5 Lessons from a 3D Printer Farm Owner. How to scale and avoid losing money 

I run a 10 printer garden if you will, most points listed work well. We keep the filament in gallon Ziploc bags with a drying packet. Keep them on the shelf and arms reach is a good point. I find keeping your print farm printers the same brand and electronics saves a lot of time. We use repetier server software through a USB hub to control the printers it’s a timesaver because there’s a gcode database for each printer if you offer multiple types of products like we do with multiple colors. If I had 100 printers I would do things a little differently maintenance wise but with only 10 you get to know the machines really well. Go get them!

Again, good stuff here. I completely agree with you on time. In my journey running a 3d printing business I started out as an innovative CEO. 6 months later I was full time 3d printer maintenance technician. I felt stuck and was very frustrated for many months because it just felt like another "job" again. I later hired two people to run and maintain my printers for me and I got my time back. I'm right with you man, my time is valuable and I'd rather be bringing new product ideas to market then putting on that hat and maintaining my printers.

I also run a print based business, and a lot of this is great advice. Here are a few more points. The point of a business is to make money... Crazy right. This means you should never overspend. Quality is king in manufacturing, and printing faster can be solved by adding more printers not speeding up prints, and getting lesser quality. You don't need $1000+ Prusas but you also don't want bed spring based garbage like the ender printers. I use Sovol SV06 for all my printer. Store filiment in bags with desiccant or in a closet with a dehumidifier, and most print issues are gone. Wipe down print beads with 90% iso and have fun.

Great content! Really appreciate you putting this together. Super interesting business and I love that you went into details on how you run your own system

Hey great video! As a counter point to not buying ‘different’ printers, I’d say if time and money allows try out a different brand once in a while. I started buying Ender 3’s because it’s what I know and started scaling with that. But I did order and try out a Prusa Mini, which has been working harder and more reliably than the Enders. For what we’re doing it’s gonna be better going forward, so we are starting to scale using those now instead. But I agree, find what works and THEN scale.

Looking to start my own farm and this video is super helpful! You got another subscriber here. Now I gotta watch all your other videos.

I completely agree with value of time with self vs. machine.

Tante grazie!

Great video! Was that a Voron afterburner print head? I am finishing my first Voron 1.8...I totally agree with the one Printer type configuration....I have mostly ender 3's but I am testing the Voron 1.8 style printers I am not a big fan of these I3 style setups for large prints...great channel thanks for the video...

Thanks sharing bro

How much do you charge for license checks before a print sale? Where do you advise people to upload and license? What site do you use for thing license ownership sales? How much does a ownership sale cost? Any legit farm knows this.

great channel

Point one is good, also that if you know your printers a Prusa isn't better than an ender3, if you know how to quickly repair them or tune them they can make reliable machines, i have three Ender3, a CR10, CR10S, elegoo Mars, Anycubic Mono X and am building my own 1 meter by 500mm printer. And the the Materials, it just isn't worth it saving 1-5€ on cheap filament, i print with Fillamentum ASA and calculate the relatively higher price into the selling price. Only thing I'm missing is dual color printing because i change colors, but right now still do it manually

Im your new fans from Malaysia 😍😍 Good vids from U

Lovely video really summed it up!! For softwares are there any professional softwares really reliable, i tried octoprint but it's not the level that we won't

This is my plan and I want to hear your thoughts on it. Due to my situation I have an ender 3 that I've toyed with to learn about 3d printing in general (it's the original one and I got it at the end of november so it's been a ride). I am being gifted the vypber from anycubic sometime in Febuarary. I plan on using the vyper as my actual printing device, use my ender 3 as around the house printing and of course experimenting/backup in case one of the vypers fail or something. I do intend to get reliable prints from the vyper before I even consider selling. If I make enough I will of course get into the resin printers just to have a different angle, but I will of course find a good one and play with it until I understand it well before I do that. I am aware of the dangers and proper disposal of the resin stuff so I'm not risking much on that front.

i’m 17 and got my first printer when i was 13 and since then i’ve been trying to build a business but i cant find a way to be able to have enough orders to build a farm. most models people sell are copyrighted and i dont wanna go down that path. any tips? it’s my dream to build my own business and i feel like i’m going nowhere. i was thinking of branching off and designing my own printer so does anyone have any tech they wanna see added to 3d printing?

Great content! Been thinking about making this kind of business, but don't want to be stuck inside having to watch while all the orders finish. Do you talk about automation in your ebook ? I would expect that early on, yes, I would be stuck inside but later on I can automate it by hiring someone to watch it for me throughout the day

Man-tanence !

What printer u recommend

I think the sidewinders and geniuses are the best with very little mods

Great Video...subbed

I'm thinking of building 3d printer

This is the way. And not the way

how does this businessman know how to 3D printing? /s Great content jk

Great vid, I'm looking to move to Russia with my wife and build a 3d printing farm. So this is very helpful.

;)

Your intro was way too loud! 🙈 thanks for the tips tho

Pitty all webites busines services went down over 12 months ago and are yet to resume. Nobody can buy nor sell any 3d print license. In short you cant sell your own business. Poor newbs inventing and uploading but cant sell out.