One thing about owning your own 3D printer is that it opens up your creativity. I suppose there are a lot of people out there that don't know what they would ever do with one. Once you have one, all of a sudden you see things you can make yourself. My brother wanted me to 3D print a vacuum adapter for his sander. I designed one and had it in the slicer in five minutes and it was printing ten minutes later. I have Creality K1 (that thing is smoking fast). It took maybe thirty minutes to print the adapter. Look, I start my eighth decade on this planet next month. If I can figure out how to do all this, anyone with two working brain cells can figure it out. Get one and have some fun making stuff.
People criticize 3D printers as being useless toys, and that is probably true if they're only used to download baby Yoda files and print them. A 3D printer is half a solution. 3D CAD is the other half. Once both complementary skills are acquired, it seems that *anything* is possible. I built a shop full of CNC tools that I now almost never use. It's so much faster and easier to draw whatever I need in FreeCAD and 3D print it. You don't need to get an associate's degree in CAD. Sam is designing parts in TinkerCAD and selling them. If you want to get started in FreeCAD, you can create surprisingly complicated parts using the 3D primitives (cube, sphere, cylinder, cone...) and adding them to each other or subtracting them from each other, then chamferring and/or filleting the part. This is basically using FreeCAD in TinkerCAD mode. As you need to create more complex geometries you can draw arbitrary 2D shapes and loft them or revolve them, and learn to use the full power of parametric 3D CAD.
A few months ago I saw an AnkerMake printer on Amazon for $200, and said, that is so cheap, I am sure I will find a use for it... It already has MANY MANY hours of print time!
THIS!!! i always thought it would be great to have one. as you stated the ideas come mostly when the Machine is standing right there. my wife did not quite see the possibilities at first. since convincing my wife (which is by the way the hardest step for most of us married man XD) i had a kobra 2 pro and now an A1 i came up with many many practical solutions for all sorts of problems in and around our house. sprinkled with some nice decorations for the happy wife happy life situation.
what is described here and on many other places is what many of "us" have experienced. First thinking its nonsense, but after the first design-to-print process there is no way back. Although I tend to design the cute stuff, it is what I do for almost 3 decades now: Designing cute stuff (rubber stamps for the decoartive papercraft industry). Since I saw some of my ideas becoming 3D I am addicted. PLUS I even made some technical items I needed for me and others, so I am on the other side of the road now, and no way of going back. This journey is repeating all over the planet, and I am abolutely sure every household will have 2-3 printers in 10 years time. Less ordering stuff online, more printing it!!! Farms like Sams still will make sense OR he will turn into a designer offering his designs, getting paid accordingly, like he said, a lot of time went into developing his special products.
I am a 3D farmer myself. For me not only the model is my IP but, even more importantly, the material and printer settings, which are very dialed in to the model and can't be transferred to a 3d party manufacturer. Love your videos ❤
@focuswest2736 I get it. I'm thinking of getting back into it 3d printing. I looked at getting a couple of my 3d models printed and the cost is ridiculously overpriced imo.
Even if you’re not selling … it’s so nice to be able to make just about anything you can 3D model to solve problems. I consider my 3D printer a tool … one of my most useful tools. Once I have the printer I can make most things I can imagine and a bunch that others did for a few bucks.
I almost never use the CNC tools in my machine shop now that I have reliable 3D printers. Once you can CAD and 3D print, you can do so much you couldn't previously do. It's such a powerful tool for anyone who actually does stuff that I can't imagine not being able to 3D print custom parts at home. I can quickly make exactly what I want without compromise, but even if what I want is cheap on Amazon, I'll often spend five minutes to CAD it and I'll print it in an hour or two for 50 cents while I'm off doing something else. CAD and a 3D printer results in nearly immediate gratification.
Love the A1! Over the past 10 years or so, I have owned several 3D Printers like the Davinci Pro, MP Mini Select, and theoriginal Prusa based self assembled machine by Hictop. Each had very steep learning curve and high maintenance, stand over it til’ its done type experience. Not a very streamlined sequence nor is the output equal to the input in terms of cost, labor, and other things. All this being said, the A1 by Bambu Lab far surpasses anything I have ever touched with this hobby. I do have to say, the product is great, the shipping and customer service varies by whom you ask. I ordered and received my printer the day after Thanksgiving, Black Friday. It took a few days for shipping and I was printing. I wanted to check the print quality and if I wanted the AMS Lite. Since the quality was great, I ordered the AMS Lite the very next day, with three or four spools of different color filament. The shipping department generated a tracking number and now we play the waiting game. The projected delivery date was near my earlier experience with the company, but there’s a catch. The tracking number and delivery date did as promised, save one thing, they shipped separate items on the same order in separate packages, each with its own tracking number. Probably an attempt to work around any legal entanglements of promised shipping time, IDK, I haven’t checked. My filament arrived as expected but the AMS Lite…. …took longer. The shipping invoice showed an approximate shipping date of Dec 25th. Again, IMO, another attempt at a legal workaround because nobody ships anything on Christmas Day, so then afterward. Each day after the 26th, I impatiently checked the tracking number, usually multiple times per day. As the days passed, the more it looked like I had been bamboozled. I lit up my keyboard griping and complaining, neither of which produced one ounce of a sense of urgency beyond “sorry for the delay, we’re working on it” type answer. As I type this, it’s the day projected for my AMS Lite to arrive. There’s been weather delays on top of the other wait, so I expect it to take a couple extra days, fine. I’m anticipating the delivery and setup process to ease my worries with the company, however slight. Other company features and benefits, the software. PC is a full blown slicer with tons of bells and whistles, while the mobile app, Bambu Handy, has less options, you get what you get. I’ve used both without much hassle. The machine’s wireless data feature allows you to begin your print right from your phone or PC, adding a shitty camera to monitor whether it’s FUBAR enough to dash to the machine and stop the job. Don’t expect much from the camera feature as it is what it is. The time lapse feature adds to the job time length so I haven’t tilted at that windmill just yet, but maybe in the future. All tolled (if the AMS Lite does arrive) the process was fairly painless if they tell you you’re gonna be waiting quite a while for some of the delivery, but mine didn’t. I STRONGLY URGE anyone as impatient as me, order the combo deal. It comes all at once. No muss no fuss. I’d have (a few) less grey hairs had I known to folllow this advice. Another option is to source their stuff with a local authorized reseller. You only have to wait the drive home. I would have chosen this route, had I known. My closest reseller is over 2hrs away, so I tried to get them to ship to store, like other normal companies, they wouldn’t, as this breaks the reseller contractual obligation with the original company. I guess, after getting the rest of my order, I’ll be satisfied, but until then, a few hours/days, I’m still waiting. Since Thanksgiving. HMU in my prof if you want any more advice, or choice in selection. ~buxtor out
I was going to comment on slant3d as well. They are focussed on b2b fulfillment, so if Sam were to have a product really take off that exceeds his print capacity, it might make sense to offload that item to a shop like slant3d.
@@thumperthoughts I'd imagine it's really good for overflow products that you don't have the capacity to print enough of to keep up with the demand, but I also imagine you'd still be paying some sort of premium for that or else the business wouldn't make sense for Slant. It'd still cheaper to build your own manufacturing network and using an overflow service like that on occasion than it is to rely on outsourcing completely.
Slant also ties in with Etsy so you never have to touch a product or deal with shipping. If you like to hand off everything other than design and your listings, barring problems, slant seems like a great idea.
This. He’s right those services aren’t great for a production run. They’re for one and done. Slant3d doing printing AND fulfillment to the customer is a totally different scenario. Also with the ones he looked at, should have looked at a quantity equivalent to 1kg of filliment. Deliver 30 pieces home to reship when orders come in. Sam hope you update this, super helpful data.
The one that is MJF is a technology by HP which is typically powdered nylon. One of the other ones on your list was quoted as SLS which is similar, but stands for selective laser sintering and also typically powder. Most of those printing services are for high end materials. Something more like a shop like yours that doesn't want to do the printing would benefit from would be Slant3D which ties into etsy, shopify, amazon, etc and when someone buys it, they print pack and ship it. Keep up the good videos.
I just placed an order with Cloudcraft after watching your video. It is a material I am unable to print. The cost was reasonable; it was manufactured in Germany and shipped to Mexico. The shipping cost was over 60% of the total cost.
