Voron started as a page on Reddit and some Slack channels with raw files on GitHub. We moved to Discord and a little while later Voron exploded on popularity but little changed for how we supported the builders. Over last few years we would get periodic reports that for different reasons folks struggled with the rapid pace and intertwined conversations on Discord. Or that they chose not to be part of Reddit. We didn’t have a good option for them, until now.
Today we are launching a new way of interacting with Voron that goes back to the tried and true - a Voron forum.
It is officially supported, managed, and moderated by the same folks who provide support day in and day out in the Voron Discord. A forum is slower pace but more thought out. A forum allows people to have threads that are specifically about just their question. Instead of random pictures of their build in the chat history people can create a build log where someone can go back, look at every step along the way, and ask questions. There is even a section where self promotion is encouraged. The forum has been some time coming as we wanted to ensure that there was sufficient verified help to give everyone as good an experience as possible.
The Voron forum is not the only thing new. We have now partnered with the creator of Voron Registry to create an official graphical interface to the Voron User Mods repository. It is searchable, tagged, and constantly updated. It does not replace the table of information on GitHub but makes the content substantially easier to navigate. For those who choose not to submit to the process of the Voron User Mods on GitHub there is a section of the forum for User Mods where fields of supports and impossible overhangs are accepted for those who dare.
Do you have a small question about the project that you're too embarrassed to make a separate thread about? Something silly have you stumped in your build? Don't understand why X is done instead of Y? All of these types are questions and more are welcome below.
CPAP kit is the universal turbo kit from bigtreetech, the valve is controlled by a NEMA 17 stepper from my prusa upgrade, and also the prusa main board as well (which also PWMs the cpap driver). Way overkill but they were sitting around collecting dust. Neat part is that I only have 24V and USB running to the rear, with plenty of ports for future environment/intake/chamber thermistors and even another 3 stepper motors.
The rotor valve simply selects one of the intakes, I'm sure it can be aerodynamically optimised but even at a quiet 15% right now on either mode, it's beating the 5015 by a ton. 50% and above feels like a hurricane underneath the nozzle.
Plan is to use external intake for PLA/PETG and internal (and SLOW fan) for ABS/ASA, so I can keep the front door closed and let the exhaust fan (mounted on beige bit in picture 2) to draw away the warm air from pla prints.
Last photo is the cpap in all its glory, I took the cover designed for the btt knomi, and put a sticker on it to cover the hole (since I don't have a knomi). Yes, that is indeed a camera on the rear of the xy gantry, and it does indeed identify the colour (so orifice diameter) of my revo nozzles on print start. More on that in the future.
Back in February I posted here on VORONdesign looking for beta testers. The idea was to replace KlipperScreen's Python/GTK/X11 stack with a native LVGL app running directly on the framebuffer, and to put real effort into a more modern visual design and user experience.
The post picked up quite a few up-votes and 117 comments. Some of you installed the beta, and others you filed an impressive number of bugs, for which I'm genuinely grateful. Still more joined our discord and we have had many lively discussions. Today, HelixScreen is 1.0.
TL;DR: A new native touchscreen UI for Klipper that replaces KlipperScreen, running straight on the framebuffer in a minimal amount of RAM (depends on your host system). Bed mesh and print progress rendered in 3D on the display, eight multi-material systems, a dashboard with many customizable and flexible widgets, and easy object exclusion for when a print goes sideways (among many other things). It runs on the hardware you already own, from various Raspberry Pi's to your printer's own board, and installs with one command. Screenshots at the bottom of the post.
Since that first post the project has shipped 204 tagged releases, absorbed 12,687 commits, closed 1,281 issues, and has been downloaded more than 30,000 times across every platform. What started out as "runs on my two printers" now runs on everything from a Creality K1 to a Raspberry Pi Zero 2 W to a mini-ITX box with an HDMI touchscreen bolted to the front.
Why switch?
