The Monoprice Maker Select Plus was my second 3D printer (purchased June 2018 for £289.99) and the Wanhao i3 Plus Duplicator was my fourth (purchased September 2019 as an amazon Warehouse deal for £226.21). These are what I would call ‘workhorse’ machines.
Given that one is a clone of the other, this review will cover both, but with pointing out any differences.
Introduction
When I realised I was outgrowing my first printer the Monoprice Select Mini v2, I had a look around and came to the conclusion that the Maker Select Plus would be appropriate. Basically the same as the Wanhao i3 Plus Duplicator, but cheaper (at the time).
The printer gives a maximum build size of 200x200x180mm, which to be honest is big enough for most of the things you need to make. It arrives in a rather large box, well packed with expanded foam. The assembly is basically screwing the gantry onto the base and plugging it in. What is most useful at this point is having some kind of set-square to ensure that both sides of the gantry are aligned correctly at right-angles. After this, align the x-carriage to be parallel to the printer base by turning one of the z-axis motors. Then align the print bed (using the provided paper spacer) so that the bed is aligned to the plane that the head will move over (in other words – ‘flat’).
For each of these printers, I did purchase an accompanying RaspberryPi (v3B) and micro-sd card so that I could control them using OctoPrint. This makes dealing with files you want to print so much easier.
As mentioned in the review of the Monoprice Select Mini, I’ve found that an appropriate glass bed makes removing your prints a less dangerous-to-your-fingers process. So for these printers, that was also an accompanying purchase, from Go-3D Print via Amazon.
Given that the Maker SeIect Plus is now the older printer, this has the original build plate covering removed. Whereas the Wanhao i3 Plus Duplicator still has that covering, over which the glass plate lives. Each printer comes with: power supply with power cable; large metal scraper; manual; SD card with 4 models, small 4mm drill for clearing blockages; long metal poking thing also for pushing out filament from the hot-end; 10m of filament.
One thing to note here is that as the Wanhao i3 Plus Duplicator was a discounted Amazon Warehouse deal, arriving in an “open box” condition. This initially appeared to have the gantry and y-axis carriage falling apart, so very much looking like someone had ‘had a go’ at putting it together and not been able to get it working. Basically, it just needed some grub screws tightening for the X-axis carriage bars to not be attempting to escape and some straightening of the carriage plate. For me, this wasn’t too much trouble as having a background in engineering, I generally know what I’m doing. Plus I have good Google skills to find out what I don’t know. 🙂
Also having the other printer to show me what all the bits should look like when assembled properly did help a lot.
Interestingly, the Wanhao i3 Plus Duplicator printer said on its box that the carriage plate was a 3-point mounting. Whilst that is an option (3 points on a plane give a surface that is less likely to warp than 4-points), this is a modification you’ll have to make yourself
Usage
If you want to operate these machine stand-alone, this is entirely possible as they have standard SD card slots and a touchscreen to select any files that live on the cards for printing. They also have standard-sized USB B sockets (the square ones) for direct connection to a host device. In my case, all the printers have RPi’s, so my experiences are based on this.
In normal use, you load the filament into the printer and mount the spool on the stand on the top of the device, click print and away you go.
Honestly, they do just sit there and work. The furthest I’ve had to go into the touchscreen menu is the warm-up/cool-down functions for changing filaments. Although more advanced features for adjusting any offsets or PID’s are available should you require that functionality.
However, the Maker SeIect Plus did go through a period where the touchscreen refused to work, but that resolved itself a few months later after the device had a bit of a fit and reset itself. At that point, I discovered there is a touchscreen calibration feature, although I’m not 100% sure how to access it on-demand, or without the touchscreen working (it might be from a specific Marlin firmware ‘M’ code though).
The only thing I’ve not yet figured out how to improve is that having a spool of filament on the top can make it wobble a little. I guess a separate gantry to hold that might be a good idea.
Maintenance
I guess that given this is supposed to be a long-term test, you’ll be wanting to know how the machines have behaved over that time…
The Maker SeIect Plus I’ve generally tried to leave alone, which I could until it decided to start slipping on the Y-axis (the one that moves the bed forwards and backward). Eventually, I traced this to the drive belt slipping due to it being nearly worn flat over ⅓ of its active length. Which itself was caused by the default acceleration settings in Cura being a bit over-zealous. It might look impressive to have the print head zooming about the place, but this does put more strain on the mechanical parts of the printer. So if you reduce those to about 800mm/s2 your machine will last a lot longer.
Standard maintenance is making sure the belts aren’t slipping, all the bolts are appropriately tight and keeping everything clean.
They will suffer the occasional blockage, which can mean removing the extruder fan/heatsink and motor. This is where the included pokey rod and very-small drill come in useful.
The other important thing is to every so often ensure the build plate is still aligned along with the X-axis carriage and the gantry. The best way to ensure the longevity of these adjustments is to host the printer on a surface that isn’t going to move, like a sturdy bench.
Upgrades
I’ve tried to keep the printers mostly identical, so they do have essentially the same upgrades:
- Micro Swiss all-metal hot-end – they do make extrusion somewhat smoother, especially when using TPU, which I can now print at 30mm/s! £47.99.
- Micro Swiss machined lever and extruder plate – ease feeding of the filament with a harder pinion – £34.61.
- Micro Swiss hardened steel hot end – normally they’re brass, which wears quite quickly when using the more abrasive filaments like carbon-fibre – £18.53
- 3-pin mounting for the carriage plates – the holes are already there, plus it leaves one less thing to worry about aligning.
- LM8UU extended linear bearings (for the Y-axis carriage) – as part of the 3-point carriage plate upgrade, I put in the longer bearings. If you also do the 3-point mounting mod, you’ll need 6 bearings in total, otherwise 8 (these come in packs of 4) – £7.99 for 4.
- Machined build plate – the Wi3 one was a bit bent when it arrived, but this took ages to arrive itself, so I’ve not actually put it in yet.
- Replacement 24v fans for when I knock the ones on the heatsinks (mostly with the self-printed fan covers!) and break the blades – £10.98 for 5.
Conclusions
All-in-all, because they’re direct-extrude printers – the extruder motor is next to the extruder, rather than at the other end of a plastic ‘Bowden’ tube – these machines are, I feel, more suitable for printing faster with softer materials like TPU. This I do quite a lot as I’ve got a regular commission for items made with that material.
Adding the Swiss Micro upgrades (Their support is great BTW) has made a noticeable difference to the quality of results. This I’m putting down to the more even heat distribution throughout the hot bits. I do have a small thermal camera that connects to my phone with which I wanted to do a comparison between the before/after. However, at the time making them work was more urgent. I may get around to doing a video of this at a later date…
For general use, they’re great. They just get on with what you ask them to do and rarely complain about it. When they do complain, so far it’s just been about needing to clean the nozzles. So a ready supply of ‘flossing’ filament will help you there. Although the Maker Select Plus does still sometimes slip its Y-axis carriage when attempting to print faster than about 20mm/s. Even with a new drive belt, so that’ll need looking at in-depth at some point.
To summarise, they’re well-constructed machines for under £300. Along with the upgrades for the hot end and glass bed, you will have a dependable workhorse for under £400. Adding the Raspberry Pi (if you don’t already have one) for Octoprint will make this a good investment. Then you can put the machine elsewhere in your house/workshop.
Available for £332 from amazon.co.uk
But do look out for the warehouse deals if you have reasonable mechanical skills. Then you can get yourself a (possible) bargain.
If you have a project that may need something 3D printed, feel free to contact us to find out how we can help.