1

Hi, I’m about to buy my first printer and i need some advice. I’ve been looking on some printers but there is just two that caught my eye; the wanhao duplicator i3 (v2) and the hello bee prusa by bee verry creative. The hello bee prusa costs about 200 usd/euro more compared to the wanhao.

The hello bee prusa have 2 print heads and seems a bit nicer and more customizable than the duplicator. Also the hBp can print at 20 microns vs 100 on the duplicator.

Do you have any other suggestion or any experiance with these printers.

I don’t have much money to spend so 600 usd/euro is my limit.

Hellobeeprusa: https://www.goprint3d.co.uk/hellobeeprusa.html

Duplicator i3: http://www.3dprima.com/en/3d-printer/3d-printers/wanhao-duplicator-i3-3d-skrivare-v2.html

2

I bought a WanHao Duplicator i3 recently. I also own a PrintrBot Simple Metal. Had some issues with my PB, had to buy a second printer as a spare. Here are my opinion about the I3.

Firstly, the printer is a solid build. Comes with heated bed, 200x200x200 build volume and print speed up to 100mm/sec.

There are a lot of upgrades available in Thingiverse.

For the it’s price, it’s a good deal.

On the negative side, it’s a Chinese brand. I received the package in good shape, however there were lots of issues I faced right from the start. A couple of screws required to assemble the structure were missing. Comes with a 10A power cable which couldn’t take the load and the CPU unit jammed on my first start itself.

The sd card is not reliable. Many a times the printer will stop printing saying card error. I use a branded SanDisk class 10 card.

The USB connection is also sometimes not reliable. The printer would abruptly stop printing while connected via USB.

Roght out of the box, the extruder nozzle was clogged. I believe the WanHao guys must have tested the printer before shipping out and left the filament bits in the nozzle. I had to disassemble my brand new printer to clear the kinked PTFE tubing and clear the clog.

The he printer doesn’t come with auto height adjustment. I have this feature in my PrintrBot and after switching to WanHao I realized how important it is. Literally you will be spending time adjusting the heated bed platform height after each print.

I honestly don’t like this printer mainly due to the problems I faced right out of the box and some minor issues on a daily basis.

I run run a small business using my printer. So I don’t have the patience and time to fiddle with the printer every now and then. But for this price, i3 is a steal.

If if you are a first timer, check out PrintrBot. It’s the best printer for starters.

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Thx for the long answer, I realy apriciate that you spend some time writing. I’ll consider a printerbot, but the print volume is small tho.

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I have a Duplicator i3 that I’ve had great luck with. It’s a decent starter printer and I’ve had a lot of opportunities to learn with it. Mine is actually the Monoprice Maker Select 3D, which is just a rebadge of the version 1 i3. I haven’t run into the SD card or USB problems that other people have mentioned.

There are lots of people printing on the i3, so there’s a lot of support out there in Google Groups, Thingiverse, Reddit, and here on 3D Hubs. There are also a lot of great printable mods to help overcome most of the i3’s quirks while also learning the ins and outs of 3D printing (I’d be happy to point you toward a few if you end up going with an i3).

Overall, while the i3 isn’t the best printer on the market, it’s no slouch and, like ram1505 already said, you really can’t beat the price.

If Monoprice ships to wherever you are, you can pick one up for $349 USD at Products no longer Available (and there’s a printable mod to add the LCD angle that the v2 has).