Great Video, thanks for sharing! I purchased my first 3D Printer and waiting patiently for delivery. I got the bug at the age of 53 and looking forward to learning and sharing this journey with my granddaughter and the 3D printing community. Thank You and keep on putting out great content, your time and knowledge is appreciated!
These outsource companies' prices get cheaper per part with the increased number of parts being ordered. Also, I know at least one of them also offers injection molding services, so when your volumes get high enough, you can look at costs of factions of dollars with a lot less production time (but there are upfront costs for mould prep and longer lead times.) But I agree the retention of IP being an important concern.
@@monetary_episode494 Well depends on what your priorities are I guess. If you're in the business of selling things you design, and you're treating this as a business, then I would think you'd want to go with whatever gives you the highest margin on sales. Outsourcing it can also reduce the wear and tear on your farm, allowing you to prioritize it's use for other lower volume production.
Biggest advantage of being in charge of your own services is that the models can be changed at a whim to meet customer needs and unforeseen improvements.
There is one big mistake in your calculation. You only asked for 1 print. Try again and ask for 10, 50 and 100 prints and you will notice that the price will decrease big time. One piece can cost $100 if you only order 1. But if you order 100 pieces the price per piece might drop to $20 or less. The real benefit of using a print hub, like PCBway, HUBS or whatever is in the big numbers. Please try again and make a follow up video, will be interesting 😊
Our business has been picking up on the printed things we sell, so we decided to pick up another multi-color printer during the Black Friday sales.. I figured I'd try one of the new kids to the color scene, especially since it's significantly cheaper than the A1 Combo (Anycubic Kobra 3 Combo). I'd done just the bare-minimum of research on it, but figured it'd be similar to the P1S as far as waste and all is concerned (I mean, how many different ways is there to purge the old color out and flow the new, right?). I was VERY wrong in that assumption, lol. For one print we do, it uses 165g for the print, 13 for the purge tower, and flushes 195g. We account for that in the cost of the print.. The Anycubic doesn't estimate the flushed amount, so you don't know until AFTER you print, but it used 166g for the print, 33 for the flush tower and 560g purge... Absolutely crazy the amount used. I'm used to just looking at bottom line on the necessary filament amounts in the slicer, giving myself a bit of padding and pulling a roll with enough to do the job (I track all my spools with Spoolman). BIG mistake on that print, lol. I will say that the Anycubic was faster by about an hour (I'm assuming since it's filament changes take less time), but there's too much waste... That's something to consider when you're purchasing something that'll do multi-color for sure, waste amounts. If one of your viewers is wanting to print things with multiple colors, they'd definitely be better served with one of the Bambu series (A1's will do nicely if they are maxing out at 4 colors), unless they're wanting near zero waste and go with one of those new Prusa machines (MUCH more expensive). At any rate, I'm going to have the wife give this video a watch when she gets off tonight, to show her in a simpler way why doing it ourselves and not outsourcing is the way to go, especially since you have a knack for making the whys and wherefores much easier to understand than I do (as evidenced by the books I normally write in replies, LOL).
@@heffe2001 That sounds like something that could be fixed in the settings. Have you talked to their customer support about this? Surely, they’re not purposely purging half a spool for a 165g print. 😅
@pophid they control purge settings on the printer, not in software for now. You can adjust it, but you may have color bleed if you lower it too much. Bambu has the software tuned for their own use, and you can control the amounts in software for different color combos, it knows red needs more purge if white is next and vice versa for example. They'll get there eventually hopefully but right now they are just more wasteful. Even if you use the purge to infill or purge objects, it still generates more than Bambu with my testing, since the printer does it and not the software.
I'm curious what brand Sam is going to be testing filament-wise.. looking for an alternative to what I've been using, but need a company with a fairly large color pallet.
You commitment to quality and customer service is apparent. Thank you for the comparison of DIY vs farming out the process. One other thing (unless I missed it) is the material cost per product. I see Bambu sells a 1 kg (2.2 pounds) roll for $20 but in quantity it can be significantly less $13 or even less. What I don't know is how many products you can create from 1 roll. For example, how many business card jigs can you produce from 1 roll? Or what does each business card jig weigh?
Idk if somebody commented on this, but for the i.materialise technology used, it is Multi Jet Fusion (MJF). A 3D print powder technology that binds the powder in layers with a fusing agent. Pretty cool tech.
Makers gona Make! Keep on makin man! Good job presenting the info in a video format and some of the behind the scenes. From my exp running a print farm in 21-22, eventually you will clean and re-lube the Z-axis lead screws due to dust and plastic particles, tighten the belts, the filament knife, the ptfe tubes wear down, maybe some of the ptfe tube connectors, maybe a stepper motor or two, build plate replacements, new nozzles as they wear or clog, maybe a fan or two due to bearing wear and they screech. These are all relatively easy to do. On creality/clone machines i could get one back up and running in 30 to 60 mins depending on the problem.
I took a little break from maker videos...right about the time you were finishing up the new shop. I come back and you are a 3D farmer! So happy for you and a tish jealous! Love to see your success. Keep kicking butt! edit: And what a great example for aspiring entrepreneurs. When I first found Sam, he was laser engraving wood spatulas and other items. Now he's got a literal wall full of 3D printers making products he designed. The lesson here is always be ready to pivot. Keep your business and your brain nimble. Your great idea may be a great idea today, but your next great idea may be even better, and much different.
Polyamide (MJF) is most likely nylon using “Multi jet fusion” which is a powder based print using HP inkjet tech. It’s solid with no infill and pretty accurate dimensionally.
preeeetty shure those prices and color options get a lot better if you inquire 10+ pieces :) or maybe contact them directly. And if you're concerned about your best designs you can easily get them protected - in germany you can register them pretty cheaply online at the patent office (not as actual patents which require lawyers and big bucks - this just gives you an insurance in case a dispute gets started)
Young man you sure have a AWESOME beard started there. It well be great to see it as it grows out more. I'm so proud of every thing you've accomplished. It's been great watching the many ways God has blessed you and your family. You are blessed to have a awesome wife that stands behind you in all your adventures. My prayer is that God will continue blessing y'all above and beyond your wildest dreams.... Much love...BBE..
Great video Sam. I’m not interested in a print farm but I love my A1 printer from Bambu I’ve been making tool holder for my tools in my woodworking shop and things around the house and I feel like my printer has already paid for it self in just a couple of months. And I’m hoping to start learning how to make my own ideas and to be able to print them. Thanks for sharing your experience with us
Quality control is in your hands with onsite. One off part ain t fair comparison,print farms like running multiple of same parts, but again slightly concerned at quality control.
I think using a company to print may be a good starting point for someone with a few product ideas to get started and test the market before investing in their own manufacturing. You can fill orders for a few months to see if the market increases and might be sustainable before taking the deep dive.
Sam! I've never seen you without a hat! And glasses! It's sad that your big Thunder laser has become a table for filament (snark). Thanks for all your work to show us how much we can save by doing it ourselves. Excellent info. Merry Christmas!
I think outsourcing makes only sense if you've already done your part: prototyped, tailored, fine tuned the thingy and you need a lot of copies fast. Then you can really outsource the fishy part with failed prints and printers. For hobby purposes you need to definietly pick a printer for your budget and have fun with it!
Personally, I restify old vehicles. And, I live rural. Best case if I send something out to be printed, is three days to delivery. I bought a 3D printer so I can get that down to a day, to design, and print. Small parts will be ready the next morning. Greatly affecting the time line to completion.
Great discussion and insightful. I’d like to recommend to all viewers in this small business niche, please reach-out to your local public schools and find STEM educators to mentor or assist. Our kids need to be inspired and learn this tech. You might also find an outlet for your older printers where you can sell them or get a tax deduction for any donation. Best of luck to all!!
I think the biggest concern besides cost, is quality control. With services like that of Slant3d’s print on demand service API, time is certainly returned to you to operate and expand the business, but how do you know that your products are being shipped at the quality you would expect from your own in-house print farm? The only way to know is to wait for the reviews and RMAs. I definitely think, however, that anyone who would go the route of outsourcing production, should have at least one high quality printer for prototyping. It would in no way be cost or time effective to outsource prototyping. I would only order “test prints” to ensure the third party print farm could print the product to my standard. All that being said, it is contingent on cost being equal to or less than your in-house cost. It would be essential to factor cost of materials, maintenance, up front cost of printer, cost of your labor, and shipping and handling. It would take quite a bit of research and analysis to make the decision to outsource.
