HTA3D P3Steel kit review

Hi,

Earlier this year I had some spare time and as an experiment I decided to rent a Prusa i3 printer from Charlies3dt (http://www.charlies3dt.com/). I initially rented it for 4 days, but called after day 2 asking to keep it a bit longer. I kept it for 5 days. It had been printing non stop all those days and nights, and in the end I reluctantly turned it off brought it back. Quickly after I decided I wanted my own printer. Last month I finally bought a P3Steel from HTA and in the mean time it is built and printing. I'd like to share my experiences.

Why P3Steel and why HTA3D.
After having played around with the printer from Charlies3dt I started looking around into kits and build guides. I stumbled opon the P3Steel and I liked it. It seemed robust and a bit easier to build than a normal Prusa i3 (no tie wraps, angular by design,...). It also looks good. I looked at alternatives (Geetech,,...) but the only thing that could tempt me more that the P3Steel was the original Prusa i3 mk2, which was out of my budget. I could make up a lot of reasons why the P3Steel was better for me but in the end there was only 1 reason that played: I just liked it.

Once I set my mind on a P3Steel kit I started looking around. There are not that many vendors that provide kits. I looked at Orballo Printing and HTA3D. Both have some good and bad reviews, and Orballo made me an offer for a P3Steel which was very complete but a bit over my budget (I wanted to stay under 500). Orballo offers an inductive proximity sensor, PEI build plate, E3D v6 lite hot end,..., but ended up slightly over 500 Euro. With HTA3D I was slightly over 400 for a similar printer without these 3 things (it has a clone full metal hotend). The thing that really pushed me towards HTA3D was the very clear videos with build instructions on-line. They are in Spanish, but the subtitles work really well.

I ordered on 19/11/2016, which was a Saturday.

Unpacking and build
The package arrived on Friday 25/11 at work. I could only pick it up Monday 28/11. Luckily we had a lot of activities planned that weekend...

I received a single box with the printer and 4 spools of filament inside. The content of the box was very well organized. It contained a number of smaller bags and boxes, all clearly labeled. I could just take out the parts that were needed during each step of the build. I started the same Monday and I assembled the frame and the X and Y axis before going to bed (way too late). As I took the 17HS4401s motors with integrated M8x8 lead-screw, the video explaining how to mount the X-axis was not relevant and I had to rely on the drawings, which were more than sufficient. The other main difference betweeen the video and the kit is that there is a lot less soldering required. The stepper motors come with cables that are already wired correctly.

On Tuesday evening I continued with the build. Next steps were mounting the heated bed and assembling the extruder. I followed the video instructions, which seemed OK until I started mounting the layer fan.The fan used in the video has completely been re-created and it was not at all clear how to mount the new one, nor in which order to mount the components. In the process of fiddling around I actually broke the cable of the thermistor. I emailed HTA3D and explained the problem, and went to bed way too late again...

Wednesday during the day I received an answer with some tips and tricks and some pictures of the new extruder and layer fan. These helped a lot, so on Wednesday I finished the extruder, including re-soldering the thermistor cable.

Thursday evening I started with the wiring.This is a bit tedious, but the instructions are very clear. There is the videos and there are some very clear drawings again. When I started up the printer and started to work throught the checks (does everything move,...) it turned out the extruder did not heat up.It turned out I damaged the heater cartridge while assembling the extruder.I replaced the wires without success but if I fix the wires of the cartridge in a specific position, the printer heats up and can print. This is obviosuly not a good thing in the longer term. I emailed HTA3D again and they offered to replace the cartrige free of charge (they even took care of the shipping costs).

Friday I was printing my first print. I leveled the bed, loaded filament and printed some feet for the printer downloaded from thingiverse. They came out perfectly first attempt (well, not perfect, but more than usable). The total build time of the printer was around 20 hours, and I enjoyed these 20 hours a lot.

Experience so far
I haven't been doing a lot yet (it's only be completed for 4 days and I have a wife and children who require some attention as well), but so fare most of what I've printed came out more than acceptable, even without calibrating. The picture of the #3DBenchy attached is printed with 'out of the box' settings without tweaking anything. I did use some Slic3r settings provided by HTA3D. I'll start tuning the printer in order to get an even better result. I've been able to turn this printer off, move it, and print again with very consistent results without re-leveling the bed. I obviously can't comment on durability yet, but so far, I have close to nothing to complain about.

The issues I have so far:
- Igus bearing are relatively loose in the X-Idler. I'll lubricate the rods a bit and if required glue that 1 bearing into place. It's not really hindering though as the bearing moves into place as the Z-axis moves up.
- I have some layer shifts in the Y-axis. I'll play around with the belt tension in order to get rid of this.
- I have an issue with the SD card reader (only discovered 1 hour ago, I'll see what HTA3D proposes).

Conclusion
So far I can only say good things. I'm very pleased with the product, the service and the support I receive. It's been an excellent experience so far, and I look forward to learning this printer better and tweaking it to my taste. There have been a couple of hich-ups along the way, but I expected this when I bought a kit. It's not a plug and play machine, but the learning experience is so much better. I can find plenty of information on forums like this, and if I don't find my way I'm still getting excellent support from HTA3D.

