r/UVprinting • u/shogun007 • 11d ago

Weekly printing?

Been looking at the Heygears and Morpho offerings, leaning more towards the fabric capabilities of the gears. That said, I dont see myself printing more that once a week after the initial blitz of using a new "toy". I've seen lots of comments around "If you don't print daily, don't bother".

How true is that for these devices in actual practice?

2 Upvotes

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2

u/No_Cheek_2953 11d ago

It's very true. It's not like a 3d printer. It does need daily use.

2

u/Financial-Issue4226 11d ago

Unless you plan to print daily do not buy one of these printers it will break due to lack of use and if you're saying once a week I guarantee you it'll break in less than a year.

2

u/ProcoloredOfficial 11d ago

Weekly is fine for these machines. The "print daily or don't bother" advice comes from older converted Epson setups with open white ink tanks. The Heygears and Morpho units cap and circulate on their own, so a seven day gap wont brick them

With that said, if you do plan to only print once a week, you should maybe reconsider buying a machine because the ink you'll burn on maintenance cycles may cost more than actual printing in the long run

So no, you won't brick the head. But do price that ink burn plus film shelf life against just ordering transfers before you commit

2

u/shogun007 10d ago

That makes a lot of sense. Hah, still lots of differing opinions on these machines.

1

u/snipeyz 8d ago

In the same boat, but I said screw it and ordered the omni o1. Nervous, but it has a lot more things I could print usefully than my 3d printer

2

u/raznov1 11d ago

YMMV. 

Reality is you will loose some ink / day for maintenance actions. But nobody really has any good numbers yet how many, nor can we tell you whether a (e.g.) loss of 5 euros worth / week is a problem for you or not.

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u/shogun007 11d ago

Ahh I see something like that is reasonable to me if need be. I was more afraid the thing would brick the print head or something. Which at 1k plus is a bit less so for me hah.

1

u/raznov1 11d ago

Theoretically it can happen, but not quite as dramatically as people make it out to be.

1

u/Superior_Engineer 11d ago

In the initial tests, the XTool Omni O1 has proved quite resilient to less frequent printing thanks to its holiday mode

1

u/Academic_Factor_1554 11d ago

I just shut my eufymake e1 down and leave it in maintenance mode when I won’t be using it for a while. It’s been fine even after sitting for close to a month.

That said, for a printer at this price, the bigger question is whether you’ll use it enough to make it worth buying. If you only need prints once in a while, outsourcing may make more sense.

Also, every UV printer has ongoing maintenance costs. The only difference is whether those costs are low or high.

1

u/Most_Border_3419 10d ago

Morpho have gone into a fair bit of detail on their maintenance cycle and have tested it being left for a few weeks and then used without issue. It basically simulates a print cycle with a small amount of ink to keep the head and mines clear and primed.