High School 3D Printing Farm  

Re: High School 3D Printing Farm

No, but if you use the live chat feature in their store I'm sure they can get you squared away! (You could also email them but it would take a while to get a reply).

Re: High School 3D Printing Farm

Thank you!

No, but if you use the live chat feature in their store I'm sure they can get you squared away! (You could also email them but it would take a while to get a reply).

Re: High School 3D Printing Farm

So I "chatted" with someone and they told me that there were other distributors and that a sole source letter would be untrue since they don't stop others from "reselling" their product. I am not sure if they just didn't understand what I was asking. I will try again tomorrow maybe and see if I can get somewhere with this because after our conversation I have been looking all over and cannot find anywhere to order these printers other than the Prusa site. All I need is a competing quote or sole source letter to make the grant issuers happy.....

-Brandon

Re: High School 3D Printing Farm

So I am a high school Engineering teacher with about ten years of experience in 3D printing with printers varying with price tags anywhere from +$20k to $500. I wrote a grant and was awarded to create a small 3D printing farm in our STEM lab where I teach our Engineering classes. The grant awarded me with enough for six Prusa i3 MK3S kits, two Multi-Material upgrades, and a few accessories. I plan to work with the students to assemble and design the "Farm" My problem is that I need a sole source letter to state that the only place I can buy Prusa printers is through Prusa before they will let me order anything. Has anyone seen or received something like this from Prusa?

Thank you in advance!

-Brandon

I would recommend an additional printer or something else than the MMUs for this case. Or if you are really set on the MMU, maybe just 1 for now.

The first issue is that you will likely be waiting a long time for them. The current estimate for March orders in June, but I would plan on that slipping as my Dec 4 order originally had an early Feb estimate and it's now late April and orders from October are just now being shipped (e.g. I expect my date to slip more).

The second issue is one of reliability. Even for those reporting successful prints it sounds like there has historically been a bunch of tweaking and fiddling (though the MMU2S is supposed to help with some of that) to get it working correctly. That could result in frustration for the users as wells as potential downtime for the printers they are installed on. Think about how it will go over for a third of your printers to be unavailable while you are getting them working. Also consider that while having to restart a failed print at home where you can usually restart shortly after a failure, considering coming in Monday morning (or after a long weekend/holiday) to find one or more failures that need to be redone. While these issues are obviously possible without the MMU, the MMU adds more failure points.

Next is the speed as the MMU can be significantly slower based on the tower characteristics needed. I ran one test slice where printing in a single color it would take ~10 hours to print the object. Doing it as a MMU print it was going to take over 40 hours and put almost half a spool into the purge block 😮 (it was admittedly an extreme example with a lot of tool changes and no optimization).

It's not as big of an issue since you'll have other non-MMU printers, but it's also worth recognizing that support for different nozzle sizes and layer heights is limited with the MMU. There are those that report getting results with different settings, but it's not as turn key as with the plain MK3 settings in Slic3r.

Re: High School 3D Printing Farm

I would suggest you create this letter. In this letter make it clear for which purpose and for which product (Original Prusa MK3 kit + MMU2) you need it.
If they don't want to sign it, you could ask if PR can provide a list of this resellers. They don't need to lie. I think you just need to find the right person who understands that this paper is just a bureaucratic obstacle.

Re: High School 3D Printing Farm

I know there is a Prusa dealer in Canada but I don't recall seeing any in the USA PrintedSolid.com has the best selection of Genuine Prusa parts but they don't sell either the printer kits or assembled printers or if the do they are not found on their webpage.

So I "chatted" with someone and they told me that there were other distributors and that a sole source letter would be untrue since they don't stop others from "reselling" their product. I am not sure if they just didn't understand what I was asking. I will try again tomorrow maybe and see if I can get somewhere with this because after our conversation I have been looking all over and cannot find anywhere to order these printers other than the Prusa site. All I need is a competing quote or sole source letter to make the grant issuers happy.....

-Brandon

Re: High School 3D Printing Farm

I thought Prusa’s warranty only covered kits that they sold. If you buy from a distributor, then you need the distributor to service any warranty claims.

THAT is the detail to confirm with chat, ang get a policy statement. “Full factory warranty support” can serve as a sole source justification. But sole source contracts are rightfully difficult to justify. A sole source justification may also be poking at why not get a Monoprice, or a Creality??

It may be easier to just do a Trade Study of different printers and vendors, and then award the purchase to the winner.
Basically you decide what criteria are important, like reliability, serviceability, reputation. You assign a weight to each criteria, and assess each choice.

I would advise against cheating on the trade, if it’s obvious that everything you like about Prusa are the criteria, and how much you like those features are the weights, sh*t could get serious.

Re: High School 3D Printing Farm

Thank you so much for the feed back I was wondering if I should go that route or not and will probably just get one MMU to start with and play with to see if we can get it dialed in. I forgot to put shipping in my bid so I can hopefully cover some of that with just ordering one of the MMUs.