Always love your videos Sam, they are definitely my favourite of all I'm subscribed to and you just say it as it is. The fact that you can run a business from Tinkercat shows everyone you don't have to buy big fancy Cad software to be successful.
My local library has a 3D printer. You upload your STL and they print the model, charging 10 cents per gram for the completed model. They use PLA exclusively.
Which machines do they use? Our library’s use Prusa mk3s+ and they are slow. Owning your own machine for prototyping is way more efficient. At least from my experience.
@@FireDragon3DThey have a Prusa MK4. Of course having your own machine is more convenient, but using the library is way cheaper than any of the services that Sam mentioned.
@@MandoJVG Sure, but don't forget wear and tear, electricity, wear on tools you need, your time to figure it all out... it's more than just the cost of the filament, especially if you are trying to run a business
I only have 2 printers (X1C), but I've designed and sold enough things to pay for them both. Basically, anything I print for myself costs me nothing. I'm going to get the bigger Bambu printer when it comes out.
@@markah910 You won't regret the A1 OR the P1 series, it really just depends on your use-case, and what materials you want to print. If you need stronger prints using more advanced filaments (IE: ASA/ABS, PC, etc), the P1S is a good starting point as it's fully enclosed, making printing those engineering-grade filaments easier. If PLA & PETG are going to be your main focus (PETG is more heat-tolerant than PLA for things like parts your going to use in your car, etc), the A1 series is a no-brainer. I've mainly been using the P1 series printers for around the last 2 years, and have finally gotten to a point where I need another multi-color capable printer, so I gave the A1 a shot. I'll definitely be getting more of these as business grows. Hopefully one day I'll have a wall like Sam's, but right now it's a hodge-podge of various brands for the single-color stuff, and a couple Bambu's for multi...
@@heffe2001 I figure since I'm going to be new to this the A1 is a decent place to start and if I like it and get better at it I can always go and get a P1 series and if I don't like it or I suck at it really bad then it wasn't that bad of an investment to begin with.
@@markah910 the Bambu printers are as near to hit print and go as I've had, they usually don't have many problems. It really depends on what your going to be printing, but I'd hazard a guess that you'll end up finding a ton of things you hadn't thought about being able to make that you do end up printing.. I do a ton of functional stuff for around the house, and sometimes it sure beats having to go to the hardware store lol.
These prices are shocking to me for those who may want to have something they designed printed you might try your public library. The library where I live will basically print it at cost of materials used for printing.
There is one thing you missed for your comparison vs the big companies. There are tons of independent small businesses out there that will charge 0.15 to 0.20 per gram for printing basic PLA and PETG. If its someone in your own town, they'll likely be happy for the work and unlikely to steal your IP. Pending your settings, a 100g item would be around $15 to $20 with out a bulk discount, etc. Far as IP with 3d printing, thats another mess, but there is no protection for functional items (a jig could be considered functional). Therefore without a patent, one could literally 3d scan or recreate your hard work and you wouldn't be able to do much of anything about it. Which is pretty messed up, but happens daily. Another pointer for those looking into starting a print farm, don't jump in with 20 printers try and run the minimum amount you need. Demand can drop off at anytime, and a fleet of printers collecting dust is a horrible thing. Not to mention that the technology is drastically improving about every 6-12 months. The machines I had before Bambu are rarely turned on now, and for single color prints I'm finding myself going away from Bambu for the newer Flsun T1 pro which is stupid fast. Oh yeah, and Sam you should really give Plasticity a try, much better than tinkercad.
I agree that local print shops are a good option, to ease into any new business ventures (I stair-stepped into this myself, too), and that IP protection for functional items is tough! I'll add a note to check into Plasticity. Thanks!
Great info! Been following you for a while and great to see how far you have come. You are a hussler and making it happen. I hope you have continued success for many years to come. You should be very proud of what you have accomplished. Keep making it happen!!!!
As mentioned by someone else, it would be interesting to see what Slant 3D would quote for a large run of parts vs just one. But you also 💯 need your own printer(s) to prototype. I think a mix of both might be the way to go.
I had no idea about Slant3D and they never came up in my searches and use of ChatGPT for preparing for this video, so it wasn't intentional. I'll add this to my next video where bulk ordering pricing is also discussed (that seems to be a popular request from this one, too). Thanks!
I had no idea about Slant3D and they never came up in my searches and use of ChatGPT for preparing for this video, so it wasn't intentional. I'll add this to my next video where bulk ordering pricing is also discussed (that seems to be a popular request from this one, too). Thanks!
If you sell the physical item that you print the files itself doesn't mean anything because they can easily copy the physical object or 3D scan it if they really wanted to copy what you're doing, not only that a really good 3D modeler could just copy it from I if it's a stencil
Like you said at the end. Id say that's one of the most important parts. What kind of person are you? Even if its "cheaper" to do it your self. It may not be the right choice.
As others have said, you didn't even take the time to see how outsourcing prices scale. I think that is generally what you're missing: scale. When you outsource, you have more flexibility to scale up or down without needing to buy more equipment or have equipment idle. Also, unless you're stuck on being a small shop, you can actually have your designs manufactured (injection molded) and drop your per-unit cost to next to nothing. You seem like a good dude and you should be proud to have made it this far, but you're thinking small and not thinking like a manufacturer.
Buuuuut Sam! What about the print files that you send to your printers through WiFi, doesn’t it go through Bambu servers and you are giving it away??? Haha great video! Never used those 3d print services, didn’t realize how expensive those are! Glad to have my own 3d printer even more!
Sam, love your videos. I wood work and laser engrave, thought about getting a 3 D printer but not sure what I would use it for. I enjoy watching you grow your business, been following you since you were making utensils. Keep up the great work.
A comment about the printing technologies. I've worked with additive manufacturing for a good 10years and know most if not all technologies to some degree. The Shapeways quote says SLS(Nylon12) which is the most common bread and butter laser powderbased polymer process. A common system is eos p396 but many others exist today. The i,materialize quote for MJF is also a powderbed based technology but with some binder and heat instead of laser(s). It is Hewlett Packard's (HP) technology. It is a competitor to SLS due to mainly higher productivity and less complex systems, but I have found it also more challenging with powder removal for complex parts (internal cavities). Why xeometry is so expensive being FDM I can only speculate, but probably using some expensive industrial system for that asa/abs and the hourly rate is high.
I just started using my first 3D printer the other day. I went with a P1S, i already want to buy another one. Problem is that i dont yet know what to design and sell.
It's exciting to get started with a new printer! The best way to come up with designs to sell is to think about problems you have and try to solve them with 3D printing.
Sam, respectfully, if someone is dead set on acquiring your files it's not that difficult to simply order one of your products and measure/3d model it. Basically reverse engineer it. I say this because I personally think that you're leaving money on the table by not selling the digital files on etsy/your web store. It's basically free passive income. That's why, if I design something to sell, I'll list both the physical and digital variants. There's been quite a few times for me I've seen things for sale on etsy that I'd like to print myself, that I gladly would have paid $5 or $10 for the stl for, to print myself. Not because I want a particular item cheaper, but most of the time it's because I want to print it in a more durable material. To each their own though. As for buying a 3d printer vs using a service, using a service is literally throwing money away unless it's just a small run of items for personal use and you don't have a 3d printer. But even then, you could probably find someone local or online with a 3d printer who will do it for less than a commercial service. For selling prints, you don't even need a full size A1, or an AMS lite to get your foot in the door. A $200 A1 mini will print beautifully and reliably, and once you get some sales going, you can look into adding to the fleet. That said, buying the combo with AMS lite is worth the initial increased cost since you save (as of right now) $80+ vs buying the mini alone and adding an AMS lite later. Unless I specifically need the bigger size of the A1, I'd be happy running a fleet of A1 minis.
Amazing the amount of time you have put into this informational video for someone interested in doing similar things. Really enjoyed your explanations of everything. Best of luck with your business.!! an old retired guy who enjoys youtube videos😊
I really liked the video, it was great to see you break everything down. It was really surprised how much other companies charge. On another note, I saw in your last video that you have a video coming up about air quality with 3D printing and I'm definitely looking forward to watching it. My spouse and I have been interested in getting a 3d printer for a while now, my only hang up is the VOCs and UFPs even from PLA. We don't have a separate workshop space to put it, just an office, so I'm unsure with children nearby if it's safe.
