Is The Snapmaker J1 The Ultimate IDEX Experience? 

Heyo! Just gonna throw out some random information as to why Snapmaker came out with the J1. The J1 started out as a kickstarter from a small team that use to work for Snapmaker but they left to start up something on their own. The J1 was originally named the Jadelabo J1. Kickstarter was a success but the team decided it needed more time to redesign some crucial areas for the J1 (moving touchscreen to different location, better design for the structure of the heated bed, the entire chassis being casted instead of several separate pieces that had to be put together by the Jadelabo team, etc). Once they were at the tail end of these big changes, they had to reach out to Snapmaker to see if they would like to get together and sell this printer under Snapmaker. Hence the odd product of the IDEX J1 in the lineup of the other Snapmaker products. Hopefully this was helpful/interesting in some way!

the amount of thought that went into designing and programming the offset calibration is incredible. the lack of thought that went into the filament holder/reload is also incredible, but for other reasons. they made a one time set up so incredibly simple, but a more regular task much more complex

Another plea for a long term follow up! This looks like the best game in town for IDEX. Also... Mixed... Comments out there about it though. I'm really impressed by Bambu and wish they'd make a multi head printer. I just have zero interest in the time and material waste of their AMUs though, for all their absolute Chad strengths.

I definitely agree with the spool location. Internal spools could also use the enclosure to keep the materials optimal. Theres even room to store spares. I'd have included the option to load from the front, or to have the sides hinge open...

Thanks for this great review. I've been eying a IDEX for some time, including this one. Looking forward to more content on the J1.

brilliant review, super throrough and technical. Earned an instant subscribe

Interesting printer Looking great 👍 Thanks for sharing your expirence with all of us 👍

The legacy Craftbot 3 and flow had some of those unique features. But those calibrations are great and the right Z screw is awesome.

i just started using my J1 for bout a week, which ive had it since January 2023. Went through the software which comes with it. learning as i go.. which i wanted to learn more about Prusa u mentioned. My kids are in Robotics class now and they using Tinkercad. The wife option of sending the G code is awesome very helpful. Thank you for this video..looking for more info on J1 and videos tutorials😊

I really dig the bed leveling thats really nice.

Great review, I was hoping to see more information on how it handles parking of the nozzles, how it handles seepage and wiping, and if it can do flex filament or not. (especially flex and non flex multi material printing)

That auto-calibration setup is as ingenious as it is simple. A custom PCB with an alligator clip hooked to the hotend could add such functionality to most any dual extrusion printer, with just a little more work (but a lot less than measuring prints!)

I've seen a couple of different J1 reviews and they've impressed me quite a lot. I had been planning on getting a Sovol SV04, but after having spent time in the SV04 user's group on Facebook it is a machine that can be a real struggle to get running and keep running...as someone who has traditionally been a fan of budget Chinese printers, I think the J1 is so much better than the SV04 that I'd be willing to pay a premium price up front to make the user experience much more palatable. Of the biggest gripes I can see regarding the printer, most seem to have already been addressed by the community (nozzles and spool holders), could be fixed with a little ingenuity (gaskets for the doors and a secondary build plate cooling fan for printing PLA or printing at high speeds), or shouldn't be too troublesome for Snapmaker to help with (spare parts sales). The only one that puts a damper on the printer for me is the size - in copy and mirror modes, it's basically like sticking two Ender 2 Pros together in terms of bed spacing. Then again, that's a problem with any IDEX printer and even the SV04's larger total print volume ends up being more restrictive on X in mirror mode (at only 115 mm vs. the J1's 150 mm) due to the size of the hot ends. If I end up getting a J1, I don't feel like I'd be able to use it to replace my existing 300x300 mm printer (Artillery Sidewinder X1) due to the size limitations. But I definitely could see the J1 replacing my modified Ender 3 as the daily driver, especially as 3D Print General's review found that the ambient chamber temperature still reached 50˚C even with the gaps in the doors.

Great video! J1 is receiving scarce coverage only while MK4 and X1C are hot and all, so I appreciate you cover this machine. It seems this is the first non-tinkering IDEX so far. I'd like to see dual material prints with PLA support on PETG parts. That'd be awesome!

For the European residents: the price is 1579 € incl. shipping and taxes.

Actually glad someone did a video on this. If i wasnt going to build my own printers this is probably as close as the market offers to something id want. Would like it a whole lot better if it had a 3 independent motor Z. As far as the surprise, technically snapmaker didnt design this machine. It was formerly known as the Jadelabo J1 and was on kickstarter. Not entirely sure but they talk about their "return" to Snapmaker.