So I am a high school Engineering teacher with about ten years of experience in 3D printing with printers varying with price tags anywhere from +$20k to $500. I wrote a grant and was awarded to create a small 3D printing farm in our STEM lab where I teach our Engineering classes. The grant awarded me with enough for six Prusa i3 MK3S kits, two Multi-Material upgrades, and a few accessories. I plan to work with the students to assemble and design the "Farm" My problem is that I need a sole source letter to state that the only place I can buy Prusa printers is through Prusa before they will let me order anything. Has anyone seen or received something like this from Prusa?

Thank you in advance!

-Brandon

I would recommend an additional printer or something else than the MMUs for this case. Or if you are really set on the MMU, maybe just 1 for now.

The first issue is that you will likely be waiting a long time for them. The current estimate for March orders in June, but I would plan on that slipping as my Dec 4 order originally had an early Feb estimate and it's now late April and orders from October are just now being shipped (e.g. I expect my date to slip more).

The second issue is one of reliability. Even for those reporting successful prints it sounds like there has historically been a bunch of tweaking and fiddling (though the MMU2S is supposed to help with some of that) to get it working correctly. That could result in frustration for the users as wells as potential downtime for the printers they are installed on. Think about how it will go over for a third of your printers to be unavailable while you are getting them working. Also consider that while having to restart a failed print at home where you can usually restart shortly after a failure, considering coming in Monday morning (or after a long weekend/holiday) to find one or more failures that need to be redone. While these issues are obviously possible without the MMU, the MMU adds more failure points.

Next is the speed as the MMU can be significantly slower based on the tower characteristics needed. I ran one test slice where printing in a single color it would take ~10 hours to print the object. Doing it as a MMU print it was going to take over 40 hours and put almost half a spool into the purge block 😮 (it was admittedly an extreme example with a lot of tool changes and no optimization).

It's not as big of an issue since you'll have other non-MMU printers, but it's also worth recognizing that support for different nozzle sizes and layer heights is limited with the MMU. There are those that report getting results with different settings, but it's not as turn key as with the plain MK3 settings in Slic3r.

Re: High School 3D Printing Farm

Thank you so much for the feed back I was wondering if I should go that route or not and will probably just get one MMU to start with and play with to see if we can get it dialed in. I forgot to put shipping in my bid so I can hopefully cover some of that with just ordering one of the MMUs.

So I am a high school Engineering teacher with about ten years of experience in 3D printing with printers varying with price tags anywhere from +$20k to $500. I wrote a grant and was awarded to create a small 3D printing farm in our STEM lab where I teach our Engineering classes. The grant awarded me with enough for six Prusa i3 MK3S kits, two Multi-Material upgrades, and a few accessories. I plan to work with the students to assemble and design the "Farm" My problem is that I need a sole source letter to state that the only place I can buy Prusa printers is through Prusa before they will let me order anything. Has anyone seen or received something like this from Prusa?

Thank you in advance!

-Brandon

I would recommend an additional printer or something else than the MMUs for this case. Or if you are really set on the MMU, maybe just 1 for now.

The first issue is that you will likely be waiting a long time for them. The current estimate for March orders in June, but I would plan on that slipping as my Dec 4 order originally had an early Feb estimate and it's now late April and orders from October are just now being shipped (e.g. I expect my date to slip more).

The second issue is one of reliability. Even for those reporting successful prints it sounds like there has historically been a bunch of tweaking and fiddling (though the MMU2S is supposed to help with some of that) to get it working correctly. That could result in frustration for the users as wells as potential downtime for the printers they are installed on. Think about how it will go over for a third of your printers to be unavailable while you are getting them working. Also consider that while having to restart a failed print at home where you can usually restart shortly after a failure, considering coming in Monday morning (or after a long weekend/holiday) to find one or more failures that need to be redone. While these issues are obviously possible without the MMU, the MMU adds more failure points.

Next is the speed as the MMU can be significantly slower based on the tower characteristics needed. I ran one test slice where printing in a single color it would take ~10 hours to print the object. Doing it as a MMU print it was going to take over 40 hours and put almost half a spool into the purge block 😮 (it was admittedly an extreme example with a lot of tool changes and no optimization).

It's not as big of an issue since you'll have other non-MMU printers, but it's also worth recognizing that support for different nozzle sizes and layer heights is limited with the MMU. There are those that report getting results with different settings, but it's not as turn key as with the plain MK3 settings in Slic3r.


Don't forget to also account for any import duties on orders over your customs limit ($800 for US)

RE: High School 3D Printing Farm

High School 3D Printing Farm is a cool thing for student! 

RE: High School 3D Printing Farm

Posted by: @seanbancroft

High School 3D Printing Farm is a cool thing for student! 

Please don't necromance threads that are nearly a year old unless you have something significant to add to the content. It's not an official rule but generally considered polite/good forum etiquette.

RE: High School 3D Printing Farm

That aside - it has been a year. We would really like to hear from the OP on how his printer farm worked out.

RE: High School 3D Printing Farm

Hi @brandon-c18,

did you get resolved you issue? If so, I would appreciate you to shortly described, for other to learn. and then I close this thread.

Thanks

Zoltan