Prusa Mini Clone from China  

RE: Prusa Mini Clone from China

@rat_patrol

Seriously, I am writing this thread as a service to provide an educated opinion on the benefit or not on this product.   I am not to the stage of asking your opinion.  The quality is good so far.  I am hoping my thread will encourage a kit from Prusa.  

RE: Prusa Mini Clone from China

@charles-h13

Didn't know you have to ask for permission to post an opinion on an internet chat forum from the OP...

I checked Aliexpress, and the Mini clone was $255 shipped for me. I'm making the purchasing opinion that the price point (compared to genuine Prusa) to advertised feature ratio is not conducive, in my opinion, of a good value from the start. 

You start talking $125-150 clones, then maybe. You would think it were possible, since you can get Ender 3 printers for $150 or less.

I, however, will be watching the thread to see where it goes. I've yet to be impressed by cloned 3D printer parts' quality and reliability, so I am genuinely curious. Please be sure to make a YT review, if possible, one you establish an opinion.

RE: Prusa Mini Clone from China

@rat_patrol

Thank you for your opinion, but the fact is it has little to do with the purpose of this thread.  If you read, you will see I posted all of your comments already.  

 Have a nice day!

RE: Prusa Mini Clone from China

@rat_patrol

I purchased it fully knowing it may not be worth it, for me it was not a matter of value but more like curiosity and challenge for myself. I treat it completely separately from my original MINI. Maybe I had some lost first batch package or unlucky pick of parts, but it's a stream of one SNAFU after another. Charles and other people seemingly have fewer issues than I do, or they are so used to fixing printers they solve such obstacles sub-consciously and don't even bother talking about it. Now I realized there are no pins or screws to which you align flexible build plate on heated bed, just 2 holes. Oh well.

RE: Prusa Mini Clone from China

@crawlerin

I am not sure yet and refuse to make judgments until I have it fully set up.  I refuse to prostitute my reputation.  I will post more soon,  

RE: Prusa Mini Clone from China

@crawlerin

as did I.  

RE: Prusa Mini Clone from China

The mini has been printing for 2 days.  I have 100% success.  It is quieter and was a breeze to connect to octoprint.  

I am finishing some photos.   I only have to say - wow.  

I will finish my review.   

RE: Prusa Mini Clone from China

@charles-h13

I did not read the whole thread, but as far as I understood, you have assembled and tested a Mini Clone. If I am wrong, please correct me.
A question from me: How does the board work? Is it 100% compatible with the original Prusa buddy board? No problems with firmware, filament sensor, timing problems etc.?

Thanks!

RE: Prusa Mini Clone from China

@karl-herbert

No problem thus far.  I upgraded it to the new firmware today.  100% compatible so far.  I think the difference is which one you buy.  The FYSTC Prus Mini is so far 100% perfect.  If I printed with PETG instead of PC Blend, it would have worked from the gate.  

RE: Prusa Mini Clone from China

@charles-h13

Thanks for the info!
That means, you had not so good experiences with PC-Blend? In which respect?

RE: Prusa Mini Clone from China

@karl-herbert

Karl,

I think I found the limitations of using it.  It does warp a little and some mechanical parts are not appropriate to be printed with it.  The extruder parts are especially not a recommended part for PC blend in my book.  

RE: Prusa Mini Clone from China

@charles-h13

I had similar experiences with extruder parts which I printed from PC. Warping was not so much the problem, but rather the structural change due to heat fluctuations and dynamic motion sequences. The material became brittle and fragile.
I had hoped that the Prusa PC was better in this respect ☹️ .

RE: Prusa Mini Clone from China

@karl-herbert

I started printing parts and became arrogant about what to print with it.  To be honest, I should have never tried to print all of the mini parts in PC blend.  

RE: Prusa Mini Clone from China

@charles-h13

I think that the elements of the x-axis and extruder are especially critical with the Mini, because warping will deform the holes. As a result, the extruder runs rough in some areas.

I have currently chosen ASA and am very satisfied with it.

RE: Prusa Mini Clone from China

@karl-herbert

I printed it with PETG.  It works very well.  

RE: Prusa Mini Clone from China

@charles-h13

I have finished mine too.
The build was a lot of fun. It's my first printer, but I have some background in assembling model helicopters 😉 I have used all the kit parts but replaced those smaller linear bearings with Misumi originals. The 10mm bearings were very good, so I used the stock ones. All the bearings were completely re-filled with Divinol Lithogrease to get perfect smoothens on all axises. I have also replaced the heatbreak with a Bondtech and replaced extruder with a Triangle Labs Bondtech clone. A high temp silver thermal paste was used to mount the heatbreak, heater and thermistor. Other than that, all stock. After the assembly there is still a bunch of screws and nuts left, and that's nice in case you loose or destroy one during the assembly. There are also two spare nozzles, a small bag of thermal paste and a handy usb stick.

I have flashed the most recent firmware and did some test printing with PLA, TPU, PP, ASA, FiberFlex and Easy PETG. All in all I'm very satisfied with the print quality. PLA printouts are awesome. Flex, Easy PETG and ASA required a bit of tinkering to get the best out of them. PP requires brim for anything bigger than 1cm (adhesion issues, glue needed). One thing that I have observed is that I need to print at lower temperatures. I'd say 10 - 15 degrees lower than what's in the default profiles or suggested by the manufacturer. For example PLA is great at 195 degrees, ASA works good at 230. So probably the thermistor is indeed a bit out of specs.

After around 20h of printing with different materials I did not have any major issues. I have one role of E-HT PLA that's really stiff and has textured surface causing drag in the bowden tubing. It made the extruder grind into the material causing a jam and failed print (twice, before I found the cause). I had to disassemble it and clean. Then I had to make sure there is no drag when the filament is pulled from the role and all other prints were good (but I could hear the extruder struggling with this specific material). So, the cause of the jam was not the hotend, but the drag from the filament role, stiffness of the material and it's strange, textured surface.

Now there is probably only one thing I will change and it's going to be the plastic hotend mount. I want to replace it with a modified version for the E3D heat block to improve the nozzle cooling fan performance. Other than that - it's a very nice printer IMHO. The only thing I would like to be better is bed heating. It takes some time to reach 100 degrees 🙂

RE: Prusa Mini Clone from China

I am done also.  Mine is completely stock.  I am 100% satisfied with the build.  In opening the box, it was obviously a return.  Hence, the deep discount.  All of the parts were in perfect working order.  The kit I received has the Meanwell power supply and a 3.2-inch display.  I have added a Raspberry Pi 4B with Octoprint.    

Total cost $112 including shipping.  They currently sell for $211-320.  They are way overpriced on eBay at $650 plus shipping.  On AliExpress, the https://s.click.aliexpress.com/e/_9fakJ P" target="true">kit is $234 plus $70 Shipping or $304.  It comes with the Gold PEI TXT sheet from FYSETC and a filament sensor.  To get the some from Prusa, it would set you back about $369 plus $47 shipping or $416.  It is probably worth it for $112 to get a warranty and customer support.   To me, I think it is worth it to go the build and fully understand the working underneath the printer.  I would strongly encourage Prusa to make a kit.  I would have bought one over the FYSETC, but until then, the FYSETC will have to do.  

RE: Prusa Mini Clone from China

First print is a little stringy.  

RE: Prusa Mini Clone from China

Guys: I tried to do a build thread but the build became mass chaos.  

RE: Prusa Mini Clone from China

More chaos