Why the Prusa MK3s upgrade should be free of charge  

Re: Why the Prusa MK3s upgrade should be free of charge

A consumer grade 3d printer is not a car. And your example is flawed in any case because the printer works fine without the filament sensor. And as far as I know the sensor worked fine for certain filaments so I can't really see what the fuss is about re the sensor. The upgrade price (which includes other incremental updates) is small in comparison to what is spent on filament and other consumables in the maker space.

Just another way to look at it, but I doubt you will agree 😮

Re: Why the Prusa MK3s upgrade should be free of charge

Print an indirect sensor mod. There you go. Free upgrade.

Re: Why the Prusa MK3s upgrade should be free of charge

I do not agree. The filament sensor is a feature that was offered with the printer and was as well a reason why users have upgradet or bought this printer. This feature does not work. What is the reason to accept this? Only because I can solve this problem with a personal mod?

Re: Why the Prusa MK3s upgrade should be free of charge

I just went to the forum and wondered why nobody has posted that he is not willing to pay for the filament sensor upgrade and wants’ it for free.
I bought a MK2s and then a MK3 because I was fed up with the bad quality Chinese printers. So I paid a lot of money for a good one to print as flawless as possible. But since the beginning I have problems with the filament sensor and it’s pretty clear that also no one at Prusa has a doubt that this sensor has a serious problem. Proof is the MK3s upgrade.
Example: You decide to buy a new car. As you want quality you decide to buy an expensive European car instead of the super cheap Chinese one. But on your new quality car the engine sometimes suddenly stops. All delivered software updates do not help. In the end the same manufacturer decides to present an upgraded engine that solves that problem. Wouldn’t it be clear for you that this is a guaranty issue?
Then let’s estimate that the manufacturer accepts that this is a guaranty thing, would you build in the engine yourself or would you expect the manufacturer to do it. Don’t get me wrong, I know we are all makers and we are able to change the sensor. I just want to paint a full picture of how I see this thing.
To come to the point, we all have paid for an expensive good quality working printer that is properly tested and not a super cheap Chinese one. I think that all MK3 users should get this upgrade for free as it is no upgrade, it is a repair and just makes the printer work as it should.

Thanks to the Chinese manufacturers many people have forgotten what are their rights as customers. You can see examples in your replies already and may see more later today.

Re: Why the Prusa MK3s upgrade should be free of charge

I do not agree. The filament sensor is a feature that was offered with the printer and was as well a reason why users have upgradet or bought this printer. This feature does not work. What is the reason to accept this? Only because I can solve this problem with a personal mod?

I doubt many people upgraded just because of the filament sensor. And it does work for some filaments, and if you turn it off it works for all filaments 😉

Re: Why the Prusa MK3s upgrade should be free of charge

That's why I wrote a feature and not the feature.

Re: Why the Prusa MK3s upgrade should be free of charge

Good luck. You aren't gonna win this fight.

Re: Why the Prusa MK3s upgrade should be free of charge

@ charles.h13: I do not see this as a fight.
Do you understand that this discussion is also about your rights as a customer? Someone offers you something, you want it and pay for it and in the end it does not work as promised. And then I should not be aloowed to ask why it is like this. Do you think that this is normal and correct?

Re: Why the Prusa MK3s upgrade should be free of charge

If an open source car from a tiny manufacturer existed I wouldn't expect the same level of support as I would from Audi. If I wanted the equivalent level of support as I expect from Audi I would buy a Stratasys machine, which isn't gauranteed support either as they may class this as an improvement rather than a defect.

Re: Why the Prusa MK3s upgrade should be free of charge

They can keep the "upgrade" I just want my powder coated sheet...

I don't feel Prusa owes me anything more than the powder coated sheet I was promised when I ordered my printer. The delivery of the powder coated sheet, or lack thereof, has seriously soured me on Prusa, especially when they started shipping them with new orders prior to making it right for those who were waiting for the sheets from earlier orders.

Now, if you ordered your printer in the past month I can sympathize but if you've had it for any length of time I'd argue the cost of the "upgrade" is minimal if it's that important to you. In the year+ that I've had my printer I've had filament run out on me exactly once. When my rolls get low I switch them out and use the remaining filament in the used roll to do small prints and prototypes of designs, but that's just me...

Re: Why the Prusa MK3s upgrade should be free of charge

Where is the difference between a Stratasys feature that was offered and does not work and a Prusa feature that does not work?
You guys really accept that all? Are you sure you have no rights as a customer. Prusa is not a tiny company, they do big business. You can read at the prusa website that they have 500 printers running constantly producing parts for printers they sell and they have more than 300 employees. They don't do it just to make the open source community happy and the world a bit better. It’s about making money. And not to be misunderstood, it’s absolutely fine for me and they really do deserve it.
This thread should not end as a blaming thread. I like what these guys have reached with their company. I just think that how they handle this issue is not correct.

Re: Why the Prusa MK3s upgrade should be free of charge

The laser filament sensor is consumable and will not render the printer useless if it becomes inoperable. If yours becomes inoperable during the warranty contact Prusa support for a new laser sensor.

