Which printer to buy

[Edward Hyde]

Hello everyone!

I'm looking to get myself a printer which is fitting for printing props, household item, general stuff and things I can build and print with my 7 year old son.
The technology has developed extremely fast and doesn't seem to stop, even though we seem to have hit a plateau for the time being, but I haven't been watching very close for the past 6 month.

I'd like to get one for myself for the mentioned reasons around Christsmas this year. It can be one or more printers and budget is 2000€ max (with a little bit of wiggle room).
AI suggests Creality K1 Max + Bambu Lab A1 Mini.
Another option would be to start with the Mini and the move on to the PS1.

Both would land me below 2000€. Both would give me the option to start with a small printer to measure whether I like it or not. But the few friends I have who have a printer never stopped using theirs.


So I'm looking for recommendations.

Best,
Edward

 

[SgtSaint]

"What's your printer?" thread on the 405th forum:
What's Your Printer?

I wish I knew this about printers before buying discussion:
"I wish I knew" Tips When Starting to 3d Print

• My favorite section of any YouTuber's channels is the recent post by Frankly Built who is well regarded in this genre - about taking some time to learn before doing:

• He also just added this one about sanding and smoothing where it leans in to the same thing I keep saying: Just sand it (as opposed to the 'slather with thinned bondo magic shell' approach).

 

[Edward Hyde]

"What's your printer?" thread on the 405th forum:
What's Your Printer?

I wish I knew this about printers before buying discussion:
"I wish I knew" Tips When Starting to 3d Print

• My favorite section of any YouTuber's channels is the recent post by Frankly Built who is well regarded in this genre - about taking some time to learn before doing:

• He also just added this one about sanding and smoothing where it leans in to the same thing I keep saying: Just sand it (as opposed to the 'slather with thinned bondo magic shell' approach).

Thanks for the links, even though I checked the threads beforehand. The "I wish" thread doesn't answer the printer question itself, and the "What's your printer" doesn't usually go into detail why people choose a specific printer, at least not to the detail I need at this point.
I already spend a lot of time on the internet, but all this can't replace hands on experience, hence the reason for me asking.

 

[SgtSaint]

The A1mini is... well... Mini. Its only 180mm³
The K1max is 300mm³

180mm is basically a toy within our context of props and especially armor. You probably don't want to have to carve up a helmet into 10 pieces just to print it, then the associated 200 labor hours of glueing it and hiding all those seams.

At 300mm the K1max will mean fewer parts, of larger size; which means less labor and less weak points and well.. 'less bad looking' larger parts.