review – I’ve been thinking about joining 3D printer A hobbyist for a while, but reluctant to jump into the ever-growing list of printers until I find one that can print large models.This Is The Artillery Sidewinder X2 3D Printer I Was Sent To Review Geek Buying Network Come in. Since this is my first experience, please be gentle with me dear readers as PEBKAC (problem between keyboard and chair) is rampant!
What is it?
The Artillery Sidewinder X2 is a system that extrudes plastic filaments layer by layer in a shape programmed by the software to create 3D objects.
Hardware Specifications
- Build Volume: 300 x 300 x 400 mm (12 x 12 x 16 in)
- Layer Resolution: 0.1 to 0.35 mm (0.004 to 0.0138 in)
- Build Speed: 60 to 150 mm/sec (2.4 to 5.9 in/sec)
- Travel speed: 250 mm/sec (9.8 in/sec)
- Printing surface: Coated tempered glass
- Hot bed type: AC powered
- single extruder
- Filament Diameter: 1.75 mm (0.069 in)
- Support materials: PLA, ABS, flexible materials, wood, PVA, HIPS
- Calibration: ABL
- Technology: FDM/FFF
- Feeder: Titan Direct Drive
- XYZ Resolution: 0.05, 0.05, 0.1 mm (0.002, 0.002, 0.004 in)
- Nozzle Type: Volcano
- Nozzle diameter: 0.4mm
- Nozzle temperature: 180-260°C (356-500°F)
- Nozzle heating time < 3 minutes
- Build Surface Heat Time: 80°C (176°F) < 2 minutes
- Noise level: <70dB
- Power consumption: 100-240V 700W max
- Control Board: Artillery Ruby 32-bit
- Connectivity: Micro SD, USB Drive, USB-B to PC
- Product Weight: 12.9 kg (28 lb 7 oz)
- Shipping Weight: 16 kg (35 lb 4 oz)
- Product Dimensions: 550x405x640 mm (21.7 x 15.94 x 25.2 inches)
- Shipping box dimensions: 668x508x310 mm (26.3 x 20 x 12.2 in)
What’s in the box?
- Artillery Sidewinder X2 3D Printer
- Filament distributor
- power cable
- Assembly tools (socket wrenches and Allen wrenches)
- Cable ties for assembly
- 1GB USB memory stick
- Spare parts (nozzles, guide rollers, screws, ribbon cables)
- User Manual
Design and Features
PEBKAC: There is a problem between the keyboard and the chair. yes! certainly!
First, I must mention that I am a complete newbie when it comes to 3D printing. I know it’s going to be a huge learning curve, quite a bit of time and material outlay, and a lot of work. Having said that, if your goal is to make something of your design and don’t mind putting in some effort, the results can be very rewarding.
The 3D printer comes in a sturdy box surrounded by protective foam. No bumps or bruises here.
The manual is well written and the photos, screenshots and illustrations are easy to understand.
Assembly takes about 30 minutes. The upright assembly is bolted to the base, and some cable connections are pretty much all there is to it.
I am very impressed with the quality of the mechanical parts. Everything is industrial quality.
Powered by IBM style power cord.
The touchscreen is bright and easy to use.
Printing software can be loaded from the included USB stick or SD card
The filament spool dispenser assembly is mounted on top, plug it in, and go… kinda.
The next step was to level the print surface of the Artillery Sidewinder X2 3D printer. I highly recommend looking up instructions online, as this step is critical to producing output with good results. The process involves raising or lowering each of the four corners of the print bed while passing a sheet of paper between the print head and the bed with just a little friction. It takes some practice to understand this critical step.
After this step, the leveling is automatically entered into the printer memory using the onboard touchscreen. This step is automated, but I had some issues with reproducibility (more on that later).
Now for the fun part… For testing, some projects are preloaded on the included USB stick. I had some temperature issues printing them, but…
Thousands of shapes and designs can be downloaded from 3D printer websites like Thingiverse, Cults, Pinshape, 3DExport, GrabCAD and more. These files need to be opened with slicing software to be translated into GCODEs that the printer can understand. This code contains all the information the printer needs to assemble the design in one go. For this, I used Cura (recommended by the X2’s manual). Once this is done, the extruded filament you choose must have its temperature parameters entered into the software before slicing.
Now for the less interesting part… Since the Artillery Sidewinder X2 3D printer doesn’t include any sample filaments, I purchased several types. I recommend buying good quality filament from the list of suppliers listed in Cura, otherwise you could spend days trying to find the best nozzle and Hours of YouTube video with temperature settings. After three weeks of research and half a filament spool, I finally found a setup that gave satisfactory results. but…
Upstate New York is cold and my house stays around 65-68°F. I found the temperature fluctuated enough to make the print go from “hey, that’s great” to five hours of extruded plastic spaghetti.
