that works to a student than crap that relies on their technical confidence. They're just gonna have more positive successful experiences with it. 

Now that I'm on my home computer, here's some more pictures of the K7:

I usually start with a print where I push a skirt to the edge of the build area so I can live level the bed. But I messed up the dimensions in cura. However, what surprised me was it didn't hit the end and stutter when it was told to move past it's dimensions. It simply stopped moving. It quietly, gracefully, said "Oh, I can't go that far, he must have meant to stop here" and it did. I've never known a marlin machine to do that, but this piece of crap printer did.

[Joseph Larson]

Groups isn't allowing me to post if I put 2 pictures in one post. So forgive the rapid fire replies.

It look the K7, like, 21 hours to do a Chibimal scaled up to it's maximum build volume, but it did it. Just chugged right along. No clogs, no muss, no fuss. It ain't fast, but slow and steady wins the race.

[Joseph Larson]

Last one.

Printed a few legos because of course what kid isn't going to print legos. And, yeah, you can see, the studs aren't round. I'm guessing it's probably backlash, but I haven't been able to track it down. But surprisingly, the legos fit with each other and commercial legos. And Ender 3 can't even do that out of the box. It's Z dimension is off by quite a bit (even if you get the bed perfectly leveled or use a raft), but it's got it where it counts.

Again, not gonna say this is a good machine. At $80 you can't expect that. But it's impressed me. Honestly, it's almost worth the price to pick one up just for the novelty of "Holy crap, it actually does work."

[Tim Keller]

The Flashforge Adventure 3 looks like a really cool simple printer.

Joe, the belt is what's causing the Z issue. I understand this printer is all about getting under the $100 price point, but the cheapest of cheap threaded rods can't be more than a couple more cents than a loop of belt.

Tim.

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