Looking to get a 3D printer soon.

The Voron 2.4 is very popular, and 300mm is probably the most popular 2.4 size, so availability of parts is good.

I decided to go 250mm since the Railcore is already 300mm and it takes a lot of space and I don't need that large a print volume very often. The Trident is a little easier and lower cost to build, but the differences are not large. For those interested, the 2.4 has a fixed bed at the bottom and the CoreXY gantry is supported by four belts driven by reduction belt drives so it won't drop when power is lost. The Trident has the same gantry fixed at the top and the print bed rises on three leadscrews with independent motors. Both the 2.4 and the Trident do auto-tramming using the 3 or 4 motors and a sensor. Various sensors are supported. Both designs use linear rails and 20mm extrusions and are made to be enclosed and print up through ABS and ASA materials by heating the interior with the heated bed. Voron is a design group that makes these designs and publishes the CAD, BOM and instructions. They don't sell kits or printers.

I haven't heard anything about voronkits dot com. I heard the Voron group was having some trouble with their trademark. I don't know the details, but the Voron design group does not sell kits or printers, so it is not from them.

I would stick with vendors that are on the Voron Discord to be safe. LDO kits have been top notch but they sell out quickly, almost like Raspberry Pi's. My DIY collection for the Trident has a lot of LDO parts kits like frame, motors and hardware. LDO makes a lot of parts for Prusa.

I would have saved money by buying a kit. Collecting parts separately is more expensive with multiple shipping and smaller bulk discounts. There were no complete kits when I started. Now there are a number of them. None are endorsed by the Voron group, they have no control over the kits. The highest quality kits sell out quickly, but even the lower quality kits are getting pretty good. Buying a kit and changing the things you don't like is a good approach for most people. Collecting all the parts is a task.
 
All good points @AlanB . I am looking at sourcing my material because it allows me more control over what I will get. For example, the kits seem to include a bottom panel made out of coroplast. I have access to .060 aluminum sheets for free. If it costs me a few dollars extra, I am ok with that. The BOM is inclusive enough that I have complete confidence in obtaining what I need. One item of consideration when I was looking at sourcing vs. buying a kit is the aluminum extrusions. I have utilized www.t-nutz.com for other building needs, which is one of my sources. I am rather adept at sourcing materials/parts, not just for this build but for other projects that I have done. The key is to locate suppliers that have enough of your items in stock, so shipping costs are contained. I should also point out that I have enough machines to do the machining on whatever I need to do :)
Good information on LDO. The one thing that I may purchase from them is the linear rails.
 
On my Railcore I updated to Misumi rails. At that time the Chinese rails were pretty iffy (3+ years ago). Today the Chinese rails such as LDO have improved a lot and most everyone uses them for 3D printers.

One thing folks have had trouble with is the T-nuts fit to the the extrusion slots. Not all T-nuts fit all brands of extrusion. Perhaps source them from the same place, or somehow insure they fit properly. Some extrusions also don't properly support the linear rails. For example I heard that Makerbeam extrusion slots are too wide for some rails to be properly supported. The Discord is a good place to vet some of the choices if there is doubt, there is usually experience there to draw on.

I think the better panel kits (Printed Solid is what I have) use ACM panels for the bottom and rear, and choices of ACM with acrylic windows or full acrylic panels for front and sides. Coroplast is in the BOM but most kits I have seen don't go with that. DIY builds often use coroplast as it is free after elections. :)

The Railcore kit came with polyethylene panels and folks often upgrade those to aluminum sheets. This increases weight and cost and often adds a lot of noise amplification, making the printer very loud. Aluminum doesn't damp well and steppers put out pulses that drive the resonances. I suspect the ACM and acrylic panels are much quieter than aluminum, and may reduce resonances that affect printing at some level. ACM panels are a laminate with thin aluminum outsides with proprietary filler in between. The filler is reportedly polyethylene but there may be more than one type of filler.

There is also a sourcing guide to go along with the BOM, it often has important info that the BOM doesn't detail. The Fusion 360 CAD model is also helpful and the detailed instructions are usually excellent though it varies a bit by model as the newer ones are improved over the older ones.
 
One step closer. Paid the duty (online) on the printer. Hope to get the Prusa tomorrow.
 
Progress! I haven't run into duty fees before, but it looks like while complex they boil down to a simple percentage of the total cost including shipping. Approximately what percentage of your total did they amount to? I am curious because this will be a factor in the XL that I have a deposit on, assuming Prusa actually ships it someday, and additionally that I actually have space left by then for a 360mm size printer. My other Prusa orders were never enough to trigger duty fees. In the case of the XL the options can change the pricing, so one could break it into lower cost parcels but this increases shipping and other costs. Did they also assess a sales tax? So many ways costs are increasing... :(
 
AlanB said:
Progress! I haven't run into duty fees before, but it looks like while complex they boil down to a simple percentage of the total cost including shipping. Approximately what percentage of your total did they amount to? I am curious because this will be a factor in the XL that I have a deposit on, assuming Prusa actually ships it someday, and additionally that I actually have space left by then for a 360mm size printer. My other Prusa orders were never enough to trigger duty fees. In the case of the XL the options can change the pricing, so one could break it into lower cost parcels but this increases shipping and other costs. Did they also assess a sales tax? So many ways costs are increasing... :(
Click to expand...
In my case, the duty amounted to about 4.623% of the total (including the shipping). Since I live in NH, there is no sales tax. Your experience in CA will be different. If I hadn't been reading this thread, I would have been shocked about the duty. But since I was forewarned, I just paid it as soon as I was notified.
 
I'm sure you are right about CA. Looks like we can't get better leadership here, even though we try.
 
7milesup said:
I am going for the 2.4r 300mm build. One of my co-workers, and a good friend, just ordered a kit from https://voronkits.com/ last Friday. I plan on sourcing my materials rather than going the kit route.

All excellent points guys, regarding the Rasp Pi. It seems that I kept seeing that the RPi was the only option whereas it is not, but I certainly understand having everything bundled in an ecosystem.

Regarding the Orange Pi, the following is a link to one of many that have done it. Not saying that you should, but there is documentation out there. https://blog.vertile.com/article/klipper-3d-printer-firmware/
Click to expand...

I've been looking up the specs for the Voron 2.4, and im liking what I see. I'm going to be following along with your build progress.

If it works out for you, I may jump on the bandwagon! :)
 
I'm curious why folks choose the Voron 2.4 over the Trident.
 
Another option on the Raspberry Pi front are the CM4 compute modules. The BTT Manta controller has a CM4 socket. CM4 boards are a bit easier to come by than regular Pi4 boards, and the combination is more compact as the CM4 sits on the Manta board. The CM4 has onboard memory that is better than the SD card so an SD card is not required. The Manta is basically the Octopus reworked to take the CM4. If I didn't already have the Octopus and Pi4 I would use a Manta and CM4, and I may change to it yet. If a CM4 is not available BTT makes a replacement for it (CB1) that is equivalent to a Pi3, and one could always start with that. I was able to get some CM4 boards, they are not off the shelf but when in stock they take much longer to sell out and quantities are not as limited as regular Pi's so you can get several. The CM4 boards are available in many different combinations of memory, eMMC and wifi/no wifi from $25 to $95 retail. For Klipper 1-2 GB ram with 8-16GB eMMC and Wifi is about right and the regular pricing is around $40-50. The CM4 boards can be used on various carriers to essentially be regular Pi4's, or optimized for specific applications.
 
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