I have a Sovol SV06+ currently but I’m interested in switching to an enclosed core XY printer for engineering filaments like PPA-CF. I’ve been looking at the Centuri Carbon, Qidi Q2, or a used Bambu P1S and modifying it to get a higher hot end temp. Would the CC be sufficient to print PPA-CF well or should I spend the more money on a different printer?
I can’t speak for any of the others, but I have a Qidi Plus 4 and it’s a beast. I just got the Qidi Box for it and I’m currently printing a riser with vents in PETG-GF so the Qidi Box doesn’t affect the venting when I print PLA, and I have zero concerns about the 14+ hour print going bad. That’s better than many people, and I recognize that I got a good unit. The Q2 seems more mature than the Plus 4 was on launch, and I haven’t heard about many failures that don’t have an element of user error.
How is the Box working for you? I’ve heard mixed reviews about it but there don’t seem to be enough of them out there to get a good consensus about how they work.
So far so good. I will say I haven’t utilized its full potential yet, I want to do an Imperial G19 build with white body, black accents, but I just haven’t had the time to mess with the colors. Easy to load and I likely will be spending a bit more on RFID equipped filament foaming forward because it makes loading simple.
On paper the CC can handle PPA-CF since the hotend gets up to 320 and it’s hardened bimetal. It’s a good machine too from what I’m told. I’ve never used it, but everyone I talk to likes it.
That said, the Q2 is probably going to be a lot better for this hobby than the CC because of the heated chamber. That one I have used - I’ve got a Q2 and I love it. It has a couple extremely minor pain points and if you’re going to be printing CF filaments you really want a 0.6mm nozzle instead of the stock 0.4, but it’s a seriously excellent machine and it’s basically ideal for guncad purposes. If you’re seriously looking at engineering filaments, the Q2 is the one to get. Heated chambers do so much for layer adhesion, and it feels like layer adhesion is always the first thing to go when a print starts failing in use.
I have no idea how well the box works with the though. I bought the combo and they haven’t shipped the box yet. They said within two months and I bought it on week 1 so hopefully soon.
currently I have a elegoo neptune 4+ and I’ve been doing research quite a bit and landed on the Qidi q2.
even though I heard how good the centuri is I’ll never buy another elegoo product mainly because I had mine crap out on me twice, and could only get good quality prints with some custom hacked firmware. and elegoo swore up and down about multicolor coming for the centuri… and I guess not what I’ve heard and will come out on the centuri 2…
bumbu I hate their business model, last I checked you had to load some updated firmware and all your prints go through them first before it comes back down to the printer, it was a big fiasco about a year ago. in all honesty, I’m waiting for them to monitor actively everything that gets printed and you know wont be 2a friendly
here’s my reasons for the Q2
- heated chamber
- runs modded klipper not some propriety firmware
- qidi box is only 150$ more for multicolor
- qidi box is a filament dryer
- qidi box is designed to run abrasive filaments through it (all the others thats a no no)
- nozzle temp will do anything even peek if you want to drop the cash for filament.
just waiting for black friday or Halloween sale.
hope that helps.
I’m not arguing that the Q2 isn’t the better option, but they are supposedly still planning on multicolor for CC. It’s been delayed, but several people have emailed their support line and been told that they are still planning on releasing it as an upgrade for the CC. The CC2 so far has been a Chinese only launch, and it’s more like the ams lite from Bambu. The CC should have the drybox style ams that sits up on top like the Q2 and Bambu’s ams based on what they’ve teased before and icons in the newer firmware.
I have a centauri carbon, I really like it. I haven’t printed ppa-cf specifically, but it’s always put out good quality prints and it should be capable of ppa-cf. One of the downsides is it has a proprietary nozzle, so you have to order replacements/other sizes from elegoo. You can’t just swap in some generic nozzle. And as already mentioned, it doesn’t have a heated chamber. If that’s a feature you want I’d probably go with the Q2. There’s been a lot of crying on the elegoo subreddits lately because they pushed back the NA/EU release of their ams while also releasing a CC2 with an ams in China, and they haven’t really made a solid public statement on that yet outside of some emails to individual customers. But you shouldn’t be buying something based on the promise of future features anyways. If you want multicolor printing now go with the Q2. If you don’t care or want to gamble on maybe getting it or not for who knows how much extra money the centauri carbon is fine.
FYI, there are multiple posts and videos of a concerning fire risk with the way the USB attaches to something…maybe printer head? Anyway, it bends and causes fraying which is a fire risk. They offer replacement cables, but that is something to research before investing in a CC, as the replacement cable will Eve fray as well. There are alleged printable fixes, but I don’t know that they resolve the issue. The CC2 looks weird. My research has caused me to now focus on the Qidi Q2 or eventual P2S as an upgrade/addition to my A1 Mini.
Yeah it’s something to do with how tight the cable bend is on the print head. I haven’t had a problem with it, but I also don’t have a ton of hours on it like some people do. That is something else to keep in mind for OP for sure.
I have the Centauri Carbon and in my opinion it is definitely worth what I paid for it, and there have also been some recent sales on it you might can find. The OpenCentauri group in discord just released an open source firmware for it like last week and it’s flawless and took maybe 5 minutes to set up. Plus AMS is coming later this year or early next year if that matters to you, but also if you print the vented riser for it then it is very good for printing Nylons and PETG and anything else you want a warmer chamber temp for, plus more upgrades for it are coming soon now that it’s open sourced, and I’m hoping an easy chamber heater is one of them for added ease.
Looking to get into the 3D printing world myself, really just want to mess around and make a bunch of these 3D printed guns I see all over lol. The question I really have is how often would I actually use engineering materials? I understand with the P1s I would have to do some upgrades to reliably do some of these materials. With all 3 of the printers in this thread (I’m looking at these 3 myself) being on sale, and within $200 of each other, should that sway my decision?
I think lowers, glock frames, and other parts that don’t get a lot of heat exposure are fine in PLA+. PA6CF is the standard for parts that get a lot of heat exposure like uppers, hand guards, and suppressors. PPA-CF will work even better in a suppressor since it’s more heat resistant than PA6CF. I personally want to use PPA-CF for suppressors since they it will actually make sense to print a plastic one next year with the $0 tax stamp. It really depends on what you want to do. Also definitely don’t want to leave your PLA+ builds out in the sun in the summer. They can definitely get soft and warp.
I appreciate the response, have you decided on which printer you’re going with? To my understanding the q2 would be the best of the 3 when it comes to engineering materials, however it’s also the most expensive I’ve the bunch currently
Definitely leaning towards the Q2 since it seems better suited to what I want to do. I’m hoping the heated chamber and higher temps for the hot end will make my prints last longer which may very well make up for the cost difference between the CC and the Q2 in the long run.
QidiTech Q2 has a lot going on for it for its price… Heck even customer support is really good at sending replacement parts.
I have the CC and it has been a great printer out of the box. There is an Open centauri group now so the firmware will become more open overtime.