Ok, so I know nothing about 3d printing, but since we became empty nester, am looking for a new hobby. My wife us taking up pottery, but thats not for me, and 3d printing seems like a good bit of fun.
Started looking at videos and comparisons and all that, and the Ender 3 came up, but it seems smaller, so looked at the 5 plus. Then I started to wonder if there might be better options, while staying under $1000. Bambu, Prusa, Anycubic…what should I look at if I want larger prints but am a beginner.
The brillants of Creality’s printers both the Ender 3 and 5, is that they use off the shelf parts. From its heatbed to its nozzle and stepper motors.
Which means that if something breaks or wears out, a replacement is $0.20 from Amazon.
The problem with Creality is quality control. Everything that I bought from Creality either broke in a few months, needed upgrades or came broken from factory. This isn’t just their printers its their laser cutters too.
However because they break they are excellent learning printers. While it may be tempting to print the biggest thing, I would advise a smaller printer like the Ender 3. It was hard to level 200mm leveling 350mm won’t be easy.
That said I think which printer you get should depend on what you want to do with it.
If you are more interested in modeling and cad design than a low maintenance printer like a Prusa would be best.
If you want to tinker with the printer itself: then an Ender is perfect since you can break it to your hearts content and fix it yourself.
Otherwise you don’t know: get the cheapest recommended printer around $350-$400 and use it til it breaks. Either you’ll know what you want or break it and you’ll get a good idea on what type of printer you need.
@madewithlayers and @makersmuse on YouTube is a good starting point