Hey everyone Patrik CK here with episode 8 of 3D printing with the Monoprice Maker Select
V2.
It’s been almost 2 years since I got my own V2 and I thought it was time to look back
and review my stretch with this printer.
For all of you peeps that have been watching since the beginning you’ll know we’ve
had our ups and downs so I want to try and encapsulate the last almost 2 years of experiences
into one video.
Of
course I wouldn’t be here without the help of you peeps out there in YouTube land so
I want to make sure and answer a few questions that have been asked about the printer itself
and printing process in general on several occasions.
I’m hoping this recap will help you decide if you should or not get a V2 of your own,
of course you’ll get my opinion in the end!
Many apologize for the even later than usual release of this video, unfortunately a 3 week
hospital stint and rough recovery period has put everything on the back burner but the
love of my family and friends have brought me back from the brink, I love you all.
So let’s start from the very beginning.
Back in 1987 I was born in a small village in…..just kidding, but seriously my first
impressions of the V2 fresh out of the box was of pure owe and enjoyment that continued
through the straight forward assembly process.
Of course the first issue arose when I turned it on for its inaugural run, a busted control
screen, which admittedly I shouldn’t have blamed the shipper because this thing was
impeccably packaged making the damage even more curious.
Never the less I was still able to perform our first print, a random pre-installed demo
which turned out to be a delightful arm chair that was a wonder to me and everyone I showed,
obviously still new to the 3D printing scene.
Now printing demos is great and all but of course you get a 3d printer to make your own
stuff and since the V2 uses the gcode standard for its model data there are any number of
CAD and slicing programs available to use.
For me though I went with Trimble SketchUp, formally Google SketchUp mostly because I’ve
been using this program for over a decade in different capacities but also because it’s
easy to use, and it’s mostly free.
But like many things as technology keeps progressing we lose stuff in the shuffle.
As of early 2018 the free version of SketchUp has moved to be a solely web based application,
while this is great for getting this program to the masses the web version does not support
Extensions which means converting the .SKB files that SketchUp generates into .STL files
used in 3D slicing programs is not possible.
While the 2017 desktop version is still available for download, at the link in the description,
in time this version will become more and more outdated.
So as of early October I’ve been learning to use Blender.
Now Blender is a completely different animal to Sketchup, it’s been used to render CG
in many feature films and utilized in tones of other projects not just film.
It does take a significantly longer time to learn but it’s absolutely worth it, especially
if you plan on making complex models like characters or figurines, of course I’ve
been playing around with the integrated physics simulators and learning the basics of creating
photorealistic scenes, especially around architecture since that is my original love.
Admittedly I’ve been focused more of rendering scenes and creating animations than working
on 3D models or making YouTube videos, I’m not very good at focusing on one thing at
a time but the fact that Blender supports exporting to STL out of the box is a very
good sign.
I will definitely discuss this transition more in future videos.
Did I mention Blender is completely free?
There is no Pro version or any limits on its functionality just because it’s free.
I will still be using CURA as our slicing program for the time being.
At first while still learning the ins and outs of the printer I printed some pretty
random models like the demo sofa, a branded door stop, and a keycap.
Then I found a benchmarking model called the Benchy, a cute little boat that is basically
a stress test for 3D printers.
Printing a Benchy can help reveal issues from bad layer adhesion, to cooling problems, to
issues with resonant vibrations.
That’s when the first mod came up.
Now I knew going in that modding this printer was a big part of owning it.
This maybe something that is not at all appealing to some people.
I’m sure many of you would prefer that the V2 do amazing prints out of the box and nothing
is wrong with that but this printer won’t, especially if you want very fine detail, that’s
why it’s only $300.
Needless to say that was part of the appeal for me.
As we’ll see there are plenty of improvements to have.
The first of these improvements was to install the z axis brace mod.
This mod basically fixes the vertical gantry in place so that any vibration or movement
in the tower wouldn’t adversely affect the printing process.
Using our benchy we pretty much saw immediately benefits and the best part is most of the
parts for the mod we printed and everything else cost less than $10 from the local hardware
store.
Next up was a better cooling setup.
By replacing the stock fan and shroud with one that delivered the air in more uniform
way to the print we saw another improvement in our benchy.
Again we printed the main piece and everything else was under $10 to get.
The last series of mods I implemented were of my favorites and revolved around the filament
spool and making the filament move around the printer as smoothly as possible.
This project was especially important because it was an almost completely, with inspiration,
original design that turned out even better than I expected.
Of course I went into great depth about each of these mods in their own videos.