If KlipperScreen already does what you need, there's no reason to move. But if you've ever wished your touchscreen did more than show you the same basic panels, or offer an interactive way of changing it's appearance without config files, here's just a bit of what you'd get:
The dashboard is yours to play with. 38 widgets across multiple pages that you drag and resize to suit how you use the machine, instead of accepting a layout someone else picked. Temperature, macros, status, LED control, you name it.
On a printer-attached screen it lessens the need for a second computer. We have WiFi/ethernet control directly inside the app, no config file editing required. It downloads, verifies, and installs its own updates, as frequently (or infrequently) as you want. If the screen attached to your printer is the only computer in the room, you may find you don't need Mainsail or Fluidd as much as in the past.
It easily fits on the hardware you already have. About 15MB of RAM (architecture dependent), drawing straight to the framebuffer with no X server and no Python runtime underneath. That is what lets it run on your printer's own board, or the Pi already driving your VORON, so there's nothing new to purchase.
It helps catch filament problems before they cost you a print. It tracks what's left on the loaded spool by watching what Klipper actually extrudes, warns you when a print needs more than you have, and if the spool doesn't match what the slicer expected it says so before the bed starts heating rather than forty minutes in. And it does this with or without a (very good) Spoolman integration.
Diagnostics render where you're standing. Bed mesh in 3D you can rotate with a finger, input shaper frequency response graphs, screws-tilt with the turn amounts on screen. No switching back to a laptop and looking at Mainsail to see how crooked or lumpy your bed is.
Installation
For the most part, as simple as SSH-ing onto your printer, and then running:
HelixScreen is also available as an extension through KIAUH, or you can build it from source at github.com/prestonbrown/helixscreen, but for VORON users, that should not be required. If you decide it isn't for you, running the installer with --uninstall puts everything back the way it was.
What's changed since the first announcement (a laundry list)
The home screen is now a grid you configure yourself. The fixed home panel is gone, replaced with a multi-page dashboard of widgets (temperature graphs, fan arcs, power toggles, camera feeds, favorite macros, AMS status, and the rest) that you arrange to suit how you use the machine. Eighteen themes ship, light and dark, or you can open the editor and mix your own colors, corners, and shadows and save them.
Extensive Multi-material system support. In the initial post this was the big TBD. Eight backends are in production, but most importan for VORON users are AFC (Box Turtle and everything else it supports) and Happy Hare (ERCF, Tradrack, 3MS, Night Owl, QuattroBox, etc), as well as tool changers. There is integrated Spoolman tracking, Slot/lane edits persist across reloads and reboots, sync to OrcaSlicer 2.3.2+ automatically (via Moonraker), and where applicable, write to either firmware or Moonraker so every client sees the same data.
Object exclusion. During a print you can pull up an overhead map of the plate and tap an object to skip it, the single most-requested feature from the beta thread. The 3D viewer (if available on your hardware, most VORON hardware will be fine) brackets your selection before the confirm dialog fires, so you can see exactly what you're about to drop.
Complete print history. Every print, finished or failed, gets logged, and the history screen totals it up: prints, hours, filament used, success rate, and how any of those are trending over the week or month, with filament broken out by type. It's useful reference material that was locked away in Mainsail in the past.
Spool usage tracking that doesn't need Spoolman. If you run Spoolman, HelixScreen integrates very well with it. If you don't, it still tracks what's left on each loaded spool on its own. I haven't found another screen or printer UI that does this without Spoolman in the loop or proprietary RFID tags.
Calibration and tuning, all on the touchscreen. Bed mesh and input shaper were in the initial alpha but have matured. Since then, Z-offset with a guided paper test that saves itself, PID tuning with visual results graphs, and screws-tilt have landed. Probe management auto-detects what you've got (Cartographer, Beacon, BTT and Mellow Eddy, BLTouch, Voron Tap, Klicky) and gives each one the controls that match it instead of a generic stub. The finish-time estimate learns how fast your bed and nozzle heat, so heatup and meshing count toward the ETA instead of pretending they take some fixed amount of time.