The risks from VOC/UFP do exist. The long term effects aren't known. A good solution can be rigging up an enclosure + window vent. It doesn't even need to be permanent. If you do some searching you can find lots of people that do this type of setup. Good luck and have fun printing! @Cheekiersky
If you live near Microcenter get 5% off when using a Microcenter credit card. Almost pays for my MD taxes when buying some Bambu printers. Make sure you payoff the CC at the end of each month.
How do you manage sending all the jobs to each printer? Are they all generally printing the same thing, or do you have to clear the slicer for each printer as you get them all ready? Could be an interesting video if your open to walking through your workflow with orcaslicer. Thanks
Just curious as to how many misprints or failures you have a day or week with that many printers, I have one A1 printer and have only had two failures, and that was due to filament getting caught on the spool and one was my fault for not having a clean build plate. I absolutely love my A1 since I bought it in October this year. I really enjoy your video's, thanks for sharing your journey with us.
If a product is selling that well though it's gotta make more senss to just start manufacturing in mass and outsource to an injection molding company or something like that. 3D printing is great for prototyping and developing a new product
Hi great video as always. I have a question I use Bambu labs filament as it's coded for this A1 machine however Bambu Labs takes forever to ship or has no stock in inventory but other brands of filament spool will not fit the A1 without printing an adapter. Do you know of any brands that will fit the A1 or any recommendations of brands to substitute or the Bambu labs filament? THANKS
I think the comparison is a bit off You are comparing a combo with the AMS lite, which you don't need to print in 1 color. So Bambu Lab A1 $339 is cheaper printer alone. Yeah I get it you can load the same color filament and have it auto switch which is nice but someone getting started out doesn't necessarily need the AMS (coming from someone that bought his printer and then decided an AMS was mandatory lol) And don't 3d print services offer bulk pricing? I did some similar research a couple years ago and the bulk pricing was significantly cheaper per unit (50-75% cheaper per unit). Grand scheme it's going to be cheaper to DIY either way long term. You don't give away your property/designs and you control the quality of the product.
Great information, it helps me make a decision on what I want to do. I also like the idea that it is useful for personal items as well. Thanks for sharing
Did he ever say the price of the filament used? Owning a 3d printer that's already a sunk cost. Just curious of how the print farm aligns to the actual filament cost.
This video is incredibly flawed for a variety of reasons but the one most important to you as a business owner is that some of these services will also do fulfilment kind of a print on demand service. which frees up your time and resources for other things.
I'm strongly in favor of printing products internally, but this comparison is heavily biased in that direction. The print services chosen were almost all prototyping services. There are print farms such as Slant 3D that will have a much lower cost, suitable to an externalized print farm. They specialize in 3D printing designs for online businesses. The sample part in this video would probably cost around $10. They not only manage the 3D printers, they also ship directly to your customer. It's not my cup of tea, but many people are designing products and listing them on Shopify, Etsy, eBay, et cetera, and having a commercial print service 3D print the products and do all of the order fulfillment. Slant 3D has an API to make it easy to integrate with online businesses. Often, someone will have one 3D printer to develop the products. They focus on product development and marketing, and outsource the manufacturing and order fulfillment. I still prefer doing it all but some people prefer to spend their time growing their business by creating new products and expanding their online presence rather than managing a print farm and shipping orders.
I had no idea about Slant3D and they never came up in my searches and use of ChatGPT for preparing for this video, so it wasn't intentional. I'll add this to my next video where bulk ordering pricing is also discussed (that seems to be a popular request from this one, too). Thanks!
Interesting, didn't expect such high prices. I wonder if you went more than 1 if that would make a difference, I know when I get PCB's it basically the same price for 1 as it is 5 and only goes up a little for more since the setup is the expensive part. Is 3d printing the same, if you did a 10 quantity would the price per unit go down a bunch?
Board pricing is what it is due to them making them on a single piece of pcboard material. 3d printing needs a dedicated printer and x amount of time to make each item, and every item adds the same amount of time to the process. Not much of a way for them to combine the costs. At least with FDM printing anyway. If you're doing things that can fit multiples on a bed and using resin printing, they could more easily make the costs lower per unit (it's just in the way the technology works).
Well done Sam however…..overhead, labor, are two huge components. But, doing yourself comes with responsibilities along with a manufacturing job to supplement your design job. Granted simple numbers get a simple comparison however tax consequences along a lot of other factors definitely weigh in. All that to say I wholeheartedly agree IP is an unknown but is president in your mode. Again, thanks for bridging the topic. Personally I build custom furniture and I’d be scared to run the cost I have invested. Ha
There is one cost you did not touch on. The computer. I know the computer I have now would not be able to handle a drafting program to design the printables. I don't even think it has the ability to interface with the printers. (it barely handles me getting on YT) If I were to pursue this, I would need to upgrade my computer. What sort of cost would that be? $500? $600? $800? $1,000 or more?
I recently purchase an all in one computer to run my laser and it was $199 on amazon with windows 11 pre-installed. You can also get something used online.
nice videos, but just a moment, did you compare the prices of the product if you order only one item from a printing farm? Try the prices for, say, 100 pieces - they’re much cheaper than what you had before. Of course, one piece is expensive because the setup is a very costly process, and companies need to charge for it.”
Hi, I see you print a lot of items that take up a good amount of space on your build plates. I also run the A1 printers. My question is, how do you keep the prints from warping on the bottom and/ or corners? Any help is greatly appreciated! Thanks for all the videos! Keep up the good work!
clean build plate, and dry filament. dry filament is a big one on bambu printers using bambu filament and using the bambu filament setting presets. they are assuming the filament is perfectly dry(it never is unless you have a dryer). if you dont have a dryer, you need to do some manual tuning to get better results.
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One thing about owning your own 3D printer is that it opens up your creativity. I suppose there are a lot of people out there that don't know what they would ever do with one. Once you have one, all of a sudden you see things you can make yourself. My brother wanted me to 3D print a vacuum adapter for his sander. I designed one and had it in the slicer in five minutes and it was printing ten minutes later. I have Creality K1 (that thing is smoking fast). It took maybe thirty minutes to print the adapter. Look, I start my eighth decade on this planet next month. If I can figure out how to do all this, anyone with two working brain cells can figure it out. Get one and have some fun making stuff.
You've made an excellent point - it's amazing how many different things you can create with a 3D printer once you get started.
People criticize 3D printers as being useless toys, and that is probably true if they're only used to download baby Yoda files and print them. A 3D printer is half a solution. 3D CAD is the other half. Once both complementary skills are acquired, it seems that *anything* is possible.
I built a shop full of CNC tools that I now almost never use. It's so much faster and easier to draw whatever I need in FreeCAD and 3D print it. You don't need to get an associate's degree in CAD. Sam is designing parts in TinkerCAD and selling them. If you want to get started in FreeCAD, you can create surprisingly complicated parts using the 3D primitives (cube, sphere, cylinder, cone...) and adding them to each other or subtracting them from each other, then chamferring and/or filleting the part. This is basically using FreeCAD in TinkerCAD mode. As you need to create more complex geometries you can draw arbitrary 2D shapes and loft them or revolve them, and learn to use the full power of parametric 3D CAD.
A few months ago I saw an AnkerMake printer on Amazon for $200, and said, that is so cheap, I am sure I will find a use for it... It already has MANY MANY hours of print time!
THIS!!! i always thought it would be great to have one. as you stated the ideas come mostly when the Machine is standing right there. my wife did not quite see the possibilities at first. since convincing my wife (which is by the way the hardest step for most of us married man XD) i had a kobra 2 pro and now an A1 i came up with many many practical solutions for all sorts of problems in and around our house. sprinkled with some nice decorations for the happy wife happy life situation.
what is described here and on many other places is what many of "us" have experienced. First thinking its nonsense, but after the first design-to-print process there is no way back. Although I tend to design the cute stuff, it is what I do for almost 3 decades now: Designing cute stuff (rubber stamps for the decoartive papercraft industry). Since I saw some of my ideas becoming 3D I am addicted. PLUS I even made some technical items I needed for me and others, so I am on the other side of the road now, and no way of going back.