This is *almost* a printer I want to have. To be clear, I'm firmly in the "I don't want to fiddle with it, I just want it to work" camp of 3d printing. I'm more worried about accuracy than speed, but lately I've been printing a lot of many-copies-of-a-small-thing jobs, so an IDEX would actually be useful for me. But this printer just isn't quite there. The lack of sealing on the enclosure is the biggest problem. The lack of automatic tramming is the other. I just don't trust those screw knobs to hold position. Not in my home, anyway. And since the printer doesn't check the tramming before each job, the only way I'm really going to know if something slipped is a failed print job. The PITA loading process is just icing on the cake. The hotend design isn't a big deal for me. I quite like the quick-in/quick-out design. I'd be happier if the hotends used a single-piece nozzle-and-throat like Revo/Bambu/Prusa XL, but since I'd end up treating them as a single component most of the time it's not that big a deal, as long as everything is set up properly from factory. Now, I'm not really in a position to be buying another printer anyway. But if I was, I'd *almost* buy this. Set it up with a good, pressure-sensor based ABL system, clean up the loading process, and make the enclosure mostly airtight and ideally double-hulled for insulation, and I'd start saving my pennies.

Wow a new printer review without mentioning Bambu. Congrats to that lol no but good review. I am very tempted with this machine but would love to see some dissolvable supports with some ASA or some higher temperature filaments.

@3:24 the facebook group already has answers to this - the ribbon cables break easily. it's a common failure mode of these printers currently.

J1s is 1000 rn, which is tempting is just a bit small for a print bed

Seems like a decent printer, and the print quality looks really good. Only thing I see is that it might need is some resonance tuning because I see a lot of artifacts from vibrations.

Back in 2020 there were quite a few IDEX machines around but none were IMO good enough, I thought within 6 months to a year we would see a definitive IDEX printer on the market, this never happened. One issue in the old IDEX machines was the choice of a single part cooling duct, Snapmaker have not addressed this issue. This is not the definitive IDEX printer I have desired, if Bamboo Lab released one with AMS capabilites I would jump on one straight away.

Thanks for the video. I am patiently waiting for my J1 to arrive. BTW, how did you print the Red, Blue and white vase with only two heads? Did you somehow swap the White.for Red while the Blue was printing? Thanks.

This with a Bambu like ams would be very cool. One nozzle loading a new color while the first is printing. No wait that the Bambu has.

The history of this printer is rather strange. It started as the Jadelabo J1 that was created by some people who left Snapmaker and launched on Kickstarter. Somehow they get back together with their ex, and got merged back in to Snapmaker. The dual nozzle calibration is very similar to the one on the Craftbot Flow IDEX series. In the Craftbot, you turn the magnetic build plate upside down and the nozzles probe on to the surface for z and inner edge of circular holes for x/y. Spring contacts touch the back of the plate to allow the electrical continuity measurement. In the Craftbot case, the calibration is completely automatic. It also has the spools on the back!

I’d love to see you try to print 2 different colors of TPU

Fun fact: the J1 is not Snapmaker’s design. It was made by Jadelabo as a kickstarter, and at some point, snapmaker acquired the design

Thanks for this great review. What I would like to know: how loud is this machine?

I just purchased this 3d printer. This is my first machine ..I have no experience in this hobby. Only many ideas of what I plan to print. Hope I can learn quickly and it won't be to hard to figure out the software.

I'm looking to upgrade my current printer and was previously set on the X1 Carbon. The ability to do multi-color prints without so much was is really attractive. I'd be curious on your opinion on how they compare. Do you anticipate testing with different materials in your later evaluations? Thanks

very good

If you just knew someone who could design and model a spacer for the lid, and incorporate spool holders in it, you could have somebody with a 3D printer print up some parts to mod your printer. Could even do that with some door seals.

It could use a custom part-fan duct for more 360 flow

Have you printed much with softer TPU material? I need to print a bunch of parts using Cheetah TPU and a lot of extruders struggle with it.

A couple things: I purchased a J1S, and I had some luck printing PLA on it, but I’m running into problems printing, PETG. I didn’t know if you had speed/temp/flow settings that you could share for PETG. Main Brand is IC3D’s RPETG. Also using poly maker, and California filaments. The other issue was I went to your Patreon site to sign up to ask this question but it appears to be somewhat inactive. Do you have another platform where I could sign up where it would be active?

The electric bed leveling and alignment is simply the best in the industry. Like that is the best I have seen. I want a dual extruder printer myself. Putin the filament on the back though is one of the worst decisions that printer makers regularly make. It's awful and it means that instead of just handling filament you have to wrestle the whole printer just to swap colors. Frankly it is stupid. It really should have a more well sealed enclosure. Idk. The best offerings still don't fully measure up to like my standards but it's almost always because they completely screw up at the smallest details. Like the fit and finish are things that really matter.

I don't know if I got very unlucky or if you got lucky. My J1 couldn't bed level reliably at all. Every time it went down and touched the contact point the indicator bounced back and forth - never (okay one time it did) actually settling in a specific location. Immediately re-running the bed leveling process back-to-back gave vastly different results each time. I ended up giving up and returning it. A lot of prints came out okay but not perfect regardless but regardless of slicer used (theirs luban? or cura w/their plugin) it always missed extrusion on initial layer circles (to be used for screw holes). Tried changing multiple settings in either and it just refused to print them properly. Hoping I just had a lemon.

Could this compete with the X1 Carbon? I'm between these two printers and I don't know which one to choose, I just want a printer that works for prototyping with materials like abs and Nylon, also being able to produce and sell some prints, so basically a tool.

