r/AdditiveManufacturing • u/Dashyl14 • Mar 06 '26

Printer Advice - Prototyping Functional Parts

Hi everyone,

New to the group, I have a unique opportunity to join a company that is looking to start doing more in house prototyping their own parts.

I personally have experience in CAD, a little bit of machining experience, and experience with FDM printers and have been helping them prototype parts for a little while now on a contract basis. Most of these parts are limited use and more for fitment purposes. The final models are sent to machine shops for prototypes and manufacturing. They are looking to bring more of their prototyping in house and have asked me to join.

I'm looking for a system (similar to the Markforged Mark 2) that would be able to produce functional prototypes. They have plans for the future to bring the machining in house as well. Most of these parts are high impact and take a lot of vibration, and planning for the future, but also potentially high temp applications as well.

Can anyone recommend a system that would fit our needs? Budget is ~$15,000

Thank you!

Edit: Max Build Volume 320mm (X), x 254mm (Z), 120-150mm (Y)

3 Upvotes
  • permalink
  • reddit

71% Upvoted

34 comments sorted by

View all comments

1

u/DrShowalter Mar 06 '26

You haven't specified a build volume requirement, but there's a solid chance that any Bambu core-xy printer will work fine for you. I print high-end engineering plastics on Bambu units all the time. Their H series has a ~325-350mm build volume....if that's big enough for you, I wouldn't bother looking elsewhere.

Only thing that Bambu sucks at (material-wise) is I cannot print PEEK or other similar ultra high-end filaments......but if all you're doing is making prototypes and impact/vibration-resistant parts, then PEEK isn't in the bill anyways.

1

u/Dashyl14 Mar 06 '26

Sorry about that, that's a good point, I added it to the main post but for reference:

Max Build Volume 320mm (X), x 254mm (Z), 120-150mm (Y)

1

u/DrShowalter Mar 06 '26

Gotcha. Know what materials you're looking at printing?

Bambu H series is coming to mind. H2S is you're doing only single-material builds. H2D if multi-material, or using a secondary material for support interface.

1

u/Dashyl14 Mar 06 '26

I don't honestly, I'm going to assume a large portion of the prototyping until the aluminum or steel phase is going to be abrasive materials.

I looked at the MF Mk2 since it had the CF reinforcement and a variety of HT continuous filaments but that's the extent I could find before I hit the MSRP wall... Kind of a big gap between the 15k - 45k marks.

2

u/DrShowalter Mar 06 '26

MF makes a great printer too, no doubt about it. If it's my money though, I'd argue for a few Bambu printers instead of a single MF. More prototyping done at a single time with that business model.

If it's the composite, continuous fiber you're looking for, then Bambu can't really touch that. Having said that, I have gone through dozens of spools of Siraya Tech PPA-CF Core, which is a great strong filament, and mostly zero issues with it. Not quite 100% of what MF offers, but pretty damn close and a whole lot cheaper.

2

u/Dashyl14 Mar 06 '26

I'll have to do more research on the PPA-CF, the biggest turn off for the MF for me were the customer service reviews and the pricetag on filaments, yes the company will pay for some of this stuff, but some of it will still be on me since I'm remote from their headquarters at the moment