No problem, I hope you find something that works for you. There's definitely a ton of money to save if you forego a lot of the cutting edge features of the XL. I just feel jaded about waiting for years and still having a product that feels unpolished.
Betty_Boopie
joined 1 year ago
I know this thread is a bit old but I want to rant a little about my experience with the 2T Prusa XL. Hopefully this helps your decision a bit.
First off if you're gonna buy it, build it yourself. 100% anecdotal but the people I've seen with crashing tool heads and major issues all have pre-assembled units. Maybe something happens to the frame in shipping, but my semi-assembled unit hasn't had any tool crashes or serious flaws... yet
Secondly, the price is much higher than the website tells you. Prusa doesn't secretly overcharge you, but they also don't include many things I feel should be at this price point. The lack of enclosure being the most egregious to me, but I also would like a camera or at least support to add one. I've had to spend an additional few hundred dollars getting more nozzles (seriously, fuck 0.4mm on a 360³ build plate), an enclosure, and even another peice of extruded aluminum so this thing doesm't rattle itself to pieces. It definitely feels more like a 'first gen' product more than anything I've had from Prusa in the past, but I do think the platform has a ton of potential.
So far performance has been good, not great like I expected out of Prusa. Mainly; it's a bit slow for a coreXY, and I've had some adhesion problems even with pla on a textured plate. I think I solved the adhesion issue with an enclosure, it's in my garage so the temperature varies a ton. Still, keep in mind since they do not even give you the option to buy an enclosed XL.
Multi color and material has been where this printer really starts to shine, I would argue that the single tool head isn't even worth producing. The filament waste is negligible and tool changes add very little time to the print (about 12 minutes per 100 changes), although I have had some issues with z shift after a tool change. It's impressive to watch it change extruders effortlessly, and probably the only part of this printer that I would say was worth the price.
If I had to do it all over again I probably would have just cancelled my pre-order. Seeing printers like the peopoly magneto at a similar price really drives home how long this printer was delayed. It almost feels outdated upon arrival, especially since the XL still has a lot of software features missing.
TL;DR it's a good printer, but not as good as I expected out of Prusa. Compared to truly state of the art printers it seems overpriced, and unless you plan on exclusively printing multi-color or material you will be better served by other products.
Pyrolysis sounds really cool in theory but in practice it's wasteful, produces lower quality fuel that is harder to refine, and contains a ton of benzene.
There's a dude on youtube making one of these in his backyard, basically a speed run to turn his house into a superfund site. I have no idea how people can see burnt plastic as a "green" alternative.