Attached are some pictures of the result and of my 4th print...

Hans

Glad to hear it seems like HTA3D are trying to improve.

I bought a p3steel from them earlier in the year and I can honestly say that I only have the frame, belts, pulleys, motors and nuts/bolts left on my unit from my original purchase.

After a problem with a service I bought (but never received) from them from the beginning which resulted in them leaving me no other option but to be forced into a successful charge back (bank agreed that a service was not provided) situation so I didn't even try to talk to them about bad design and faulty parts that didn't work from the start.

Many of the printed parts are badly thought out/designed and in my case it seems they were printed too fast to be strong enough to do the job. Cable chain being a classic example of literally falling apart upon trying to join the links together. Hole diameters on the extruder mount were all too loose to allow adequate tightening of the bolts for the hotend and the cooling fan duct, this appeared to be due to a scaling issue during printing.

X axis belt tensioner was too flimsy a design which showed layer delamination and a low yield strength with minimal belt tension. An upgraded design and printed properly cured that

Ramps was replaced with a Duet.

Supplied psu couldn't provide 12v even with adjustment, replaced with a 24v meanwell unit. (I think this contributed to the original heated not operating well)

Threaded Z rods on mine were so badly out of true it was unreal. Upgraded to acme Leadscrew and associated printed parts to cure.

The Ali heated bed would never heat above 70c (no use for abs). A silicone heat bed fixed that issue.

Talking of the bed, the smooth rods were not straight which in conjunction with the flimsy (bendy) bed support frame meant that if you tightened the Y axis belt too much the bed would not run true and bind, the Ali heated is stronger than the bed support would lead to the support twisting and allowing the whole unit to bind when you leveled the bed, i redesigned and remade a stronger bed support and added line bored/polished bronze bushings on all smooth rods to eliminate wear, and to allow a smooth running movement system.

The clone hotend wouldn't print pla without jamming until I modified and polished the heat break.

So my printer works perfect now but in no way can what I have now be associated with the product that was supplied by HTA3D

Any edits are to correct my bad Grammer...

Edited 5 time(s). Last edit at 12/21/2016 03:56AM by Calvinx66.

Hi Calvin,

I read your opinion on HTA3D before buying ;-) I know you had bad experiences.

I purchased the printer with stepper motors with integrated trapezoidal spindle. That means it came with different X-asis printed parts. I didn't notice any problems with the printed parts on mine and the x-axis tensioner does it job in my case. I have't notice any structural issues with this, but I'm a bit of a noob when it comes to 3d printing so I might miss something.

I have not had the issues you describe with the cable chain. I assembled the links and disassembled them a couple of times without any issue. The problem with the cable chain is that it's na bit tight. I added an inductive sensor and it was very difficult to get the extra cable through the chain, even without this extra cable it was not an easy task to get everything through. I actually broke the X-asis end-stop holder in the process (this is where the chain is fixed to). I printed a slightly modified one which allows me to remove the chain and the cables easily. With the original piece you had to run the cables through this part as well, which made unmounting very difficult.

I did receive a RAMPS board as ordered, and the power supply is currently set to 12V and delivers that, also under load. I could easily get more out of it wihtout load when I was assembling.

I also tested the heated bed based on your comments. I've got the Alu heatbed as you did. It reaches 80° in 6 minutes, but I can't get it over 95°. I'm only getting 11.3V at the heatbed though (from 11.9V output at the RAMPS). I don't have enough experience to judge if this is normal performance or not. I might increase the voltage on the power suply to get some better results. I'm not sure how high I can safely go though.

I did have issues with the Y axis as mentioned in my original post, but I managed to work these out by playing with the tension of the belt, lubricating the rods and increasing the voltage of the power supply (it was set too low to start with). What bothers me with the bed is that the bolts that are used to fixed the bed are not 'sunk' into the heated bed itself. This means these bolts get above the heated bet 3-4mm, and the hot-end can run into these bolts.

I'm not sure what you mean by 'allowing the whole unit to bind when you level the bed'. I don't understand 'bind' in this context. I'm having some issues with the bed leveling after installing an inductive probe. I was assuming it was due to the installation/calibration of this probe, but I would like to understand your remark better to make sure I'm not facing the same issue.

Even though your experience is different than mine, I really appreciate your feedback as it allows me to understand the printer better and learn. Thanks a lot for that.

Regards,

Hans

Binding is a term that is used to describe tight spots in the y axis travel. This is due to the bed support twisting when you try to level the bed if you have to tighten a corner instead of the heat bed actually lowering what actually happens is that the bed support twists because it is not strong enough which leads to the bearings twisting out of alignment with the smooth rods this then tightens them up on the rod and makes everything stop moving freely hence the term "binding"

Lead screws integrated into the motors were not an offered option earlier in the year. A much better idea.

The raised bolt heads are an issue unless you use a sheet of glass which then bypasses the problem.

Regards

Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 12/22/2016 11:21AM by Calvinx66.