This journey is repeating all over the planet, and I am abolutely sure every household will have 2-3 printers in 10 years time. Less ordering stuff online, more printing it!!!
Farms like Sams still will make sense OR he will turn into a designer offering his designs, getting paid accordingly, like he said, a lot of time went into developing his special products.
I am a 3D farmer myself. For me not only the model is my IP but, even more importantly, the material and printer settings, which are very dialed in to the model and can't be transferred to a 3d party manufacturer. Love your videos ❤
Would you be willing to share your settings?
😜
id rather buy the printer and learn myself instead pay someone to print stuff for me. Knowledge is worth SO much more.
Do you have 20k for a print farm. One is easy but a farm is a big investment
@@focuswest2736 Printerrrrr not Printerrrrrrrrrrssssssss
@@dronus but the video is about a farm or company for productuon. Anyone getting into it obv will buy a single printer for themselves like I did
@focuswest2736 I get it. I'm thinking of getting back into it 3d printing. I looked at getting a couple of my 3d models printed and the cost is ridiculously overpriced imo.
@dronus i got the p1s and couldn't be happier
Even if you’re not selling … it’s so nice to be able to make just about anything you can 3D model to solve problems. I consider my 3D printer a tool … one of my most useful tools. Once I have the printer I can make most things I can imagine and a bunch that others did for a few bucks.
I almost never use the CNC tools in my machine shop now that I have reliable 3D printers. Once you can CAD and 3D print, you can do so much you couldn't previously do. It's such a powerful tool for anyone who actually does stuff that I can't imagine not being able to 3D print custom parts at home. I can quickly make exactly what I want without compromise, but even if what I want is cheap on Amazon, I'll often spend five minutes to CAD it and I'll print it in an hour or two for 50 cents while I'm off doing something else. CAD and a 3D printer results in nearly immediate gratification.
Love the A1! Over the past 10 years or so, I have owned several 3D Printers like the Davinci Pro, MP Mini Select, and theoriginal Prusa based self assembled machine by Hictop. Each had very steep learning curve and high maintenance, stand over it til’ its done type experience. Not a very streamlined sequence nor is the output equal to the input in terms of cost, labor, and other things.
All this being said, the A1 by Bambu Lab far surpasses anything I have ever touched with this hobby. I do have to say, the product is great, the shipping and customer service varies by whom you ask. I ordered and received my printer the day after Thanksgiving, Black Friday. It took a few days for shipping and I was printing. I wanted to check the print quality and if I wanted the AMS Lite. Since the quality was great, I ordered the AMS Lite the very next day, with three or four spools of different color filament. The shipping department generated a tracking number and now we play the waiting game. The projected delivery date was near my earlier experience with the company, but there’s a catch. The tracking number and delivery date did as promised, save one thing, they shipped separate items on the same order in separate packages, each with its own tracking number. Probably an attempt to work around any legal entanglements of promised shipping time, IDK, I haven’t checked. My filament arrived as expected but the AMS Lite…. …took longer. The shipping invoice showed an approximate shipping date of Dec 25th. Again, IMO, another attempt at a legal workaround because nobody ships anything on Christmas Day, so then afterward. Each day after the 26th, I impatiently checked the tracking number, usually multiple times per day. As the days passed, the more it looked like I had been bamboozled. I lit up my keyboard griping and complaining, neither of which produced one ounce of a sense of urgency beyond “sorry for the delay, we’re working on it” type answer. As I type this, it’s the day projected for my AMS Lite to arrive. There’s been weather delays on top of the other wait, so I expect it to take a couple extra days, fine. I’m anticipating the delivery and setup process to ease my worries with the company, however slight.
Other company features and benefits, the software. PC is a full blown slicer with tons of bells and whistles, while the mobile app, Bambu Handy, has less options, you get what you get. I’ve used both without much hassle. The machine’s wireless data feature allows you to begin your print right from your phone or PC, adding a shitty camera to monitor whether it’s FUBAR enough to dash to the machine and stop the job. Don’t expect much from the camera feature as it is what it is. The time lapse feature adds to the job time length so I haven’t tilted at that windmill just yet, but maybe in the future.
All tolled (if the AMS Lite does arrive) the process was fairly painless if they tell you you’re gonna be waiting quite a while for some of the delivery, but mine didn’t. I STRONGLY URGE anyone as impatient as me, order the combo deal. It comes all at once. No muss no fuss. I’d have (a few) less grey hairs had I known to folllow this advice. Another option is to source their stuff with a local authorized reseller. You only have to wait the drive home. I would have chosen this route, had I known. My closest reseller is over 2hrs away, so I tried to get them to ship to store, like other normal companies, they wouldn’t, as this breaks the reseller contractual obligation with the original company. I guess, after getting the rest of my order, I’ll be satisfied, but until then, a few hours/days, I’m still waiting. Since Thanksgiving. HMU in my prof if you want any more advice, or choice in selection. ~buxtor out
I'd be interested to see what Slant3D would charge you for the same model.
I was going to comment on slant3d as well. They are focussed on b2b fulfillment, so if Sam were to have a product really take off that exceeds his print capacity, it might make sense to offload that item to a shop like slant3d.
@@thumperthoughts I'd imagine it's really good for overflow products that you don't have the capacity to print enough of to keep up with the demand, but I also imagine you'd still be paying some sort of premium for that or else the business wouldn't make sense for Slant. It'd still cheaper to build your own manufacturing network and using an overflow service like that on occasion than it is to rely on outsourcing completely.
@Slant3D
Slant also ties in with Etsy so you never have to touch a product or deal with shipping. If you like to hand off everything other than design and your listings, barring problems, slant seems like a great idea.
This. He’s right those services aren’t great for a production run. They’re for one and done. Slant3d doing printing AND fulfillment to the customer is a totally different scenario.
Also with the ones he looked at, should have looked at a quantity equivalent to 1kg of filliment. Deliver 30 pieces home to reship when orders come in. Sam hope you update this, super helpful data.
The one that is MJF is a technology by HP which is typically powdered nylon. One of the other ones on your list was quoted as SLS which is similar, but stands for selective laser sintering and also typically powder. Most of those printing services are for high end materials.
Something more like a shop like yours that doesn't want to do the printing would benefit from would be Slant3D which ties into etsy, shopify, amazon, etc and when someone buys it, they print pack and ship it. Keep up the good videos.
I just placed an order with Cloudcraft after watching your video. It is a material I am unable to print. The cost was reasonable; it was manufactured in Germany and shipped to Mexico. The shipping cost was over 60% of the total cost.
Great Video, thanks for sharing! I purchased my first 3D Printer and waiting patiently for delivery. I got the bug at the age of 53 and looking forward to learning and sharing this journey with my granddaughter and the 3D printing community. Thank You and keep on putting out great content, your time and knowledge is appreciated!
These outsource companies' prices get cheaper per part with the increased number of parts being ordered. Also, I know at least one of them also offers injection molding services, so when your volumes get high enough, you can look at costs of factions of dollars with a lot less production time (but there are upfront costs for mould prep and longer lead times.) But I agree the retention of IP being an important concern.
@@gman9543 That might be the most cost effective route, but that kills the joy of 3D printing. And no one wants to kill that!
@@monetary_episode494 Well depends on what your priorities are I guess. If you're in the business of selling things you design, and you're treating this as a business, then I would think you'd want to go with whatever gives you the highest margin on sales. Outsourcing it can also reduce the wear and tear on your farm, allowing you to prioritize it's use for other lower volume production.
If you're dealing with reputable, established companies, NDA's are the norm to protect your IP.
Sam just amazing seeing all the stuff you have accomplished with your new 3D printing business well done 👍
Thank you, I appreciate it!
Biggest advantage of being in charge of your own services is that the models can be changed at a whim to meet customer needs and unforeseen improvements.
Very correct there is a lot of flexibility and also one is in control of everything.
There is one big mistake in your calculation. You only asked for 1 print. Try again and ask for 10, 50 and 100 prints and you will notice that the price will decrease big time.
One piece can cost $100 if you only order 1. But if you order 100 pieces the price per piece might drop to $20 or less.
The real benefit of using a print hub, like PCBway, HUBS or whatever is in the big numbers.
