My BotMill experience

On January 23rd I placed an order for a fully assembled Glider 3.0 and 5 lbs PLA. It was advertised to be shipped within 7-10 business days. Which did not happen. The advertisement actually read

BotMill's fully assembled, plug-and-play Desktop 3D printer. Ready for 3D printing: Take out of the box, plug in the power cord and USB and load a file to print. Many free extras included.

Shipping: This top quality item is produced individually for each incoming order. Shipping is usually within 7- 10 days. We do our best to minimize any delay.

For this I payed $1813 including shipping.

I am a software engineer and I have started a project to create a simplified software to print with these machines. I know how to write software but I need a machine to connect the software to. Even if I think I can put together a Mendel I rather let that be done by someone who knows it than do it myself. This was my main reason for ordering an assembled machine from BotMill. Due to the delayed shipping my project has also been delayed and now due to the incomplete machine I have to put the project on hold until I know how to proceed.

Here you can view a short test of my project [memention.com]

During this period I have closely followed the comments about BotMill in these forums without adding my opinions. Hoping that they actually cared about their customers and tried to delivery something close to what they describe.

Yesterday I received, lets say a part of my order. It was far from usable and it was missing important pieces very easy to see even for a reprap amateur. It did not contain the extruder or the extra PLA I ordered.

What I received was a Mendel frame with a Gen 6 board. The screws that holds the frame together was not tightened so it was a very wobbly construction. Apart from missing the extruder and the PLA it also lacked the belt for the Z axis. The plastic parts had very similar quality that others have shown in the forum. I examined the electronics closely and found that they had screwed the PCB board tightly against the motherboard plate without any spacings making it bend. I loosened that and carefully checked the wirings and connected it to my computer. The electronics, motors and optoends seem to work. But they had mounted the X axis optoends on the wrong side which could cause damage if I would have tried to home the machine. It looks like they have glued at least one of the gears on the motors and there is no evidence they have filed the motor shafts. I am uncertain how to proceed with that, or with the whole project as a matter of fact. There are many many details like this.

Yesterday I sent BotMill a list of questions and they have not answered any of them. The only response I got was that they have the extruder and the PLA and they will ship that.

As I payed my order through PayPal I tried to place a dispute at PayPal for Missing Quantity, Missing Parts, and Time Sensitive Late. But the first thing I learnt, that I think everyone using PayPal should be informed about is that PayPal have a 45 day limit on disputes. How does this play here? I placed my order on January 23rd, they shipped the incomplete and faulty machine on March the 10th. How many days are there between these two dates? 46 days! Coincident?

My advice for any orders payed through PayPal is to require shipping so you receive the items before the 45 day limit ends. Otherwise file a dispute directly.

My pain is not over. As I live in Sweden I will be forced to pay 25% VAT on this too, pardon my language, piece of crap. But that will be evened out during the year as this has been a company project and the VAT will be take from my customers.

I hope this helps someone else as it has been a very expensive lesson for me.

I think you have a good argument that the 45 day limit should not apply since they didn't ship the unit to you when they charged you. It is unreasonable for paypal to expect you to contest an item before you receive it! If you paid paypal through your credit card, then you can also contest the charges there.

The track record of this company speaks for itself. The fact that they would ship non-working units, not just occasionally, but multiple times to costumers indicates their lack of concern. Also, most reputable vendors don't charge you until the unit is being shipped. Botmill charges you the moment you place an order regardless on when they actually ship.

The software looks great! And it's on a Mac!

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 03/16/2011 11:45PM by brnrd.

sorry to hear it, be assured that the rest of the community is not as poor as some of the vendors.

Dear RepRap Community,

First off, we would like to thank you for all the support you have given us.
Please note that recently we have made several changes to our plastic pieces
as well as assembly process.

Our plastic pieces where being made by a manufacturer molding and
casting and the first batch was fantastic. Unfortunately one shipment
contained sub-par components and we have stopped to deal with this supplier.

We are now getting plastic pieces from a new supplier and as of the last two
weeks we have also started to print the parts directly on our BotMill 3D
printers again. We have them working almost 24 hours a day printing our
perfect sets.

We would like to apologize for any inconvenience or delays this may have
caused. For the few customers that had issues with some plastic part(s)- we
are replacing with the new pieces. For some customers who are still waiting
for previous orders-they are all going to be shipped in the very near
future-we are catching up fast to fill the backlog of orders.

In order to show proof of quality, service, and attention to detail, we will
now start to give progress updates with pictures and videos to every client
that has purchased an assembled machine as well as pictures and videos to every client who purchased a kit so they can see their pieces being made directly on our machines. Along with every printer we send
out will be printed instructions as well as a USB that includes promotions,
an accessory price list and order form, copy of instructions in link format, and more.

There are only a few people who received faulty items. In short, we are
communicating with all and will resolve all.

We truly hope that this can rectify any past issues and look forward to
moving ahead with new advancements in this industry.

Sincerely,

BotMill Team
www.BotMill.com

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