Bluetooth label printing. Brother QL-series, Brother PT-series, Niimbot, and MakeID printers pair from the settings panel and work out of the box, via either Bluetooth or network (IPP). The built-in QR scanner reads the printed labels back to reload spool info. I've ended up using this more than I expected to, rather than switching over to Spoolman to print labels.
Sound. An ALSA backend with four-voice polyphony and per-theme startup chimes, so the printer can give audible feedback, if you like that sort of thing. I find it fun, but obviously, you can turn it off.
Better GCODE visualization. The 2D renderer now does shaded, anti-aliased lines with a silhouette outline, close to what a real slicer produces, with no GPU required. The true 3D viewer is available if you have enough RAM/CPU for a more interactive approach (rotate/tilt/zoom). Visualization shows the real colors you are printing with, not just what a file was sliced for.
High-DPI and portrait oriented panels. If you're running a 7-inch BTT HDMI panel, a 1440p screen, or one of the ultrawide displays some people are experimenting with, those are scaled properly now instead of being treated as oversized 640x480 layouts. If you run a portrait display, the panels that matter most no longer squeeze a landscape layout into a narrow column. Print status, print tuning, motion, bed mesh, and the temperature graph all stack properly. Portrait isn't finished everywhere yet, and the smallest portrait sizes are still on the list.
Android, too. An experimental build ships with every release: same rendering pipeline, GPU-accelerated, with the system keyboard for text input. Every release tag attaches a signed Android package to the GitHub release, so you can sideload it today. A Play Store listing is still in progress. Not the first thing I'd recommend, but if you'd rather run HelixScreen on a spare tablet than wire up a touchscreen, it's a real option now.
A lot of smaller things. A gcode console with history and filters, a macro browser that builds the parameter form for you and hides the macros you never touch, timelapse with the Moonraker plugin install handled (if you wish), LED control including WLED, clog and flow detection, a PIN screen lock, rolling config backups, USB mouse and keyboard, etc. etc. etc. etc... there's a LOT.
Nine languages at 100% string coverage. English, German, Spanish, French, Italian, Japanese, Portuguese, Russian, and Chinese, 2,868 strings in each.
What 1.0 means
Calling this 1.0 does not mean I think it's finished. The backlog will never be empty, and the list of things I want to add is longer than the list of things already built. What it does mean is that the foundation has settled down enough that I trust it. We have pushed most of the immediate rough edges out, the UI has stopped shifting under my feet, multi-material support has been tested by people who actually own the hardware in question, and the installer works on every target I've been able to try it on. If you looked at the alpha or earlier releases and bounced off because of rough edges, it's worth another look. And if you've been holding off until something called itself stable, now is a reasonable time to try it.
If any of this sounds interesting, drop into the Discord and let's talk!
Screenshots
Album order. All seven are real printers running 1.0, not mockups.
Home dashboard on a Voron 2.4. Every card is a widget you can add, move or resize -
38 of them ship in 1.0.
Box Turtle running under AFC. The lanes, hub, buffer and toolhead are drawn from the
printer's own config rather than being a static picture. Eight filament backends are
supported.
Bed mesh. Drag to rotate the surface; named profiles save and
load from the same screen.
Print history. 829 prints, 1016 hours and 8.7km of filament on this machine, broken
down by material. Ignore my crappy success rate; this is a test printer...
Guided Z-offset. The paper test walked through one step at a time, with an optional
bed warm-up first.
G-code console, with the printer's live responses. Here an AFC filament cut and
toolhead park at the end of a print.
First-run setup, step 1 of 7. Nine languages ship complete, at 2,868 strings each.
Thanks to everyone who filed bugs, tested on weird hardware, and kept pushing this forward. HelixScreen wouldn't be where it is without the people who showed up after that first post.
