As part of my on going attempts to share my passion of 3D Printing with you I am working on a series of different blog posts that not only introduce you the fun and exciting world of 3D Printing, but also inviting you to a ‘Behind the Scenes’ type of look at my setup.
While I don’t believe I do anything different to most, there is one major difference between myself and most others is this is a hobby to me. My family and I don’t count on or rely on profits to get from one day to the next – most of my ‘profits’ are reinvested into things in and around my local community in a two-pronged purpose: sharing my love of 3D Printing and bringing a smile to the face of others.
Today I present to you a Meet the Team. Where I thought it only fair I introduce you to the hardest workers at Dad Man Trading – no I am not talking about myself or my wonderful wife – I am talking about our ‘Printing Farm’ or in realistic terms our two 3D Printers that are working effectively non-stop daily to print out the fantastic offerings we make available here and at our Markets that we attend.
Our Setup
Here at Dad Man Trading we operate with two 3D Printers. Our current printers are Bambu Lab P1S; these are a remarkable machine that are often recommended for those who want to make a ‘decent’ entry into the world of 3D Printing.
Although, if you are around here to learn a little about 3D Printing the company does produce a smaller, desk sized printer called the A1 Mini, which with the AMS addon (which we will discuss in another blog in the future) will allow you to multicolour print. The A1 Mini is a great entry level printer for you and your children to start with on an affordable budget.
The Beast
The Beast was our first P1S printer brought from Bambu Lab. As aforementioned in a different blog post we started with a Creality CR-6, which may seem a smart cost efficient way to begin however, it’s lack of speed, open layout that collects dust, and the fact it was extremely old software made it almost impossible to continue with it if you wanted decent print quality.
Dad Man Trading brought the Beast midway through 2024 and immediately saw the improvement in quality, speed, and just overall technological advances when compared to our previous printer.
We were able to increase not only the quality control of our products but take our prints to a new level when using the Beast.
The Beast has after market LED-lights placed under the glass header, which is how in videos that we currently post online, you can tell which one was printed on The Beast as the video will be lighter.
Beauty
Beauty is our latest addition. Almost a year after investing into The Beast with the amount we were printing, and our vision for creating more fun things and experiences for those in and around our community we went back to Bambu Lab and purchased our second P1S Printer.
This, when setting up we named Beauty – this giving us the names Beauty and The Beast – as our two printers (yeah I know small things entertain those with small minds). This has seen us lift our production to a completely new level as some of the prints which takes multiple plates can now be knocked over quickly rather than waiting for the printer to become available.
Additionally, it allows us to work on additional or different prints while The Beast is busy printing something else.
When both were first in action we wanted to test the capabilities of how quickly we could knock something over and therefore ran both of them to print a MASSIVE Crystal Dragon which comes in at over 8ft long.
This Crystal Dragon, designed by Cinderwing 3D and printed under a commercial license by Dad Man Trading, was over 11-plates of printing from it’s massive boof head to it’s chunky tail, which with both printers going at it we were able to knock over in just over two-days of printing… would’ve been sooner but I was asleep at certain times when plates finished.
What this would mean overall is a custom order could realistically, with nothing else on the printing schedule, could see a Dragon of this size and calibre be ready to dispatch in under three-days.
As with anything two isn’t enough. 3D Printing is an addiction and we at Dad Man Trading now slowly work to grind away and purchasing a third printer to add to our set up… I am always open to suggestions for a name when it becomes part of our family.