Some Notes on Acquisition
Where to buy from? If this is your first rodeo, and you're only building one machine, I highly recommend a kit. Buying oodles of parts from different suppliers can be a hassle, and often will only save money if you're buying more than one machine, or spending a lot of time scavenging deals.
I am sourcing four machines, and building two myself. Right now I have less time than money - so my sourcing decisions may not match your own.
Last note: this is a video build. I am filming myself with Google Glass, and I don't edit much.
I hope that was exciting.
Materials - initial run, anyways
- woodworkerssource.com
- $10.25 per printer - $41 for 6 sheets of 1/4" Baltic Birch plywood, 20"x30"
- You need 1.5 sheets per printer, so six sheets = 4 printers
- McMaster-Carr
- $70.68 for 6 Smooth Rods - 8mm by 400mm precision steel shaft
- $10.72 for stainless steel threaded rod, 5mm by 1000mm long
- $24.62 for 3/16" Borosilicate glass, 8"x8"
- $23.73/4 for 25' of 3/8" heatshrink tubing (way more than you'll need for one printer... I'm stocking up). Get the red heatshrink.
- $17.79/4 for polyester cable sleeving - if you don't make the printer nice, it's way harder to fix it later.
- $7.51/4 for 1/16" diameter high-temp sleeving - I'm going to try putting this on the thermistor.
- AliExpress
- $12.42 for 20LM8UU bearings (you need 10... order extra. I ordered 60 for four printers)
- $3.40 for 6mm wide tensioning springs
- $14.00/4 for 50 625RS bearings - I think you only need 3 or 4.
- reprapdiscount
- $209 for Rumba Big Box with Smart LCD controller, endstops, Mk2B heatbed, 3 gt2 belts and pulleys, hall endstops, 2 thermistors, 1 40mm fan and a ceramic screwdriver
- Even I get the kit. Makes sourcing much easier.
- E3d hotend
- $81.09 per hotend. It's steep, but the hotends are very nice.
- Also kickstarted the Pico hotend.
- Fastenal.com
- About $50 in screws, nuts and bolts per printer. I don't know the exact count of what needed per printer. Below counts are approximate.
- 50 * 6-32x3/4" socket cap screws to hold the machine together
- 10 * 6-32x1 1/4"
- 10 * 6-32x1 1/2
- 50 * 6-32 washers
- 100 * 6-32 nuts
- 25 * m3x10mm screws to hold the motors on
- Various longer m3 screws for electronics mounts, extruder
- Total: $487.93
- Missing:
- motors, which I already had - expect to pay $14*5 = 70, or 557.9375 for the whole machine.
- Laser cutting cost - I'll be using Nova Labs' laser.
- Probably some little bits for the extruder assembly
- PET tape - my personal bed adhesion solution. Search Amazon for powder-coating tape.
You could save on most of the bits from McMaster-Carr, but you'd likely be sacrificing quality - same with Fastenal. Cheaper electronics packages abound as well, and there's no need for a fancy all metal hotend... unless you need one.
Long post. But a final shoutout to WoodWorkersSource - they sent an extremely amusing shipping notice, so much so that I thought that the plywood deserved its own unboxing video.