If you haven’t seen them check them out in my 3D printing playlist.
So far so good, I’ve had a blast making and installing these mods, printing random
and useful models but as with anything there is a dark side.
Some may even consider these mods as the dark side but I don’t.
None the less there were two issues that did hamper using the printer until they were fixed
and ones that I would call defects.
One of these issues I did talk about in depth in episode 6.
The short story is, due to a design fault, the gear that feeds the filament into the
printer moved out of place which required taking the entire printer head apart and essentially
gluing the gear’s set screw back in place.
The issue was with the print bed not heating up.
Several times all I had to do was mess with the power/data cables on the back of the control
unit and it would start warming up.
I assumed there must be a loose connector or something inside the control unit.
After the third time, off camera, I took the control unit apart and made sure all the cables
were properly seated.
As anticipated I did find one of the connectors for the bed was loose, luckily it was an easy
fix to tighten the fastener down.
It hasn’t given me any trouble since.
If you think you have the same problem just be careful and make sure the printer is unplugged
because you have to remove the power supply unit completely to get to the control board
where all the wires feed into and if you touch the wrong thing you will not have a good day.
If you peeps would like a more in depth video on this fix leave a comment below.
Oh and one of the fans is making an odd noise at start up but it goes away after a minute
or two.
It will need replacing eventually.
So that’s my experience with the V2 until now, mostly good and fun to work with but
with the occasional issue.
Luckily nothing that required a major out of pocket expense to fix only my time.
During the same period I’ve been asked tones of questions about the printer and the printing
process.
I won’t be able to get to all of them today but keep them coming!
I make an effort to answer as many as I can, no question is too daft, just don’t ask
what my favorite color is, because it’s green.
The first of these questions was Why did you take the spool holder off the
top of the printer?
I decided the move the spool holder from the top frame to the control box mostly because
of the brace mod from episode 3.
Watching how much it moved while printing without the brace mod I thought why even risk
it?
A spool that weights almost 10 pounds (1kg) brand new is a significant weight even when
compared with the printer itself so why not move it from the top of the gantry to somewhere
else?
How accurate is the print time in Cura compared to real life?
It’s a little optimistic in its estimates.
Typically it takes about 7% percent longer than it estimates so a 1 hour 40 minutes long
estimate turns out to take closer to 2 hours.
Not entirely sure why this is since all the specs like feed speed and print speed are
accurate.
You bought the V2 because of the size of the print bed, but have you actually used the
whole bed?
You’re right, that was one of my justifications for buying this printer as opposed to say
the Monoprice Mini and honestly none of my models needed that much room so far, but it’s
a good idea to see if we actually got what was advertised.
Of course on closer inspection and something that’s completely obviously now we can see
that the print head can’t actually reach the edges of the bed.
So, it turns out that while the bed is physically 120mm by 120mm the actual printable area is
closer to 110mm by 110mm making the advertised bed size a little misleading.
How long does a spool of filament actually last?
I get this question from peeps weather they are into 3D printing or not and like many
things the answer is, it depend.
But I did do some maths on a familiar print, our good ole Benchy.
A Benchy on normal quality uses 5.43 meters or 17.8 feet of filament.
A standard 1.75mm 1kg spool will have roughly 400 meters or 1310 feet of filament.
So if all we printed were Benchys’ we would be able to print 73 of them from one spool!
Something that would also take 6 straight days of printing to do!
Would you still recommend buying this printer after using it this long?
It has to be said that this is an entry level printer that I think is great for learning
the ins and outs of 3D-printing and for the price you can’t ask for more.
In that respect yes I would still recommend this printer, with the caveat that modding
it is a thing and part of the fun for me.
Yes, you can print just fine without adding any mods but don’t expect show level quality
even with the upgrades.
It’s also important to note this is not a commercial grade printer so if you plan
on printing models on a consistent basis to sell or what ever you’ll be better off getting
a more robust printer but be ready to pay for it.
As far as the monoprice mini is concerned, it does have less need for modding but still
not zero, it has a smaller print bed, and slower print speed making it hard to recommend
right away, but it is usually $100 less than the V2.
Those are all the questions I can get to right now, again if you have anymore don’t hesitate
to leave them below I will do my best to answer all of them!
I hope this follow up on my experience with the V2 so far has helped to inform you all
a little more on whether or not this printer is right for you.
Well this has been Patrik CK, like and share if you enjoyed this content.
Subscribe to get more videos when they come out, hopefully more often than not.
Your support on Patreon and Amazon is very much appreciated.
Hope to see you all next time, thanks everyone!