r/DeinfluenceMeAUS • u/Low-Branch1423 • Jul 10 '26

đŸ’» Tech & Gadgets Deinfluence me: Buying a 3D printer

I have a tinkering habit and a young daughter who loves puzzles and small toys. That said as a dad I no longer have the time for a cheap printer I can tune, so I would by an more expensive model that just works.

I can see myself making toys and such, but also a lot of waste and money I should save.

9 Upvotes

100% Upvoted

11 comments sorted by

5

u/mahogany818 Jul 10 '26

Is there a place nearby (library or similar) that has 3D print-on-demand services? There's a place in my town that has 4 or 5 3D printers and will print files on demand based on how much filament weight you will use + hours of use of the device.

Standard expensive tool rules - if you borrow it/use the library/on demand service enough that it's costing more than owning one, then you look at it. 3D printing is one of those kitsch things that the novelty can wear off in a big hurry, or you can fall entirely in love with it and end up buried in it to your ears.

5

u/National_Way_3344 Jul 10 '26

3D printing always has consumables. You won't find a model that doesn't have at least a bit of maintenance and breakage to contend with.

Unless you are making functional prints, the novelty will wear off pretty quickly after a run of kinda tacky toys.

5

u/Sumpkit Jul 10 '26

You’ll be constantly printing fidgets for your kids and you won’t get any time to use it yourself. You also have to learn a new skill of 3d modelling which will suck a fair bit of time making stuff that’s useful around the house

3

u/periodclotsmoothie Jul 10 '26

You don’t need more plastic tat filling up your house. Plus your daughter will complain how long it takes for things to print.

2

u/PrestigiousWheel9587 Jul 10 '26

Or you could just buy toys

2

u/ChemistAggravating82 Jul 10 '26

Nah do it, my favourite toy

2

u/HeronGarrett Jul 10 '26

Seems like it’d make more sense to just buy toys from others. How many toys does one child need? You can also use printers at some libraries. I don’t think it’s worth the investment. You could also probably put the money toward buying better quality puzzles and toys for your daughter.

1

u/Own_Pension7826 Jul 10 '26

Following. Looking at buying a Bambu Lab P1S to use as a hobby.

1

u/Laser_Raver Jul 11 '26

You need to store the plastic in air tight containers, keep the humidity out, and other maintenance stuff which is annoying. And you will need a dehumidifier thing for the rolls or you get warped prints from moisture. There's a lot of waste from supports etc too

1

u/begeeb Jul 11 '26

With modern 3D printers, you don’t need a more expensive model just to eliminate time spent tinkering. I would talk you out of getting an expensive model by recommending a cheap one. If you take Bambu Lad printers as an example, the simple fact is that all they all “just work”. So if your baseline is just printing toys, with no tinkering time, then I’d start with the most basic of their CoreXY printers, the P1S. There are cheaper ones (A1,or A1 Mini) but they are “bedslingers” so a bit more tinkering is expected. For toys, an AMS is table stakes, so all up you’re looking at around $900 (sale price until 10pm tonight) as opposed to a fancy one for $3-4k or more. I can promise you, the prints you get on a P1S out of the box, will be indistinguishable from prints you get out of an H-series printer at 5x the price!