Please try again and make a follow up video, will be interesting 😊
Our business has been picking up on the printed things we sell, so we decided to pick up another multi-color printer during the Black Friday sales.. I figured I'd try one of the new kids to the color scene, especially since it's significantly cheaper than the A1 Combo (Anycubic Kobra 3 Combo). I'd done just the bare-minimum of research on it, but figured it'd be similar to the P1S as far as waste and all is concerned (I mean, how many different ways is there to purge the old color out and flow the new, right?). I was VERY wrong in that assumption, lol. For one print we do, it uses 165g for the print, 13 for the purge tower, and flushes 195g. We account for that in the cost of the print.. The Anycubic doesn't estimate the flushed amount, so you don't know until AFTER you print, but it used 166g for the print, 33 for the flush tower and 560g purge... Absolutely crazy the amount used. I'm used to just looking at bottom line on the necessary filament amounts in the slicer, giving myself a bit of padding and pulling a roll with enough to do the job (I track all my spools with Spoolman). BIG mistake on that print, lol. I will say that the Anycubic was faster by about an hour (I'm assuming since it's filament changes take less time), but there's too much waste... That's something to consider when you're purchasing something that'll do multi-color for sure, waste amounts. If one of your viewers is wanting to print things with multiple colors, they'd definitely be better served with one of the Bambu series (A1's will do nicely if they are maxing out at 4 colors), unless they're wanting near zero waste and go with one of those new Prusa machines (MUCH more expensive). At any rate, I'm going to have the wife give this video a watch when she gets off tonight, to show her in a simpler way why doing it ourselves and not outsourcing is the way to go, especially since you have a knack for making the whys and wherefores much easier to understand than I do (as evidenced by the books I normally write in replies, LOL).
@@heffe2001 That sounds like something that could be fixed in the settings. Have you talked to their customer support about this? Surely, they’re not purposely purging half a spool for a 165g print. 😅
@pophid they control purge settings on the printer, not in software for now. You can adjust it, but you may have color bleed if you lower it too much. Bambu has the software tuned for their own use, and you can control the amounts in software for different color combos, it knows red needs more purge if white is next and vice versa for example. They'll get there eventually hopefully but right now they are just more wasteful. Even if you use the purge to infill or purge objects, it still generates more than Bambu with my testing, since the printer does it and not the software.
I'm curious what brand Sam is going to be testing filament-wise.. looking for an alternative to what I've been using, but need a company with a fairly large color pallet.
You commitment to quality and customer service is apparent. Thank you for the comparison of DIY vs farming out the process. One other thing (unless I missed it) is the material cost per product. I see Bambu sells a 1 kg (2.2 pounds) roll for $20 but in quantity it can be significantly less $13 or even less. What I don't know is how many products you can create from 1 roll. For example, how many business card jigs can you produce from 1 roll? Or what does each business card jig weigh?
Those are great questions! I'll add them to my video list to make. :)
Great info. Any creative use will need a local printer to prototype. This is absolutely a must.
Idk if somebody commented on this, but for the i.materialise technology used, it is Multi Jet Fusion (MJF). A 3D print powder technology that binds the powder in layers with a fusing agent. Pretty cool tech.
Makers gona Make! Keep on makin man! Good job presenting the info in a video format and some of the behind the scenes. From my exp running a print farm in 21-22, eventually you will clean and re-lube the Z-axis lead screws due to dust and plastic particles, tighten the belts, the filament knife, the ptfe tubes wear down, maybe some of the ptfe tube connectors, maybe a stepper motor or two, build plate replacements, new nozzles as they wear or clog, maybe a fan or two due to bearing wear and they screech. These are all relatively easy to do. On creality/clone machines i could get one back up and running in 30 to 60 mins depending on the problem.
I took a little break from maker videos...right about the time you were finishing up the new shop. I come back and you are a 3D farmer! So happy for you and a tish jealous! Love to see your success. Keep kicking butt!
edit: And what a great example for aspiring entrepreneurs. When I first found Sam, he was laser engraving wood spatulas and other items. Now he's got a literal wall full of 3D printers making products he designed. The lesson here is always be ready to pivot. Keep your business and your brain nimble. Your great idea may be a great idea today, but your next great idea may be even better, and much different.
Thanks, it's been a wild ride!
Polyamide (MJF) is most likely nylon using “Multi jet fusion” which is a powder based print using HP inkjet tech. It’s solid with no infill and pretty accurate dimensionally.
preeeetty shure those prices and color options get a lot better if you inquire 10+ pieces :) or maybe contact them directly. And if you're concerned about your best designs you can easily get them protected - in germany you can register them pretty cheaply online at the patent office (not as actual patents which require lawyers and big bucks - this just gives you an insurance in case a dispute gets started)
Young man you sure have a AWESOME beard started there. It well be great to see it as it grows out more. I'm so proud of every thing you've accomplished.
It's been great watching the many ways God has blessed you and your family. You are blessed to have a awesome wife that stands behind you in all your adventures.
My prayer is that God will continue blessing y'all above and beyond your wildest dreams.... Much love...BBE..
Thank you for rambling on, personally you have convinced me to buy if or when I plan to DIY.
Question: Will you ever do custom printing using a supplied 3D file? • If so, do you also have a minimum order requirement?
Merry Christmas Sam & Family! Blessings!✝🕊🌟💚🎄💗
Merry Christmas to you and yours as well! 🎄
FYI the shapeways one was SLS
Great video Sam. I’m not interested in a print farm but I love my A1 printer from Bambu I’ve been making tool holder for my tools in my woodworking shop and things around the house and I feel like my printer has already paid for it self in just a couple of months. And I’m hoping to start learning how to make my own ideas and to be able to print them. Thanks for sharing your experience with us
Quality control is in your hands with onsite. One off part ain t fair comparison,print farms like running multiple of same parts, but again slightly concerned at quality control.
I think using a company to print may be a good starting point for someone with a few product ideas to get started and test the market before investing in their own manufacturing. You can fill orders for a few months to see if the market increases and might be sustainable before taking the deep dive.
Sam! I've never seen you without a hat! And glasses! It's sad that your big Thunder laser has become a table for filament (snark). Thanks for all your work to show us how much we can save by doing it ourselves. Excellent info. Merry Christmas!
Great job once again, lots of interest in your farm, been growing a farm out myself. Keep the great videos coming.
I think outsourcing makes only sense if you've already done your part: prototyped, tailored, fine tuned the thingy and you need a lot of copies fast. Then you can really outsource the fishy part with failed prints and printers. For hobby purposes you need to definietly pick a printer for your budget and have fun with it!
Personally, I restify old vehicles. And, I live rural. Best case if I send something out to be printed, is three days to delivery. I bought a 3D printer so I can get that down to a day, to design, and print. Small parts will be ready the next morning. Greatly affecting the time line to completion.
Great discussion and insightful. I’d like to recommend to all viewers in this small business niche, please reach-out to your local public schools and find STEM educators to mentor or assist. Our kids need to be inspired and learn this tech. You might also find an outlet for your older printers where you can sell them or get a tax deduction for any donation. Best of luck to all!!
I agree! It's important to give back to the community, especially with STEM education. Thanks for the suggestion!
I think the biggest concern besides cost, is quality control. With services like that of Slant3d’s print on demand service API, time is certainly returned to you to operate and expand the business, but how do you know that your products are being shipped at the quality you would expect from your own in-house print farm? The only way to know is to wait for the reviews and RMAs. I definitely think, however, that anyone who would go the route of outsourcing production, should have at least one high quality printer for prototyping. It would in no way be cost or time effective to outsource prototyping. I would only order “test prints” to ensure the third party print farm could print the product to my standard. All that being said, it is contingent on cost being equal to or less than your in-house cost. It would be essential to factor cost of materials, maintenance, up front cost of printer, cost of your labor, and shipping and handling. It would take quite a bit of research and analysis to make the decision to outsource.
Just wanted to say this was my favorite video of yours so far. Thanks for the info!
Wow, thanks! Glad you enjoyed it!
Always love your videos Sam, they are definitely my favourite of all I'm subscribed to and you just say it as it is. The fact that you can run a business from Tinkercat shows everyone you don't have to buy big fancy Cad software to be successful.
You could set a side hustle to your current print business, as a print service supplier too.
My local library has a 3D printer. You upload your STL and they print the model, charging 10 cents per gram for the completed model. They use PLA exclusively.
