hoping to join the makergear community soon!

[helifrek]

Hello all,
I have been looking to upgrade from my flashforge and have settled on the M2! I looked at others and the M2 seems to be the highest quality for the cost. Anything I should be aware of before ordering?
Does makergear offer military discounts? Are there any coupon codes or maybe a black Friday sale coming up? The M2 is not over priced but I would like to save money where I can!

Thanks everyone.
Brandon

[jimc]

welcome brandon. i dont think there is a military discount of any kind and in the year and a half i have had mine i have never seen it go on sale. the price has always been steady. you really cant go wrong with the printer. its an awesome product with great company and community support. i havent ever known someone to be dissatisfied with it. there is usually the few questions or hiccup in the beginning but someone will always make sure you work through it. from that point on its usually smooth sailin.

[Capt. John]

Welcome Brandon,

Cost vs. performance vs. reward. I rate my M2 as some of the best money I've ever spent.
Knowing what I know now, it's worth more to me ...than I paid for it, and consider it a bargain.

If you're tight on money, possibly contact MakerGear for a used printer.
Seen something to this effect by MG when they first listed the dual extruders.

Diver_rings_printing.jpg (113.06 KiB) Viewed 11789 times

My M2 makes 14 dollars every 90 minutes, less expense for juice and filament.
Low side would be 6 bucks an hour, for a 10 hour print day, 60 bucks and it don't bitch
about working conditions, or hourly wage, works on holidays and never calls in sick.
The machine is printing out diver rings, or fishing tackle. Made close to 100 rings thus far.

Fan is tilted up, using ABS and that material prints without a fan. Cardboard boxes are
a wind break to keep the interior by the bed warm so ABS does not warp up from the heated bed.

[helifrek]

It is great to know the M2 can handle a lot of daily use! sounds like you are making your money back fairly quickly as well. I use my printer purely for fun but maybe I should start thinking about putting it to work. The Flashforge is a great printer for the price and you get a lot of nice features included like the dual extruders, lcd and printing from an SD card. The problem with the flashforge is consistency. The bed needs leveled almost everytime I use it, I have been using RepG and use makerware every once in a while but I get issues with each one and I am pretty much sick of both of those! I have learned a lot over the past year but I am at the point where I want a big boy printer
I have designed a lot of parts for radio controlled use that I could probably start selling if I could produce them consistently and not have to babysit the printer.

Here are a couple of questions for you guys.
1. From what I have read, the M2 uses 2 power supplies, do you guys find that a pain in the rear end? is there a way to use just one?
2. The wires! all of those wires hanging around look messy, does anything ever get tangled up or snag?
3. It comes with a SD card reader right? how do you print from the SD card?
4. If printing using a computer, do you have to make sure the computer will not go to sleep? I had a print crash because my computer went into sleep yesterday after 2 hours of printing.

That's all I can really think of for now.
Thanks again guys!
Brandon

[insta]

1) The newer M2s are single power supply, 24V. Gives good performance from the motors and fast heating on the bed.
2) I have a dual-extruder (moar wires!) and I've never had one snag. I'm a little concerned about the wire on the heated build platform since most of the flexing seems to be happening at the HBP itself, but I have an aftermarket heater.
3) They have an SD card reader, either on the electronics or Viki itself.
4) if you print from SD card, either by starting it from Viki or the PC, it will survive the PC shutting down or disconnecting.

I also don't make anywhere near the amount of money Capt. John makes, but comissioned prints approximately keep my M2 running and upgraded. I'm kind of envious of John's success.

[helifrek]

Maybe John can throw us some business (once I get my M2!)

that is great to know about the single power supply, I was a little worried I would have more wires than I needed. My Flashforge has a 24V power supply as well but the bed take forever to heat up, especially if I am printing ABS and have the temp at 110C. I really hope the M2's bed heats up faster like you say! I guess that is also comparing apples to oranges.....

I have a whole bunch of my radio controlled stuff up for sale as well as my flashforge, just waiting to sell all that stuff before placing my order! looking forwards to building the M2!

one more question (gotta make my posts count since I have to wait for them to be reviewed before they can be posted!)
How do you guys feel about all the 3D printed parts being used on the M2? I understand that it probably brings the price down but do you guys feel that it kind of cheapens the design at all? or is it nice knowing you can print replacement parts if needed?

[insta]

I've been moderating your posts, I'll be on it pretty quickly

I don't think the printed parts "cheapens" the M2 -- I think it allows them to produce the right part for the application without having to use a 5-axis CNC mill or lots of assembly. The parts are printed in black ABS and look really good, and doing something stupid (like bumping the machine into a door frame carrying it) doesn't mean you have to order replacement parts.

[jimc]

actually compared to most printer i h=think the m2 has fewer printed parts. have you looked at an airwolf lately...holy crap that entire thing is 3d printed and plexi. the m2 really only has the extruder motor mount, filament drive, z axis knob and a spool holder. i have never had an issue with the filament drive. i like that i can just print an new one myself and if you print it in high infill, like 80%, then its solid as a rock. on an occasion you will hear someone running 110 on their bed but not too often anymore. i myself havent seen any difference, actually i get better prints in abs at 90-95c. really no reason to get over that. atleast on the m2 anyway. your ff might be different and have the thermistor for the bed in a different location and you need to run it hotter. to reach 100c i believe the new 24v units are around 15 min give or take. i cant remember the exact #. as for the bed, the last time i had to level that was about 4 mos ago. i dont travel anywhere with it so the adjustment stays put. only thing i screw with is my z-height because i am swapping between build plates often. the nice thing about the m2 is it just works. mine runs every single day and in a year and a half i havent had many issues at all. in that amt of time its been down maybe 3-4 days total. some wear and tear stuff but thats it. i also really dont find there is much for wires all over either. all the wires are in nice neat wrapped harnesses.

[insta]

Same here with downtime -- next to none. The only downtime on my M2 has been related to my own stupidity, and one instance of the heated build platform wiring flexing to failure. That is only a problem on 1st gen M2s, any new one won't have that problem at all.

Do get a few extra hotends. Through no fault of the design itself they do clog and you'll want additional ones, especially if you are using your M2 in any production context.

I'd also suggest an extra borosilicate sheet as well, if you're doing more than 1-2 prints per day. You can remove one and put it in the fridge for a few minutes to pop the part off quickly while the new one is heating back up to get running again.

[helifrek]

Well guys, I think all of my questions have been answered. I am sure I will think of something else though here soon. I just gotta sell my darn printer now! haven't had any bites on it yet. I guess I will go watch all those M2 youtube videos again and daydream some more

I thought of another question! do you guys have any advice for making money with your M2's? While I plan to use it mostly for my rc hobby, and I have made a little money with my flashforge, I never really put much thought into using it to make any type of profit. How do you guys go about doing that?