When I saw this Mars Lander https://www.prusaprinters.org/prints/84660-spacex-dragon-lander, I had to print it. I have fond memories of having built and flew one back in the day.
Well over 60+ hours to print, but the end result was most satisfying, and, I still have the original Mars Lander! 30 hours and 886 tool changes on the bottom section, 21 hours and 636 tool changes on the top section, and the legs, nose, nozzle, and ladder for the rest of the time.
What do you mean by 886 and 636 “tool changes”? Awesome work, by the way. I wish I could get that quality of finish, particularly on small parts like the ladder.
Whenever there is a change of color, the MMU2S retracts the current filament, moves its selector to the next color (MMU2S can handle up to 5 filaments), loads the new filament to the nozzle, purges the nozzle for a predetermined volume on the wipe tower, then continues with that new color. Each change of color or filament is called a tool change.
You can see the wipe tower at the top right of the picture (wasted filament) and at the layer this pic was taken at, there are 3 colors changing before this layer is complete.
Thanks for the explanation. I’d never heard the terms before.