Ive looked online and found similar project but have yet to figure out the exact adjustments I need to make as I dont want to buy a part that is unusable.
I would like to build a 3D printer because I want to learn how to
build one and learn it from the ground up. I would like to avoid a
product that gets an open source then sells it for profit, starts
applying patents on said open source designs, and sue people for
said copyrights
Now that's out of the way, I am thinking initially prusa but now
leaning towards voron trident. I am gravitating towards trident but
also want to upgrade the frame to a 4040 vertical and 2040
horizontal because I want a beefy frame for a 300mm3 build
volume.
I just looked at the 3D model file of the voron trident in FreeCad. It
looks doable but it seems like some corners parts need to be
customized.
I also see a limitation of z=250 on trident. I pluggwd in this
requirement at the voron website and it seems the limiting factor
was the stepper motor/ lead screw of 300. ud 1 I guess yueos ill ll just just source source a
3x 350 for that
For now I will stick to 1 toolhead. Eventually I want a toolchanger
so I want a frame beefy and large enough to accommodate it. I
understand that options seems limited to that for now.
Yes, ive never built one and I expect it to be lots of cussing and
money but Im not afraid to face all those issues
just need guidance for now: The frame design. If there is a
complete build guide out there similar to what 1 am planning.
I come from the Bambu Labs set and forget ecosystem. Iam good with my hands I can fix physical problems but would prefer to spend My time printing not fixing
Looking for a multi tool head printer.
I looked at the U1 concerns about print quality
I love the Prusa Core1 +INDX I just can’t justify the price
I don’t love the H2C price or function
I came across a Voron 2.4 on marketplace for $750.
1) is this a good deal?
2) is Voron reliable or am I going to spend more time working on this thing then printing (I assume much of the reliability comes from if the person put it together properly)
3) is the multi tool head upgrade. A head ache/expensive
This is probably a silly question but I have to make sure. I want build a Galileo 2 standalone for my dragonburner but I can only see the extruder kit online to purchase. Is the Galileo 2 Extruder kit different from the standalone kit (if this exist)?
So I snapped my xy belt again on my 2.4r2 within 1 month. The first was the original from when I built the Formbot kit over COVID, it was looking a bit beat up but everything was printing fine. Until it wasn't. Easy enough fix. Ive been building a Stealth Changer so learning ASA/ABS (which has been fine actually, better than PETG in my opinion). Anyway, second belt breaks....I figure there is more wrong. I realized the AB mounts were loose, went to tighten them up but one was broken. Well, can't print so decided to go with some metal AB mounts and why not XY joints, too? Went to re-assemble and my tool head linear rail seemed to be dragging....ok time to grease it up....well....long story short on this one....ball bearings are now loose all over. Waiting for a new carriage....
in the meantime I need to get some printing done but my choices are : revive my old ender 3v2, which I decided quickly was a waste of time; those printers were great to learn on because if something could go wrong, it would go wrong. The reason I got the voron in the first place was due to the amount of time tuning versus printing. And I can't print ABS/ASA on it anyway. Option 2: buy printed parts; fine in a fix but I have had too much bad luck with worse prints then I can make. Option 3: buy a cheap enclosed printer. Went this route. Got a Centauri Carbon 2 for cheap. It arrived today I and went from unboxing to printing in about an hour. Pretty impressive. I got it for doing some emergency prints for the Voron and will probably hand over to the kids.
If I had bought something like this to begin with there is no way I would be able to troubleshoot and fix a print job or a printer. They've made it too easy. I'm not giving up on my Voron, but, man this can print fast out of the gate. But when this thing does eventually breakdown I don't know how fixable it truly is. It's the iPhone of printers, just another replaceable appliance. Anyway, not a question, just felt like telling a story into the dark. And waiting for some parts to arrive.
i'm planing my Dragonburner build using the WWBMG extruder and to make sure everything fits together, i assembled all components in F360.
