The new printer is an Ellegoo Mars 4 Max. It's part of Ellegoo's family of small printers, but this one is scaled up to be intermediate in size between the normal Mars 4 and the Saturn series. The build space has size (x, y, z) = (196, 122, 150), and this is exactly what I need. I can fit the body of a 50' coach into this volume if set it at an angle, which I need to do anyway for proper printing. I can't fit a 65' coach in one piece, but I'm likely to build exactly one of those, ever, so can make other arrangements.
Other improvements in this generation:
- Higher resolution, possibly useful for printing sculpted things like figures. Even on the old printer, the resolution was good enough for "look, you can read the writing on the axlebox covers". It may improve the flatness of some surfaces.
- Higher-power LCD, giving short print times.
- Better optics, giving a more even beam and a better chance to print to the edges of the build plate.
- Proper protection of the LCD screen from leakage of the resin. (This self-destruct tendency if the tank leaked was a good reason not to buy some of the other printers in the range, even at discount.)
- Apparently, better adhesion to the build plate; it's quite hard to free the prints for washing, and anything printed directly on the bed without supports needs brutality to shift it.
- New slicing software, forced by Ellegoo's change in working format of the print files, but probably an improvement on Chitubox.
The slicing software is called VoxelDance Tango, which name pings my arty-rubbish detector, but early signs are that it's probably quite good. The first things I noticed were better automatic support-generation than Chitubox and less waste in the baseplates of the prints which are now honeycomb structures. The ergonomics of the new software are dubious, but I still need to learn my way around it.
Early results: it prints my banana-van parts better than the old printer ever managed. There's less warpage, cleaner surfaces, no rounding off at lower corners, and the supports are easier to remove. Where the underframe has a tiny hole in a crank to accept a wire pull-rod, the new printer actually prints the hole whereas the old one filled it in. It seems like a virtuous upgrade.
New printer cost £285, which is very close to the cost of the old one when it was a current design. The Mars 3, last years model, can now be had for about £175, but that is a smaller machine.
More results to follow, with some pictures.