The new sensor is an optional upgrade. Optional upgrades are not a right to every consumer free of charge.

Re: Why the Prusa MK3s upgrade should be free of charge

I would not be surprised if there was a phase out of the laser sensor, i.e. once the current inventory is depleted, any sensor issues would be dealt with by sending an upgrade kit instead. Replacement sensors are $15 on the store, and a kit is $20 and probably far cheaper from an at-cost perspective.

I'm on the fence here; my printer was just over a month old when the announcement was made so I would have waited had I known; I do kind of feel the "2 week" grace period is a little short. A longer-term offering would have been nice, e.g. a discounted rate for those that purchased over the past month or two could get it for just the cost of shipping or some such. But that would probably have just added to the backlog already; I can't imagine how many kits they are going to have to send out and eat the shipping cost, adding another ton of orders won't help. So maybe when the dust clears on the initial surge we will hear more...

But in the meanwhile, a user here has made a lovely remix of the R4 parts that is compatible with the existing sensor with an indirect bearing. So I'm going to print and use those and get me a Mk3(S0.5)

Re: Why the Prusa MK3s upgrade should be free of charge

A brake pad is a cosnumable, a filament sensor for sure not. And even it it was, than it would have been worn out already the first time I switched on the printer when it did not recognize the blue filament.
And I do not see this as an upgrade, it's a replacement to get the printer to it's full advertised features. Btw. this senso does not work for a lot of MK3's, not only my one. So it is not a simple guaranty, it's a standard error for the MK3's.
Also I did have contacted Prusa, but I did not get an answer.

Re: Why the Prusa MK3s upgrade should be free of charge

A brake pad is a cosnumable, a filament sensor for sure not. And even it it was, than it would have been worn out already the first time I switched on the printer when it did not recognize the blue filament.
And I do not see this as an upgrade, it's a replacement to get the printer to it's full advertised features. Btw. this senso does not work for a lot of MK3's, not only my one. So it is not a simple guaranty, it's a standard error for the MK3's.
Also I did have contacted Prusa, but I did not get an answer.

Unfortunately, the laser sensor will degrade over time making it a consumable part. Not sure if you ever had to replace a laser mouse but in my place of work I replace them all the time.

If this optional upgrade is causing you this much distress and you can’t afford it I will gladly send you $20.

Carry on.

Re: Why the Prusa MK3s upgrade should be free of charge

I agree that we should have had a working filament sensor as promised with the MK3, but companies makes mistakes and thats fine.

But what bothers me... Is that I ordered the upgrade on the first day it was out, and i bought the "print yourself" kit, because there was a 3-4 week lead time for the other one.

I ordered on the 13th, and it STILL has not shipped.

I asked customer service 2 days ago, and they said it will ship early this week, and still nothing.

The shop states that orders will be shipped 1-2 days after order. Its now over a week.

When i bought it there was no "lead time" warning for the print yourself kit.

Thats what annoys me. I paid for an upgrade for a revised filament sensor and they cannot even ship it in a timely manner.

Still waiting.

Re: Why the Prusa MK3s upgrade should be free of charge

A brake pad is a cosnumable, a filament sensor for sure not. And even it it was, than it would have been worn out already the first time I switched on the printer when it did not recognize the blue filament.
And I do not see this as an upgrade, it's a replacement to get the printer to it's full advertised features. Btw. this senso does not work for a lot of MK3's, not only my one. So it is not a simple guaranty, it's a standard error for the MK3's.
Also I did have contacted Prusa, but I did not get an answer.

As far as I remember it was never mentioned that the filament sensor works for any filament. The software was improved and damaged(burned) sensors are being replaced under warranty. I have MK3 and MK2.5 and I'm using the filament sensor whenever I expect the run-out condition. It does work for me.
Would I like a free upgrade? Of course, but saying this feature was false advertised or is a generic issue on MK3 is just not true.

Re: Why the Prusa MK3s upgrade should be free of charge

From https://www.prusaprinters.org/original-prusa-i3-mk3-bloody-smart/ :

Filament sensor is one of the technologies which will be and should be present on all new 3D printers. There are many ways how to detect a filament, for example, a mechanical switch or an optical switch, but we chose LASERS. Our optical filament encoder not only detects the presence of a filament, but also its movement. This means we can detect running out of the filament, pause the print and ask the user to insert a new spool. That is pretty basic. But we can also detect stuck filament and offer the user a cold pull to clean the nozzle and continue the print. We also have a second way to detect a jammed nozzle, but more on that later. Little added convenience is the filament auto loading. When the new filament is inserted, printer detects it, offers a preheat and then finally loads it into the hotend.

I can not find anything that tells me that it does not work for all filaments. And I would be happy if the printer would do what was offered. With a laser or whatever sensor. And just to be clear, It's not because of the 20$, I just want my printer to work, simple as that.

Re: Why the Prusa MK3s upgrade should be free of charge

I can not find anything that tells me that it does not work for all filaments...

Don't put your cat in your microwave ...