Hey fellow community of makers and creators! I have been 3D printing since 2020, starting as a hobby and this year I am making a business with it. There is so much potential to this technology and I hope to demonstrate some interesting uses for it locally in Kelowna, BC, Canada. I currently have two printers: Creality CR-10 S Pro V2 and Ender 3 S1; I also have a 3D scanner that I’m excited to explore the possibilities with. My wife and I are creating some products for in store, and I’ll be providing 3D printing solutions for businesses - as there are many opportunities right now with supply chain problems. I’m not an expert yet, but have some skill with printer maintenance, slicing, modeling. I’m currently learning more advanced 3D modeling to step up my abilities, and I’m looking to grow into producing parts, items, things with specialty filaments (nylon, carbon fibre, flexible etc). I hope to contribute useful knowledge I’ve gathered on the way as well as how 3D printing can be applied to business for furthering the entire industry. Please feel free to connect!
@LegendaryEarth welcome! I am not running a printing business but ran a successful photography business for 25 years. I have a lot of insight in running a non bric and mortar business. It has lots of odd ins and outs. Pay Rent! Pay yourself! Make sure if the business goes under spectacularly you don’t have personal assets on the line too. I watched a competitor crash and burn.
I generally make only functional parts, usually ASA, ABS, PEEK, PC, and NYLON.
HI @LegendaryEarth Welcome to the Forum, Glad you found us.
Look forward to seeing some of the solutions you come up with. If you are able would love to see some of the prints you produce.
Hello and welcome @LegendaryEarth,
Cr10s-pro v1 user here, just recently join this forum and everyone is very helpful with suggestions and tips.
Great platform to share and learn here.
Happy 3d modeling and printing!
HI @Joehunt
We strive to help with all the info we can provide. It’s not quite a “toaster” (plug it in and use it) environment yet but it’s getting there.
Glad you found us
Experience in business is definitely useful, thank you for the basics! I am curious to hear more about your experience printing ASA, PC and Nylon - I guess also ABS and PEEK too! I will be getting a Bambu labs x1 carbon for printing the high temp materials soon…
Hey @Joehunt
I put in my description Cr-10 s pro v2 but I may have jumped the gun haha! I actually have a Cr-10 s pro v1 that i have added BL touch but i wasn’t finished and I am now having trouble getting it auto-homing z axis properly. I thought it may be v2 by the time i was done…
so a question for you and any other Cr-10 s pro v1 users: did you have any trouble with the nozzle scraping the bed on left side while “priming” before prints?
Mine was doing this religiously every print. Bed leveling did nothing. I put on a Z gantry lead screw sync kit and it still didn’t change. I assumed it was either capacitive sensor malfunctioning and/or firmware issue. So I went to upgrade to BL touch…waded through all the confusing info out there and many dead end links for solutions. I installed it with the jumper and extension cable to z- since it is originally a V1. But my auto home only goes up now… and creality support is not really helpful at all.
Anyone know of solutions for this?
I tried the tiny machines screen and firmware but it didn’t seem to work for me, i went back to creality screen and firmware…also didn’t work.
Thank you for any help!
Have you fixed this?
When you said you leveled the bed did this mean auto level or have you done a manual level?
I do not put much faith in the auto level, the manual level is where you really set the bed to be level.
Auto level simply checks where is the bed but manual level actually makes the bed level.
When you manually level the bed you should keep doing the four corners over and over until you need no adjustments at all four corners. Then and only then, auto level to tell the printer where the whole bed is…
Materials need to be carefully matched to the part. I don’t like slippery terms ‘strong’
PlA is rigid and quite hard it will shatter if hit. Easy to get good prints.
ABS is similar a bit less rigid, that provides more impact resistance. Enclosed helps.
ASA similar to ABS added UV resistance. I don’t print much ABS, ASA is replaced it for me. Enclosed helps.
PETg Easy to print, less rigid than ABS, better impact resistance but gummy.
PEEK is EXPENSIVE. I occasionally need the chemical resistance it offers I would not mess with it unless nothing else will do. ENCLOSED. High temp everything strong and light IF you can get it to print well.
PC- DRY IT!!! My best advice is always dry it before use and keep it sealed and as dry as possible. Enclosed. It is harder to print than ASA less rigid and well printed it is hugely impact resistant.
Nylon is basically similar to PC only even less rigid and more (maybe) impact resistant.
I never say stronger.
A tire is crazy strong, beat it with a hammer and you will give out before it does. Steel will deform slowly.
A bridge made of rubber is silly, A steel tire just as. Both are ‘strong’ what really matters is the application do the properties meet what you need.
I have printed gears. Nylon, PC are terrible they have too much flex and skip. PLA however does not. I made a bumper pad for a door, PLA would crack and break, Nylon or PC will stand up to it. I decided to use PETg and capped with TPE best of both.
When you read guides I would suggest ignoring ‘strong’ most will say PLA is not strong because it is brittle. It is great when you need unbending hard parts where softer things will not do. It is the application that matters.
bookmarking this information for future use. 
great explanations!
@sonic.cues indeed I was manual leveling it. I should have specified. I understand that the “auto level” of these printers is simply a mesh compensation grid for the printer to get better prints, but it does not “level” the bed - must still be done by hand. I got very good at doing this haha, though the problem persisted. I currently am communicating with Creality but they are very poor in actually helping - even after great detail, pictures, video etc… Creality is not impressing me with this. The CR-10 s pro was excellent when working, id like to get it going though I’m unsure if I’ll get creality products in the future.
@kitedemon Thank you for great descriptions of your experience with these materials. Yes, application and the qualities required for it are what dictate material used. I’ve been reading some materials research by some of the industrial printer brands for better knowledge on what to use and how. Next, I’ll have to experiment and learn through doing it this year. I’ll have a X1 carbon to work with these materials in the next few weeks. I’ll post some more once I have more direct experience of the materials.
LOL thanks Lauren. I find it distressing when so much emphasis is placed on strength and no conversations of other properties is made.
PETg is stronger than PLA. Is it really? It is absolutely more impact resistant but it bends more. It is just different.
We are lucky to have a range of materials that are stiff to flexible, with lots of different mechanical characteristics. I can’t quite see how to make a flow chart of something, I wish I could. Where someone could make choices and be brought to options that might work better. Add things like max hot end temp and enclosure so users would be set up to succeed rather than fail.
Another outside the box thought, Remove all your softwire for printing especially the slicer software. Do this where you fully remove the software and leave nothing behind, especially settings. Reinstall the software new. It was amazing how often this fixed some strange things. Have you completely reset the printer to an out of the box software state as well, that may also help.
Hey there @LegendaryEarth ,
Sorry for not replying sooner been busy with work and hobby. That grinding while priming sounds like levelling issue.
My setup is totally stock except for bltouch v3, pei/pax magnetic sheet and other 3dprinted accessories like fanduct and filament guide…and tm3d f/w!
Checkout member intro page where i had shared my upgrade journey New member but old user - #15 by Joehunt
Cheers
Joehunt