I have pulleys I’ve printed in ABS with hundreds of miles on them. Shrinkage had only been an issue a couple of times, that was with really cheap filiment. You can scale up the model by 0.5 to 1% in cura to resolve that issue. Print wheel pulleys at 100% infill.
Get some inexpensive Plexi, 2 step epoxy and a Plexi knife and make an enclosure. You will be so happy you did.
Press fit for ABEC is very hard with 3D printing. Id recommend pins for kegel, easier but still challenging
I currently have 1200km on ABS pulleys.
I print petg pulleys and it works great. I think nylon would be a bit better though.
PETG is so easy to work with, I use it for almost everything.
There are a lot of replacement boards out there for the ender 3. Lots of them claim they’re silent. Which do you recommend?
The big tree board seems mentioned most and looks like an easy switch.
I built this enclosure out of a sheet of Home Depot sanded plywood. This was just a test fit, I moved the PSU and control board down to the lower compartment before running the printer in there. The bottom panel was attached with rare earth magnets for easy access to the electronics. Eventually cut and printed up some sliding vents as it would get pretty steamy in there, lol. About $60 with plywood, magnets, leds, soft close hinges, and glass.
Actually, my ABS pulleys wear out in about 200 miles. I now print them all out of nylon. Even the press in pulleys don’t brake or show much wear after 200 miles.
I just put in the 1.1.5 board and it’s like night and day. I modded my venting system with silent ones and these are what I still hear 
So far just moving my printer around, it’s dead silent.
I have to put this new firmware I edited on and left my Sd card downstairs, too late to go get it.
For everyone else, I just got the skr mini E3.
It’s a plug and play board for the ender 3.
If you use a BL touch, the wiring harness needs to be swapped around.
I just put a petsfang on as well, will drop the new firmware and try out a few calibration prints with the new board tomorrow!
The petsfang looks like the recognizer from tron on the ender…
Made a huge difference with the new SKR board. I’ll post some pictures of the prints tomorrow.
I prefer the bullseye over the petsfang
Holidays have been nuts! I decided to show the printer to my cousin and I’m gonna work some more on a few upgrades. I’ve got some time now
One really nice thing I noticed was the 24v 360w PSU. It’s not a meanwell, which is the gold standard for quality replacements for these cheap PSUs. I was expecting 12v
If you’re buying a boars, your best bet is likely the SKR mink which is a drop in replacement and $35. That will make adding bed leveling sensors, software controlled leds etc etc much easier
Here what I’ll be doing:
I have a titan and a left hand BMG extruder lying around. Intending to set up a direct drive and eliminate the Bowden. We shall see. If I do this, E3D v6 as well.
She’s really into dragons and the like right now. Which is why I thought this would be a great gift for her. Gave her this as a lead up gift. A dragon egg, it opens and locks closed. It’s about 9 inches tall printed on my printer with some cheap rainbow filament
Merry Christmas everyone
Thanks for kicking off this post @bwahl602 - I ordered the E3 pro through creality’s sale and looking forward to getting started with it. My main interest is in being able to make small parts for my shop - There are often moments when I think “ugh I wish this thing connected to that thing” and I figure some simple custom parts I design will be better than the duct tape solutions.
It seems like the key upgrades to start with are a glass bed, bed springs, and the bowden feeder tube (I think that’s what it’s called). So i bought this kit:
What you guys think about the side spool holder?
Looks like it feeds the extruder pretty straight in at the lower print levels.
Prob won’t work with the ikea table enclosure deal.
I never had issues w/ the angle of the top mounted setup, but I’ve only done like 20 prints and am going direct drive now, so top mount ftw. Footprint is also better.
Yes the foot print is not ideal, but someone mentioned the filament wearing through the printed guide that keeps the angle outward.
I get on with it quite well taking the filament off the top can help with the acracy of the print and it reduced friction of the extruder guide. One thing to note if you use it is make sure you filament dose not rub on the z axis screw as it transfers grease on to the filament and that’s just bad in every way
I want to add bearings to the spool holder as well not found one I like yet
I’ve seen a couple but haven’t decided which one I want to try yet.