If you had your own printer it would cost you about $0.02 per gram.
Which machines do they use? Our library’s use Prusa mk3s+ and they are slow. Owning your own machine for prototyping is way more efficient. At least from my experience.
@@FireDragon3DThey have a Prusa MK4. Of course having your own machine is more convenient, but using the library is way cheaper than any of the services that Sam mentioned.
@@WrongTimeWatchOr less. Nearly all of the PLA that I buy for my Creality K1C is well under $20/Kg.
@@MandoJVG Sure, but don't forget wear and tear, electricity, wear on tools you need, your time to figure it all out... it's more than just the cost of the filament, especially if you are trying to run a business
Bro!!!!! your hair is finally unveiled!!! Behold it in all its glory!!!!!!
Haha, Ta-Da!!!! :D
I only have 2 printers (X1C), but I've designed and sold enough things to pay for them both. Basically, anything I print for myself costs me nothing. I'm going to get the bigger Bambu printer when it comes out.
That's awesome! I'm excited for the new Bambu printer, too.
I've been on the fence... this definitely helped to push me over it, towards purchasing a printer.
Thank you
I'm happy to have been of help!
@Samcraftcom just bought the A1.... been looking at it and the P1 one for couple months.
Now, how do I tell the wife? Lol
@@markah910 You won't regret the A1 OR the P1 series, it really just depends on your use-case, and what materials you want to print. If you need stronger prints using more advanced filaments (IE: ASA/ABS, PC, etc), the P1S is a good starting point as it's fully enclosed, making printing those engineering-grade filaments easier. If PLA & PETG are going to be your main focus (PETG is more heat-tolerant than PLA for things like parts your going to use in your car, etc), the A1 series is a no-brainer. I've mainly been using the P1 series printers for around the last 2 years, and have finally gotten to a point where I need another multi-color capable printer, so I gave the A1 a shot. I'll definitely be getting more of these as business grows. Hopefully one day I'll have a wall like Sam's, but right now it's a hodge-podge of various brands for the single-color stuff, and a couple Bambu's for multi...
@@heffe2001 I figure since I'm going to be new to this the A1 is a decent place to start and if I like it and get better at it I can always go and get a P1 series and if I don't like it or I suck at it really bad then it wasn't that bad of an investment to begin with.
@@markah910 the Bambu printers are as near to hit print and go as I've had, they usually don't have many problems. It really depends on what your going to be printing, but I'd hazard a guess that you'll end up finding a ton of things you hadn't thought about being able to make that you do end up printing.. I do a ton of functional stuff for around the house, and sometimes it sure beats having to go to the hardware store lol.
I think the shop build was the first one I saw of yours.
These prices are shocking to me for those who may want to have something they designed printed you might try your public library. The library where I live will basically print it at cost of materials used for printing.
Mine charges 10 cents per gram. Not bad, but my cost to print at home is 2 cents per gram, or less.
There is one thing you missed for your comparison vs the big companies. There are tons of independent small businesses out there that will charge 0.15 to 0.20 per gram for printing basic PLA and PETG. If its someone in your own town, they'll likely be happy for the work and unlikely to steal your IP. Pending your settings, a 100g item would be around $15 to $20 with out a bulk discount, etc. Far as IP with 3d printing, thats another mess, but there is no protection for functional items (a jig could be considered functional). Therefore without a patent, one could literally 3d scan or recreate your hard work and you wouldn't be able to do much of anything about it. Which is pretty messed up, but happens daily. Another pointer for those looking into starting a print farm, don't jump in with 20 printers try and run the minimum amount you need. Demand can drop off at anytime, and a fleet of printers collecting dust is a horrible thing. Not to mention that the technology is drastically improving about every 6-12 months. The machines I had before Bambu are rarely turned on now, and for single color prints I'm finding myself going away from Bambu for the newer Flsun T1 pro which is stupid fast. Oh yeah, and Sam you should really give Plasticity a try, much better than tinkercad.
I agree that local print shops are a good option, to ease into any new business ventures (I stair-stepped into this myself, too), and that IP protection for functional items is tough! I'll add a note to check into Plasticity. Thanks!
Great info! Been following you for a while and great to see how far you have come. You are a hussler and making it happen. I hope you have continued success for many years to come. You should be very proud of what you have accomplished. Keep making it happen!!!!
Thanks, I appreciate the kind words and support!
As mentioned by someone else, it would be interesting to see what Slant 3D would quote for a large run of parts vs just one. But you also 💯 need your own printer(s) to prototype. I think a mix of both might be the way to go.
I had no idea about Slant3D and they never came up in my searches and use of ChatGPT for preparing for this video, so it wasn't intentional. I'll add this to my next video where bulk ordering pricing is also discussed (that seems to be a popular request from this one, too). Thanks!
I was interested to hear that you like a relatively low-cost multi-color printer. Thanks for the info.
Shapeways quote was for SLS not FDM as well
I have no interest starting a print farm but I found your video interesting and entertaining.
Thanks for sharing! Would be interesting to see what Slant3D would charge.
I had no idea about Slant3D and they never came up in my searches and use of ChatGPT for preparing for this video, so it wasn't intentional. I'll add this to my next video where bulk ordering pricing is also discussed (that seems to be a popular request from this one, too). Thanks!
I keep my Printers in LAN mode. I know it limits the functionality, but I totally agree about keeping IP in house only.
If you sell the physical item that you print the files itself doesn't mean anything because they can easily copy the physical object or 3D scan it if they really wanted to copy what you're doing, not only that a really good 3D modeler could just copy it from I if it's a stencil
Like you said at the end. Id say that's one of the most important parts. What kind of person are you? Even if its "cheaper" to do it your self. It may not be the right choice.
As others have said, you didn't even take the time to see how outsourcing prices scale. I think that is generally what you're missing: scale. When you outsource, you have more flexibility to scale up or down without needing to buy more equipment or have equipment idle. Also, unless you're stuck on being a small shop, you can actually have your designs manufactured (injection molded) and drop your per-unit cost to next to nothing. You seem like a good dude and you should be proud to have made it this far, but you're thinking small and not thinking like a manufacturer.
Buuuuut Sam! What about the print files that you send to your printers through WiFi, doesn’t it go through Bambu servers and you are giving it away??? Haha great video! Never used those 3d print services, didn’t realize how expensive those are! Glad to have my own 3d printer even more!
May the lord bless and protect you and your family and your business.
Sam, love your videos. I wood work and laser engrave, thought about getting a 3 D printer but not sure what I would use it for. I enjoy watching you grow your business, been following you since you were making utensils. Keep up the great work.
Hope often do you clean your build plates, and what’s your method? Can we watch it in action?
Everything has a price but set that price really high. Great video!
A comment about the printing technologies. I've worked with additive manufacturing for a good 10years and know most if not all technologies to some degree. The Shapeways quote says SLS(Nylon12) which is the most common bread and butter laser powderbased polymer process. A common system is eos p396 but many others exist today. The i,materialize quote for MJF is also a powderbed based technology but with some binder and heat instead of laser(s). It is Hewlett Packard's (HP) technology. It is a competitor to SLS due to mainly higher productivity and less complex systems, but I have found it also more challenging with powder removal for complex parts (internal cavities). Why xeometry is so expensive being FDM I can only speculate, but probably using some expensive industrial system for that asa/abs and the hourly rate is high.
I just started using my first 3D printer the other day. I went with a P1S, i already want to buy another one. Problem is that i dont yet know what to design and sell.
It's exciting to get started with a new printer! The best way to come up with designs to sell is to think about problems you have and try to solve them with 3D printing.
Sam, respectfully, if someone is dead set on acquiring your files it's not that difficult to simply order one of your products and measure/3d model it. Basically reverse engineer it. I say this because I personally think that you're leaving money on the table by not selling the digital files on etsy/your web store. It's basically free passive income. That's why, if I design something to sell, I'll list both the physical and digital variants. There's been quite a few times for me I've seen things for sale on etsy that I'd like to print myself, that I gladly would have paid $5 or $10 for the stl for, to print myself. Not because I want a particular item cheaper, but most of the time it's because I want to print it in a more durable material. To each their own though.
