3D-Printer: KIT or DIY

Akadis · January 23, 2017

Goal: Prusa i3 mk2

So I have a friend which could print all the parts of the prusa, i have a local store to get nearly all mechanical parts and because I am in an electronics/informatics school i won't have any problems with that part

My Question:

Would it be worth it to DIY all of it or should i get the Kit?

r4tch3t · January 23, 2017

I'd say, if you can afford it, a kit. Everything will be there and there's no hard to find parts holding you up.

Akadis · January 23, 2017

4 minutes ago, r4tch3t said:

I'd say, if you can afford it, a kit. Everything will be there and there's no hard to find parts holding you up.

i am thinking about diy to save money. Would I have disadvantages like bigger tolerances and stuff?

dany_boy · January 23, 2017

4 hours ago, Akadis said:

i am thinking about diy to save money. Would I have disadvantages like bigger tolerances and stuff?

The money you will save is not much, and the disadvantages are many if you go full DIY. Even with a kit a 3d printer can be difficult to set up. Go for a kit if you wanna save money, if you want it to just work buy a pre-made.

Cheers!

Hackentosher · January 23, 2017

Yeah get the kit. Chances are your local store won't have things like the PEI bed with auto leveling points or the Ultimachine Mini Rambo. I mean the i3 mk2 kit is pretty cheap and it includes some very high quality parts, there isn't much reason not to go with it.

Andster29 · January 23, 2017

I would go kit. You pay more but everything works better together. I really think the $50 or whatever you spend for the kits is worth it to save time troubleshooting. There are so many headaches that occur when doing a DIY solution. If you have all sorts of time and really want to tinker, then go the DIY solution. Otherwise, the kit is going to be much better in the long run.

r4tch3t · January 24, 2017

Put it this way, I have very little spare money so I decided to go the diy route, that was a year ago. I got caught up by a couple of hard to get parts. I should have it working soon but I wish I'd just saved for a kit so everything was there. Would have taken a couple months extra to save money, but I'd have been using it now.