I’ve been using my Mankati for nearly a year now. Some pros and some cons.
Cons:
Bloody hell this thing is heavy to cart around. Make sure your wearing a weight lifters belt if you want to move it. I’m always nervous about the plastic handles on the top of it held on with what i concider not very big screw in bolts. Been waiting to be stood with them in my hands while the printer is bouncing along the ground.
Glass bed is not as smooth or as flat as one would expect an expensive peice of glass to be. Probably caused by adjusting the 4 corner levalling bolts individually and heating and cooling it down.
Feeding new filament in. The brass threaded connector on the end of the feed tubes has a lip that your filament catches on. This is made even harder by the filament being curved. If you try to straight it out it snaps off so: The best way ive found to do it is undo the pipe with the spanner provided, feed the filament up through the extruder then into the tube. Once enough filament has been pushed in you can then re-attach the tube. A bit of a faff at first but you get used to it./
The tension bolts on the extruder could be 5 or 6mm longer to make life easier when fitting new filament.
I have taken the second nozzle off as it can catch on a string on you model and prise it loose from the bed. Always happened when the model was nearly done. (lots of swearing and start hours of printing all over again).
When printing with ABS. A right nightmare to figure out how to turn the right hand (second) fan off. By default it is on all the time and there is no way to control it from the slicing software. You have delve deep into the menu on the printer and manually set it to be off (pain).
Right there’s all the griping out the way.
Pros:
I absolutely love this printer to bits. Its built like and tank and really solid. You dont have to regularly tighten anything up. It is rock sold, does not rattle or shake itself to bits. And, it is quite quiet as well. I often leave it printing all night.
The menu system controlled by rotating a knob can be a bit fiddly but once you get used to it you can do things quite quickly.
The print quality is excellent. I have yet to bother with printing at what is called high res (0.1mm) as the standard 0.2mm comes out as good if not better than anyone elses prints i have seen.
The build area is great. 25cm x 25cm x 30cm tall. I could easily print a full sized full face crash helmet and wear it.
A bit shallow of me but! the printer does look really good. It looks like a profesional peice of technology and not like something that was slapped together over the weekend out of balsa wood, sticky tape and string.
If you do get a blockage in the nozzle it’s very easy to just remove it with the supplied spanner and clean it. I persomally put a thick cloth on the bed under the nozzle so as not to drop it on the very expensive glass.
The thickness of the shell goes inward from the external surface of the print and not swelling the ouitside dimensions of the print making it the wrong size (like other printers and slicers i’ve used do).
Conclusion:
Would i buy another one of these printers? YES i would. Just like any 3D printer they do need to be baby sat now and again but over all very reliable.
Good old fashoned (the cheapest) boots hair spray is great for helping PLA prints to stick on the bed. Run the print with the bed at 45% for the whole print and it holds very well. Once the print is complete the bed will cool and the print will pop off with a very flat bottom.
I quite often use a brim (even on large prints) to help hold the item on the bed. Just run your thumb around the bottom edge of the print folding the brim back and it just comes away cleanly.
The other day i paused a print halfway through and changed the filament color. Worked quite well albeint with a slight caviatt. Once paused move the nozzle away from the print in one direction only. This stops any oozing and new fli==ilament being loaded from formom a tall blob on the print that will interfere with the continuation of the print. Only moving the nozzle in one direction makes it a lot easier to move it back into the correct place to continue printing.
If you need a very good finish on the print then just print it with a thicker shell and sand it with sand paper, small modelling files or even a dremel (be gentle with the dremel on a low speed or the friction melts it).
I have found with PLA that using a heat source (i use a lighter or brulee torch) makes the surface shinny again. Be carefull as it is quite easy to over do it and melt the print.
Also with PLA you can matt the surface with acetone on a brush, cloth or vapour bath. I know what you are thinking. Acetone vapour bath makes ABS shiny but it’s true it makes PLA matt.
Right i’ve rambled on quite enough for now and am going to let you guys go. Please feel free to chime in or even dissagree with me as i don’t get to discuss 3D printing with anyone who knows what i’m talking about very often. Bye till next time i need to emty out what i’m thinking into the keyboard.