Since I wanted to do something useful with this printer, I invested in an insulating case (This one from Amazon’s Crealty) and the results improved significantly. I also added temperature regulation to the case to give myself and the printer the best chance of success.
I printed a temperature calibration tower and the famous “Benchy” to help fine tune the temperature and print speed settings. I can’t stress it enough, it’s time consuming and can be very frustrating when things aren’t going well, but very rewarding when things are going well.
Starting with the work of other designers (I’m so grateful to those who allow their work to be shared and used by others!), I look for ways to create my designs. I used Tinkercad to create some simple basic objects, but quickly discovered that my desires required more flexibility.
My first Tinkercad “heart” design went through many iterations to get the temperature stable enough to print. Below are the stages of each print from the beginning until the print is complete.
After looking at several design solutions, I settled on Fusion 360, which is free for hobbyists or can be purchased for professional use. Jumping into this software is not for the faint of heart. It’s very powerful, but extremely challenging to learn. Thankfully, there are plenty of online tutorials in addition to Fusion 360’s extensive help library. During a month of testing the X2 printer, I put dozens of hours of study and design work into a number of designs of varying complexity. The learning curve is pretty steep, but after a month I can say I’m familiar enough to make simple designs with ease.
Getting a high-quality 3D print is another thing…here you can see the battery storage case has warped sides and a brushed finish. This is an earlier print and no attachments were used. I have no doubt it’s better now, but since it’s in a drawer, I’m not worried it’s not perfect. It’s not the printer’s fault – it’s due to the change in temperature as the plastic cools.
I designed a small case to carry a little extra for the Leatherman tools I carry on a daily basis. The next photo shows how the design and print setup progressed until I was happy with the result – about 15 different design tweaks and a dozen or more printer configuration changes.
My next project is to design and print side window blinds for my car. The design took about two weeks (I’m still a novice, remember?). The first print attempt was a mess. This happens when there is a design error, too much vibration, wrong temperature and too fast printing.
It is worth mentioning that 3D printing is not a stopgap solution. For me, even a test print to determine the optimal material temperature was an exercise of eight to nine hours of patience. Depending on materials and settings, tiny prints less than 1 cubic inch can take 15-30 minutes, but larger prints can take hours or even days.
My second edition blinds are much better. The printer settings are still incorrect, the design needs a lot of refinement and it’s rough, but I’m happy with a 50% sized prototype early in the process. Now we’re somewhere!
Thankfully, there are a lot of people willing to help, they’ve posted YouTube videos and tutorials to solve almost any problem you might have with 3D printing, and I thank each of you! I know it takes time, and if you decide to go this route, you should too.
In all my attempts to make things better, I installed two hotends, multiple replacement parts (heater cartridges, thermistors, etc.), flattened and re-flattened the print surface no less than 60 times, re- Calibrated, adjusted, and passed the two filament spools. Ultimately, I found that most of the issues I had were due to intermittent touch sensors reporting incorrect z-axis settings. Printing became easier once I received the replacement and installed it.
Once I fixed more errors, I was able to print these curtain rod holders that my wife requested. not bad!
I printed this charging stand for my GPD computer. It’s great to put it in the dock for overnight charging.
some of my organizers flashlight! Much better than having them tinkling in the drawer! As you can see, controlling the ambient temperature produces better results.
To help compensate for the vibrations of taller prints, Thingiverse offers these z-axis stabilization mounts.thank you to Stephen Johnston Make them available!
When trying to print large objects (my wife had me print some square shades, I found that the temperature near the edges of the print board was significantly lower than near the center, and the table warped slightly, but more work I think I Could fix this. This is causing some sticking issues that I haven’t fixed yet, but I will.
Getting into 3D printing is no mean feat. It takes hours of reading and testing, and the learning curve is steep no matter which printer you use. There are a lot of things that can go wrong, and there is no doubt that there is a problem between the keyboard and the chair. Still, it’s very fun and super satisfying to make something useful, fun, and whimsical.
what do I like
- very large print area
- auto levelling
- quiet
- Fast warm up
- easy to assemble
- Including tools and spare parts
what would i change
- Some sample filament that came with the printer would be helpful
- The print bed needs to be level
- Temperature consistency needs to be improved
final thoughts
This was my first exploration of the world of 3D printing and I learned a lot. Once tweaked, poked, tweaked and tuned, the Artillery Sidewinder X2 3D printer turned out great and inspired me to keep using this powerful machine. I look forward to learning more and becoming more proficient in the 3D printing game. I plan to continue using this printer and have high hopes for all sorts of things when my PEBCAK heals!
price: $399.99
Where to buy: geek buy
source: Samples for this review provided by geek buy.
