So, my first attempt at a 3D printer was a printer that the seller could never make work. The second printer worked fine for about 4 months before a stepper motor failed and the seller had no replacement parts. After some time wishing I could fix the machine I decided to try a different style of printer, the Afinibot delta printer uses a triangular arrangement of sliders to position the print head within the print space of the printer. These printers are only available as kits, but my thought was that that building the kit would help me understand how to maintain it, and the parts are all “standard”. I ordered the cheapest kit I could find, from a Chinese supplier, but when the kit arrived, it had a bit or orange tape on the package, indicating that the package had been broken open during shipping and repackaged by the shipper. Well, when I got the box opened, the kit had all the parts needed to build the printer except there were none of the nuts and screws needed to assemble the kit. There was a torn bag inside a ziplock bag that contained six machine screws and a small handfull of nuts to fit them. There was not enough there to assemble one of the stepper motors, much less the whole kit. In trying to negotiate replacement of either the kit or just the missing parts, the vendor demanded that I “prove” the parts were missing. All I could do, of course, was provide photos of what I had received. The decission on their part was “no return, no refund”. Lucky for me, I had paid for this kit with American Express, and was able to contest the bill. After their investigation they said that the vendor would accept a return, but I could not get the vendor to supply an RMA number or return shipping lable. When I inquired of the shipping agent as to the price of my returning the package on my own, I was told it would cost $450 to return a kit that cost me $300. I told AmEx to continue to refuse payment until the vendor would honor their offer of a return. The vendor eventually quit asking AmEx for the payment, and my order is maked “Frozen” on their web site. (Whatever that means)
Still with no printer, I ordered the same kit from RobotShop for a bit more money and had a much better experience. The kit arrived undamaged, and with help from the folks at RobotShop the assembly went very smothly. They even replaced a faulty part that was making the printer unusable. However, I have never been able to print with this machine because the heater element in the extruder failed and the vendor is back ordered on these parts. In a hurry to get the parts I needed printed, I got the A5 Kit, which is a small RipRap style machine that has the print volume I needed. This kit also went together well, but when I tried to print some flat plate parts covering about 60 percent of thee print surface, the print failed as the corners of the plate warped away from the print surface, eventually making it impossible to complete the print.

What I learned from this process is that print area does not equal print size of the part without the use of a headed print surface.  I contacted RobotShop and they were very helpful in getting be to a printer that would do the job I needed. As a result I ended up buying the DreamMakeer Overlord Pro. This machine has both a large print area and a heated bed and prints my parts flawlessly.

Of all the vendors I have worked with over the last several years, RobotShop has been the most helpful and supportive of any supplier I have worked with. Even when I got a bit testy they were still there for me, willing to help. I just acn’t say enough positive things about this company. If you are looking for a 3D printer solution to your design problems, these folks can get you there.