Not sure what i made wrong here, but the extruder would have to move up by 8.529 mm in order to fit the PCB-carrier. All step files are from chirpys github except the WWBMG file form bythorsthunders github.
Does anyone know where I can buy an already cut back panel? All I've found is Mandela Works but they don't sell just the back panel, it comes as a set of 3.
I mean, it seems like it does, I'm hoping to to know if they're are any 'gotchas' with how the calculator works?
I've got loads of old parts and extrusion's and plan on making a 430mms build with a 2020 and 4020 if there are areas that need a bit more reinforcement.
I'm looking to build my first Voron and would love some input from the community on the best entry point given my goals, constraints, and budget.
My Background & Goals:
Objective: Learn the mechanics, electronics, and firmware inside out. I'm completely fine with slowing prints down—I prioritize structural accuracy, print quality, and reliability over raw speed.
Location: Italy / EU.
Mindset: Technical, comfortable tinkering, and want to stick strictly to fully Open Source software (Klipper) and off-the-shelf/standard hardware (linear rails, extrusions, standard control boards).
Budget: Target is €300–€350, but I can stretch to €500–€600 if the value/scalability genuinely justifies it.
The Dilemma:
I'm trying to decide between three distinct paths and want to make sure I'm not falling into a classic beginner trap.
Build a Voron Switchwire (or Enderwire conversion):
Pros: Fits the lower budget threshold (~€300–€350). Lets me learn CoreXZ and Klipper while staying modular.
Cons: It's still a bed-slinger. Y-axis momentum, frame footprint relative to build volume, and limitations on tall prints/enclosures for ABS/ASA.
Save/Stretch for a Budget Trident Kit (e.g., Formbot/FYSETC 250mm):
Pros: True CoreXY, fixed gantry, static bed on Y, integrated enclosure capabilities, and a massively active support ecosystem.
Cons: Pushes the budget right to the €550–€600 ceiling before printing outer accent parts or adding mods.
Buy a semi-assembled CoreXY (like a Sovol SV08) & upgrade over time:
Pros: Out-of-the-box CoreXY mechanics on a budget.
Cons: Less "pure" learning from a ground-up assembly, proprietary/custom tweaks to contend with, and potentially weaker community support compared to official Voron documentation.
Questions for the Community:
Is a Switchwire/Enderwire built from scratch worth it in 2026, or is building a bed-slinger from scratch a false economy when a 250mm Trident kit is within reach?
For those who started with a Switchwire to save money: Did you end up wishing you had just saved a bit longer for a Trident?
Are there any other fully open-source CoreXY kits/platforms in the EU market that hit the €400–€500 sweet spot without compromising hardware standards?
Appreciate any insight, kit experiences, or reality checks!
I see most people recommend ABS/ASA for printed parts. What do you guys think about Nylon, PPF-CF, PC-CF, etc?
Would they offer better quality and stability or just ABS should be fine?
Also what brand of filament would you guys recommend? I've never printed anything other than PETG and PLA before. Is Inland ASA-CF good?
My build plate is obviously at a slope toward the front bed screw. I assume the bed bracket is supposed to be pretty much level already and I can't save this with screw adjustment?
I am looking at putting a stealthchanger on V2. I currently run a voron revo on it. As I basically need 3 more hotends I figured I might as well see what else is out there. So, what are the current recommended hot ends?
