qu-bd Universal 3D Printer Extruder on Kickstarter

[orcinus]

I am now thinking that I will add a steel ball and spring or rubber 'O'ring, steel washer and ball.

Ball and spring are along the same lines i've been thinking of.
Now that i think about it, whoever thought a *flat* fixed plunger pressing against the filament was a good idea? That makes 0 sense to me, unless as a draconian price-cutting measure.

[mikegrundvig]

Sadly, I'm getting very nervous about my Qu-Bd extruder. Pretty much everything anyone who is using it has written up has complained about it. I've yet to see someone say it works well.

-Mike

[mattrsch]

I think it can be made to work well. The drive system needs some improvement. I am having a friend turn down a piece of delrin to fit in the tensioning hole. I will stack it up so that it's a delrin plug, then a springy material (maybe O rings, I'm going to try a piece of white eraser from a mechanical pencil), and then the set screw. It should slip more easily across the delrin than the set screw, and a small amount of springiness will help for unevenness in the filament. If that doesn't help enough I think a drive gear with more, narrower teeth would make a difference. I will try to dremmel an extra grove in the gripping surface of each tooth on the spur gear. I am pretty happy with the performance of the hot end so far.

[mikegrundvig]

I'm not so worried about being able to make it work. I'm just frustrated that it was supposedly a great turn-key option. I spec'd it for our club as the option for all of our Hadron printers. Now I'm glad that I'm the only one that bought it as I'm likely going to spec something else instead unless good feedback starts rolling in.

-Mike

[mattrsch]

I'm kind of hoping there's a silent majority that it is working well for. I'm new to 3d printing so maybe i'm missing something. I was expecting the same as you, a solid turn-key extruder setup. I almost got half way through a print last night

[orcinus]

AFAIK, Laszlo of Arcol.hu was working on "mini-Hyenas", drive gear versions of his Hyena hobbed bolts.
He had a successful crowd-sourcing thing going on on Indiegogo (http://www.indiegogo.com/projects/mini-hyenas) but he doesn't have them in his store yet.

I'm guessing one of those might make the qu-bd much more reliable.
That + a spring-loaded (or an o-ring-loaded) plunger should make that extruder a whole different story.

Or at least that's what i'm counting on

[Nyx_]

Hmm. I was also in the hope that the QU-BD reveals itself as the greatest extruder of all times!
Unfortunately, based on the reports, it seems it's not anything like that.
So, my main concerts addressed to the owners of the QU-BD:
- It is possible to change it somehow in order to make it work as great as we expect?
- Should we consider another extruder instead?

Just out of curiosity: Can anybody post a image of a printed object with the QU-BD extruder?

Thanks.

[bdring]

I ordered some after the Kickstarter closed. I am happy to wait until the dust settles before I get mine.

While I have yet to hear about successful prints from users, there are not that many people publicly complaining compared to the number of orders they shipped. Is it too early to hear from them or are they getting prints.

I worry how these guys can make any money. They only got about $80k from the Kickstarter. It sounds like they have at least 3-4 people working there for 4-5 months with expensive machines and materials. To me, the money has got to run out fast. I don't know how many orders like mine they took though.

[mikegrundvig]

Last I heard, they were on the 4th set of pre-orders. I got in right at the start of the second set.

-Mike

[orcinus]

I worry how these guys can make any money. They only got about $80k from the Kickstarter. It sounds like they have at least 3-4 people working there for 4-5 months with expensive machines and materials. To me, the money has got to run out fast. I don't know how many orders like mine they took though.

I think they're doing the extruders with a loss. AFAIK, their real "goal" is the combined mill + 3Dprinter bot they're designing.
So i'm guessing they're doing the qu-bd extruders at a loss to attract enough attention which they'll use to market the CNC once they start producing it.