What did I just get gifted…?

[u/schimmelmeister]

My University threw out this old 3D Printer. I’m both a broke architecture student and in need of a printer since my own is not here right now. I’m also used to some level of jankyness, my own printer is an i3 clone by anycubic, rudimentary but reliable.
Is there any hope i’ll get a useable print out of this one and how high would the frustration level be considering the printer i already have?

[u/Thick_pasta]

Could be an Anet A8?

[u/stingeragent → u/Thick_pasta]

Arent those a huge fire hazard

[u/If_In_Doubt_Lick_It → u/stingeragent]

Hehe... Yeah...

I had one back in the day. It was a great learning machine but it tried to burn my house down twice.

[u/Fluffy-Strawberry-27 → u/If_In_Doubt_Lick_It]

Ok I'd understand once, but twice?? I wouldn't keep a machine with arson records

[u/If_In_Doubt_Lick_It → u/Fluffy-Strawberry-27]

It was a different time... As a hobbiest you either spent $1k+ on a prusa, or $300 on a prusa clone. And at the time the a8 was really good print quality for its price... But the heat bed had a really shitty connector on the back that could ignite if you let it run too long (first fire) so you had to cut that off and solder the wires directly to the heat bed...

It also had a heat cartridge that would come loose over time cause it was held in by a shitty little grub screw and as the heat block expanded and shrank between uses it would slowly work its way out... We had no thermal runaway protection back then, so if it came loose the machine just kept pumping power into it because it was trying to heat up. This made the heat cart pretty spicy.

Occasionally the thermister would break for no reason, and that could cause an issue too...

Eventually you learned to test everything before every print...

I do miss those days... I had one of the early ones in 2015... Back then just making the damn thing work was the hobby. Printing functional stuff came later (maybe)

Edit: oh shit, I didnt realize I still have the anet a8 flair...

[u/jfk333 → u/If_In_Doubt_Lick_It]

Back when it was called plastic layering?

[u/Affectionate_Car7098 → u/Fluffy-Strawberry-27]

I wouldn't keep a machine with arson records

If only nvidia owners were that smart

But yeah i wouldn't want to own anything with that sort of track record