As for buying a 3d printer vs using a service, using a service is literally throwing money away unless it's just a small run of items for personal use and you don't have a 3d printer. But even then, you could probably find someone local or online with a 3d printer who will do it for less than a commercial service. For selling prints, you don't even need a full size A1, or an AMS lite to get your foot in the door. A $200 A1 mini will print beautifully and reliably, and once you get some sales going, you can look into adding to the fleet. That said, buying the combo with AMS lite is worth the initial increased cost since you save (as of right now) $80+ vs buying the mini alone and adding an AMS lite later. Unless I specifically need the bigger size of the A1, I'd be happy running a fleet of A1 minis.
Amazing the amount of time you have put into this informational video for someone interested in doing similar things. Really enjoyed your explanations of everything. Best of luck with your business.!!
an old retired guy who enjoys youtube videos😊
I'm glad you found it helpful!
Went directly from the 1st X1 Carbon video, to this.. O_O
something that would have been nice to show was the material cost for that sample model. few bucks or so?
Hey Sam hows the reliability of the A1 printers after running them 24-7
Yay New Video. Thanks For Helping For many people Your A Great man
Shapeways was also not FMD, it stated SLS. Understandably more expensivenot filam
I really liked the video, it was great to see you break everything down. It was really surprised how much other companies charge. On another note, I saw in your last video that you have a video coming up about air quality with 3D printing and I'm definitely looking forward to watching it. My spouse and I have been interested in getting a 3d printer for a while now, my only hang up is the VOCs and UFPs even from PLA. We don't have a separate workshop space to put it, just an office, so I'm unsure with children nearby if it's safe.
The risks from VOC/UFP do exist. The long term effects aren't known. A good solution can be rigging up an enclosure + window vent. It doesn't even need to be permanent. If you do some searching you can find lots of people that do this type of setup. Good luck and have fun printing! @Cheekiersky
If you live near Microcenter get 5% off when using a Microcenter credit card. Almost pays for my MD taxes when buying some Bambu printers. Make sure you payoff the CC at the end of each month.
How do you manage sending all the jobs to each printer? Are they all generally printing the same thing, or do you have to clear the slicer for each printer as you get them all ready?
Could be an interesting video if your open to walking through your workflow with orcaslicer. Thanks
Just curious as to how many misprints or failures you have a day or week with that many printers, I have one A1 printer and have only had two failures, and that was due to filament getting caught on the spool and one was my fault for not having a clean build plate. I absolutely love my A1 since I bought it in October this year. I really enjoy your video's, thanks for sharing your journey with us.
If a product is selling that well though it's gotta make more senss to just start manufacturing in mass and outsource to an injection molding company or something like that. 3D printing is great for prototyping and developing a new product
Hi great video as always. I have a question I use Bambu labs filament as it's coded for this A1 machine however Bambu Labs takes forever to ship or has no stock in inventory but other brands of filament spool will not fit the A1 without printing an adapter. Do you know of any brands that will fit the A1 or any recommendations of brands to substitute or the Bambu labs filament?
THANKS
MJF is "Multi-Jet Fusion" - HPs name for nylon powder sintering
I think the comparison is a bit off
You are comparing a combo with the AMS lite, which you don't need to print in 1 color. So Bambu Lab A1 $339 is cheaper printer alone. Yeah I get it you can load the same color filament and have it auto switch which is nice but someone getting started out doesn't necessarily need the AMS (coming from someone that bought his printer and then decided an AMS was mandatory lol)
And don't 3d print services offer bulk pricing? I did some similar research a couple years ago and the bulk pricing was significantly cheaper per unit (50-75% cheaper per unit).
Grand scheme it's going to be cheaper to DIY either way long term. You don't give away your property/designs and you control the quality of the product.
Great information, it helps me make a decision on what I want to do. I also like the idea that it is useful for personal items as well. Thanks for sharing
I'm glad the video was helpful!
Did he ever say the price of the filament used? Owning a 3d printer that's already a sunk cost. Just curious of how the print farm aligns to the actual filament cost.
This video is incredibly flawed for a variety of reasons but the one most important to you as a business owner is that some of these services will also do fulfilment kind of a print on demand service. which frees up your time and resources for other things.
Invest in a good non disclosure agreement. The power varies by state.
I'm strongly in favor of printing products internally, but this comparison is heavily biased in that direction. The print services chosen were almost all prototyping services. There are print farms such as Slant 3D that will have a much lower cost, suitable to an externalized print farm. They specialize in 3D printing designs for online businesses. The sample part in this video would probably cost around $10. They not only manage the 3D printers, they also ship directly to your customer. It's not my cup of tea, but many people are designing products and listing them on Shopify, Etsy, eBay, et cetera, and having a commercial print service 3D print the products and do all of the order fulfillment. Slant 3D has an API to make it easy to integrate with online businesses. Often, someone will have one 3D printer to develop the products. They focus on product development and marketing, and outsource the manufacturing and order fulfillment. I still prefer doing it all but some people prefer to spend their time growing their business by creating new products and expanding their online presence rather than managing a print farm and shipping orders.
I had no idea about Slant3D and they never came up in my searches and use of ChatGPT for preparing for this video, so it wasn't intentional. I'll add this to my next video where bulk ordering pricing is also discussed (that seems to be a popular request from this one, too). Thanks!
Interesting, didn't expect such high prices. I wonder if you went more than 1 if that would make a difference, I know when I get PCB's it basically the same price for 1 as it is 5 and only goes up a little for more since the setup is the expensive part. Is 3d printing the same, if you did a 10 quantity would the price per unit go down a bunch?
Board pricing is what it is due to them making them on a single piece of pcboard material. 3d printing needs a dedicated printer and x amount of time to make each item, and every item adds the same amount of time to the process. Not much of a way for them to combine the costs. At least with FDM printing anyway. If you're doing things that can fit multiples on a bed and using resin printing, they could more easily make the costs lower per unit (it's just in the way the technology works).
Well done Sam however…..overhead, labor, are two huge components. But, doing yourself comes with responsibilities along with a manufacturing job to supplement your design job. Granted simple numbers get a simple comparison however tax consequences along a lot of other factors definitely weigh in. All that to say I wholeheartedly agree IP is an unknown but is president in your mode. Again, thanks for bridging the topic. Personally I build custom furniture and I’d be scared to run the cost I have invested. Ha
are you going to add to your solar farm considering with all the new machines?
Informative for sure 💖💖👍👍🙏🙏👍👍💖💖
Thanks! Glad you found it helpful.
Thanks for the info Sam.
Getting 'one of' is generally most expensive. Be interesting to see comparison of ordering 25 items.
That's a great point - I'll add that to my list of comparisons.
There is one cost you did not touch on. The computer. I know the computer I have now would not be able to handle a drafting program to design the printables. I don't even think it has the ability to interface with the printers. (it barely handles me getting on YT) If I were to pursue this, I would need to upgrade my computer. What sort of cost would that be? $500? $600? $800? $1,000 or more?
I recently purchase an all in one computer to run my laser and it was $199 on amazon with windows 11 pre-installed. You can also get something used online.
Tinkercad, it's browser based, run on anything just about
Like the new haircut Sam.
Do you have a website for the items you sell?
It's time to make your own 3d printing service:) LETS GO:D
Great video Sam 👍
Thanks! I appreciate you letting me know!
Amazing information! Thanks for sharing!
Thank you for sharing this. . . Great stuff!
My pleasure!
The only time I'd send out to a service if I needed a one off on an exotic process.
My partner and I like your videos, trying f hard ti set up shop in cali...not for the weak 😮 lol
What were your start-up costs?
nice videos, but just a moment, did you compare the prices of the product if you order only one item from a printing farm? Try the prices for, say, 100 pieces - they’re much cheaper than what you had before. Of course, one piece is expensive because the setup is a very costly process, and companies need to charge for it.”
Hi, I see you print a lot of items that take up a good amount of space on your build plates. I also run the A1 printers. My question is, how do you keep the prints from warping on the bottom and/ or corners? Any help is greatly appreciated! Thanks for all the videos! Keep up the good work!
clean build plate, and dry filament. dry filament is a big one on bambu printers using bambu filament and using the bambu filament setting presets. they are assuming the filament is perfectly dry(it never is unless you have a dryer). if you dont have a dryer, you need to do some manual tuning to get better results.
Did the Xometry cost include the shipping? It looked like you could choose 3 day, 6 day or overnight and you had selected 3 day.