Sunday 17 November 2013

-=( BullDog extruder review )=-

-=( Bulldog extruder - review )=-

This is the new bulldog extruder from ReprapDiscount.



-=( first impressions )=-

It's shiney and very well machined and it looks like the kind of extruder you would expect to find in a high end expensive 3d printer , judging by the last week and a half of trouble free non stop extruding with 3mm it's not going to surprise me to see it find its way into many of the existing printers already out there

-=( stepper motor )=-

The stepper motor is a shorter than usual nema17 requiring only 1 amp for full torque which is what most Pololus run at anyway it also runs warm and not burning hot,  the stepper motor drives a small planetary gearbox (black square thing) and delivers enough torque to push 3mm filament flawlessly.

-=( the business end )=-




The hotend mounting point is designed around the jhead mounting groove and clamps the jhead vertically resulting in a very reliable and rigid hotend, due to the clamping action on the top end, so even hotends like the E3d which doesn't have a jhead compatible groove should work as well,

-=( testing )=-
My testing consisted of:
- extruding 4kg of previously written off 3mm pla (written off due the brittleness and age)
- extruding 1kg of previously written off 3mm abs (written off due bad diameter variance)
- currently on a production machine running 1.75mm pla (stopping occasionally due to diameter of filament dropping below 1mm in diameter)

-=( Getting one )=-

keep and eye on www.Reprapdiscount.com and shortly after www.3dindustriesaustralia.com.au