M2 Kit Sales To Pause

[jferguson]

While I'd love to be able to buy a kit for the old kit price, Rick, I'd have to say when i originally saw the price delta, I concluded that you guys must not have understood what kit-builder support was costing you. I think this thread probably covers most of the issues incidental to kit sales - and support. I suppose I should be spending the time I would have spent building it working SWMBO over about the incredible additional value of the ready-to-run version.

john

[Jules]

Jules - for the most part, multiple kit orders come from schools. We do not see a lot of individual buyers getting multiple kits. When multiple machines are ordered they are normally assembled machines. For schools that want multiple kits, we recommend they get one of the machines assembled as reference unit (that helps).

Kits were put on hold so that we could get assembled machines in stock. It is working as machines are in stock.

Rick

Shoot! Thought that was a brilliant idea!

[rpollack]

I had to google SWMBO

[Vandal968]

I am very grateful that I was able to buy a kit, the price delta was enough to get me to take a chance. At the full assembled price, I would have gotten an Ultimaker since I was already familiar with it and it's a good machine. I've found the MakerGear to be a better machine, but since it's less well-known and I had never used one I was really on the fence and even considered cancelling my order while I awaited my ship-date. I'm extremely pleased that I stuck it out as this is by-far the best 3D printer that I've ever used.

cheers,
c

[pyronaught]

I bought a kit to save money AND be more familiar with the machine. I achieved both. I rarely call tech support at any company for any problems with their products, EVER. I'll even try to fix genuinely broken products before shipping them back as a last resort. I hate phones and I hate waiting for things in the mail.

[swbluto]

I bought a kit because it was the cheapest machine with the largest build area (And had at least 4-star reviews on Amazon; That was a year ago, now there's many more 3d printers with at least 4 stars on Amazon.). If I were forced to pay $300 more, I would've bought a competitor's machine instead. More than likely, I would've settled with a lower build area (6x10") and got a cheaper "good" machine instead.

[pyronaught]

If the price of the kit was the same as the price of an assembled machine I would not buy the kit and I doubt anyone else would either. They primary factor was saving money, and $75 an hour isn't a bad rate for assembling your own machine. Being familiar with the machine is nice, but not worth spending four hours on if I'm not saving money in the process.

[swbluto]

If the price of the kit was the same as the price of an assembled machine I would not buy the kit and I doubt anyone else would either. They primary factor was saving money, and $75 an hour isn't a bad rate for assembling your own machine. Being familiar with the machine is nice, but not worth spending four hours on if I'm not saving money in the process.

Kind of a side tangent, but you realize you didn't really save "$75/hour", right? If I recall correctly, the shipping cost for a kit was $90 higher reducing the savings by that much.

[Jules]

I bought a kit to save money AND be more familiar with the machine. I achieved both. I rarely call tech support at any company for any problems with their products, EVER. I'll even try to fix genuinely broken products before shipping them back as a last resort. I hate phones and I hate waiting for things in the mail.

I actually thought long and hard about doing that.....then reality quickly set in and i realized that as a complete newbie, i was a lot better off just watching the assembly videos to learn about the machine, and letting the MakerGear folks set my first one up for me.

Was it worth the extra $300? You betcha! I had a boatload of stuff to learn about 3D printing, not enough time to do it, and i figured that as i made the upcoming upgrades to the printer and learned to use it, it would be easier to take it in stages instead of having to do it all at once.

I could easily put one together now, but back then, buying the assembled version was the right decision. (At least for me it was.) It let me focus my energies on learning to use the Rhino design software and learning the characteristics of the materials themselves, and understanding the mechanics of deposition. (Saved me a lot more time than the few hours of assembly in the long run.)

[pyronaught]

I could easily put one together now, but back then, buying the assembled version was the right decision. (At least for me it was.) It let me focus my energies on learning to use the Rhino design software and learning the characteristics of the materials themselves, and understanding the mechanics of deposition. (Saved me a lot more time than the few hours of assembly in the long run.)

Well, you'd be spending time on learning how to use the machine no matter which route you went. Since we are only talking about 4 hours of time here, you would only delay your learning curve by 4 hours. Now that assumes there were no problems during assembly, and that you are good with following written directions, using tools etc. As mentioned, since the components have not been pre-tested as with an assembled machine there is the potential for something not working to cause a delay.