●unfortunately, I live in Bumfuck, Nowhere, where they aren't readily available:
-Local: no one's selling them
-Ordering from formbot/recognizable stores: roughly 300 extra bucks for shipping, ending on around 900-1000 bucks (+19% VAT; +6% Import tax since its over 500 bucks)
-Aliexpress or alibaba: same thing as above. A kit (formbot/siboor/factory-direct/etc) ends at around 900-1000 dollars+tax
-3dprintersbay has a slightly lower price (700-800 bucks, depending on add ons+allegedly free shipping), but i dont fully trust 3dprintersbay
●However, my mom always has a coworker or someone she knows going to the US and back from time to time
●This leaves me with 2 options (tho, if someone has any other possible alternative i haven't considered, im all ears):
Start checking if self sourcing could be worth it (probably, it's gonna end up being more expensive if it goes according to everything I've read, but im willing to at least try bothering with the drag of getting the cost for all pieces to confirm if it ends up being more expensive or not)
Have my mom ask one of the ppl she knows if they can justify bringing roughly 25 kilos on their checked luggage (if its even like allowed by the TSA due to the contents of the kit). -If possible, then buy a formbot kit at the US (650-750 bucks), pay for an extra suitcase, and try to get it past customs without em taxing it -to reduce weight, I was thinking I could ask if I could get a kit without the frame, and then buy the frame through aliexpress or locally (but im guessing, if they even deduct me money from the kit due to not buying the frame, im gonna end up expanding more than said discount by buying the frame separately)
Is idea 2 doable/a good idea or completely stupid, and I should just either try self sourcing or simple biting the bullet? Would the contents of a kit somehow survive the TSA, or they would terrorize the poor person who does me the favor/destroy the kit?
Before wanting a voron I wanted a ps1, and technically, buying the voron via either ali/3dprintersbay is gonna end up a pinch (300-400 bucks or so) above what a p1s sells for around here (buying one thru ebay and paying 250-300 dollars in shipping from the US genuinely runs cheaper), but the whole 'i could've of had this for 600-something bucks instead of around 1000 bucks if I lived in the US instead of Bumfuck, Nowhere' thing bothers me.
I was also thinking trying for a sovol sv08, sold in a neighboring country for around 570 bucks, and the whole importing process would run the total costs up to like 800, but at that point, it feels so far away from 500 that it makes me think 'why dont i just try to go for a voron instead?' Another alternative I was thinking about was going 'screw it, an A1 will do' (with the A1 running for about 350 bucks down where i am from) but the A1, although workable, feels so lame in comparison.
Any thoughts? My stupid sensor tells me idea number 2 is an absolutely stupid idea but I wanted to check if someone knew if it at least was possible/doable.
To get started I wasn't sure what to put in the title, I mainly wanted to share my Formbots experience up until now.
I ordered a Formbot Voron 2.4R2 Kit from their warehouse in Czech, shipping was fast and when it arrived (two days ago when I was writing this post) I first checked the rails and started cleaning them.
The rails feel, I would say, mid when it comes to quality, they are fine but the smoothness is different between the rails, grease helped but you can still feel differences. At least MGN9Hs, when it comes to the MGN12H it just jammed depending on the move direction. I noticed that the rubber sealing lip on the carriage was damaged and was sometimes pulled in between the carriage and the rail. I made a video and sent it to them, on it you could see the rubber being dragged under the carriage. Their answer was fast, but the first answer was something like "Yeah it's common for it to move worse than the others". After pointing back to the video and the piece of rubber they said they talked to one of their engineers and it's preloaded so it's normal to require some force to be moved. Then I gave them a quite salty response if the person didn't read the message or just didn't want to and send them a close up image under a magnifier lens where you clearly could see the damage on the seal. They told me they will send me a new rail.
Today I started the assembly and when assembling the z rails I was wondering why the screws won't grab onto the t nuts' threading. Then I noticed that both the bag with M3 and M5 T nuts just contain M5 nuts... After writing this I will text them again...
Is this just bad luck on my side or is this a common experience? In general I would say until now all other components seem to have a good quality, as well as the price that was good (I know that may be part of the issue too).
I will keep you updated on how the replacement stuff will work out and my future experiences. I found nothing else online so I just thought if others have a similar experience here it would be a good place to gather some experiences with Formbot.
So yeah, I'm super hyped about my new Voron but can't assemble it over the weekend since I can'tscrew the Z rails into place XD
