So one of my Elegoo Mars printers went down and a friend offered to part with his printer in exchange for me printing stuff for him when I finished up the current project I was working on. So I now own an Anycubic Photon 3D SLA Resin Printer.
Right off the bat there’s a LOT of similarities between the Elegoo Mars and the Photon but don’t be fooled, these are two entirely different printers and about the only things they can share are resin, fep film, jump drives, and vats.
It took a few tries to get it setup and I can see why it was difficult for my friend to use. Using what I learned from setting up and getting good prints from the Mars printers I was able to get a print going on the 3rd try by first leveling the print bed, setting the zed axis to proper zero, and making sure everything was clean. One other thing I noticed was that the build pate was smooth like on my original Mars printers so I hit it with some sandpaper to give it slightly rougher surface for things to grip onto. I think it all worked as I look over my shoulder the first print just finished so I’ll grab a pic of it here:
So there we have the first semi successful print which is supposed to be a crashed JU-87 Stuka and it looks like the supports failed on one part of the tail… but that’s ok, it’s crashed so we’ll just let it roll this time.
Bit of a learning curve with this as I was spoiled with Chitubox, the Photon software is not as gentle with things and I had to upgrade it in order to get it to work properly with the machine. But once I got the two working together it seems like the rest just kind of came naturally and it’s pretty simple to use if you’ve ever used a 3D printer with a touch screen.
Some things I’ve noticed right away, it’s louder, the zed motor whines quite loudly when it moves. I do however like the tabs that help to automatically line up the vat whereas the Elegoo Mars just has a dimple the vat sits into which can be easily missed if you’re in a hurry. I also like how the USB port is on the right hand side instead of the back, it did mean I had to put it on the right side of the printer farm but it is easier to get to.
So day one with it and it’s not that bad. We’ll see how things go as I work with it some more and get more acquainted with this little thing.
If I’m not mistaken right now you can snag these on sale from the Anycubic site for $169.00 as they’re clearancing them out to make room for newer models. This puts these right in reach of those looking to get their first resin printer without breaking the bank so definitely something to consider.
As I said, it’s not so bad to be honest and I’m sure once I get used to it I’ll be whipping around it and slinging resin everywhere just like I do with the Mars’ printers.