Please review the build volume and if is affected by the mode (copy, mirror, single object).

Really wish they would have made this the 400cube like the artisan.

i wish other single extruder machines would use this method of bed leveling along with ABL sensors. Having the ability to close the gap and adjust as needed then let the abl work out the variances of the bed itself would be huge. Like with the Sovol SV06 and SV06+ not having a way to manualy level the bed in order to fix the issues with the firmware and ABL. Also adding a main bed fan like the K1 or P1P/X1C would help out a lot seein its core xy the extruders and printing layer doesnt change the bed height does a main fan would help out. And quick question isnt a reverse bowden set up just direct drive with a bowden tube?

Looks like the "Bambu Lab" printer for dual extruder printing. Of course it's not a bambu lab clone or anything, different kinda printers. But if Bambu Lab made an IDEX printer it would probably look similar to this one.

On another note... do you know how to delete the print history on the Sonic Pad? I cannot figure this one out. Thanks.

I was almost sold until the 3mm gap in the front door was a thing. I print alot of ABS.

thinking about bambu release X2 IDEX printer and each extrusion connected to an AMS

Is the bedframe in plastic? Because that will bend over time acc to my experience. How does it compare to the Flashforge Creator 3?

Good review but i did not see any info on how does it cleans the nozzle between color changes.

Are there clogging problems? I'm gonna buy it but have doubts...

Any updates on the J1? I see in the main Facebook group people are having lots of clogging and hotend issues.

The coverage for Snapmaker printers has always been limited here on RU-vid. Not sure if it’s the price, the print quality or what? I’ve owned an A-350 for years and it has served well, but the J1 may be my new purchase. I was considering the Bambu until I saw this.

Are you (or anyone) familiar with the Snapmaker 2.0 A350 with the dual extruder module? I have a quick question. With a Snapmaker 2.0 A350 with a dual extruder, are you able to pause the machine and switch 1 of the filaments and resume the print?

❤❤❤

Damn shame for that filament inconvenience. can you imagine having a clog and having to move the entire thing to troubleshoot it.

Wish the sample prints have random distribution of the two filaments, highlighting the efficiency of filament usage compared to frequent purging. Also, nowhere there is mention of ability to print two different models(seems to be due to lack of cpu oomph) at the same time. Does printing two different materials mean, it should be possible in theory? If it could, will definitely outcompete Bambulabs without a doubt. Just some 💭❤️👍

The gap is probably intentional, you should be able to print abs just fine like that

I don't know if anybody could help me with this but, when I print something with their program Luban on the Snapmaker everything works fine, but when I use prusaslicer which I want to switch to as it has more possibilities for saving & importing I am having clogging issues. I tried copying all the settings as good as possible that I used before, but it still doesn't want to work. Any help would be highly appreciated

Although my device is 2 weeks old, ASA and ABS filaments do not stick to the tray, what should I do?

snapmaker j1 or bambulab x1 carbon?

How do you not blow circuit breakers daily with all these printers I own 11 and I am scared to run them on my non dedicated 20 amp circuit breaker and I only run 3 on it

Is better than Raise 3D printer?

Wow, I was expecting this to be like 1.5x the price

You didn't have issues with clogging? Not even temporary clogging aka the clicking sound from the extruder that occasionally goes away by itself but leaves underextrusion while it was present? You had no issues with bad walls due to uneven extrusion? You have not experienced layer shifts? Really???? I honor you've mentioned the suboptimal single-sided parts cooling and the bad bowden tube routing with the sharp bend on top of the print heads. The very few other J1 reviews I've seen so far have not even mentioned these. Without heavy modifications of the hotend (exchanging heatbreak), part fan and installing a top panel riser for better boden tube routing this printer is not reliable. The fact that your promised videos about your additional ideas for testing the J1 never showed up makes me believe, you meanwhile ran into those problems with your J1. 😉

The problem with the J1 is SPEEEEED... or the lack of it... for $1300 it should be much faster than it is....

$1300? Ok. I can get 3 Sovol SV04s for that.

Bed leveling wheels on springs? NOPENOPENOPENOPENOPENOPENOPENOPENOPENOPE

If you don't like to fiddle, upgrade parts, do "mods", constantly battle with clogging, and expect that you can actually print with reinforced nylon or anything other than PLA then this printer is not for you. I have had this machine for 6 months and it is nothing but a disappointing headache. Besides all of the thrown away material and time wasted, it has been broken down for a month now because they don't have the replacement part I need in stock. They do, however, have parts to build new machines. Don't make the same mistake. Get an X1C so you will have an actual usable machine that works right out of the box.

why is it 1300 usd but 1700€ 🤷‍♂️🤷‍♂️🤷‍♂️

Oh Great another pro machine which only costs as much as a top end Bamboo X1 Carbon. Well, that's get for the rich users out there! For the rest of us users it be only a dream again. Seems more and more printers are going down to route of only rich users can buy them! Like Prusa's etc. Good if you got tons of time and money. Not so for the rest of us.

I have had nothin but issues with my machines. The poor print head design and QC causes clogs all the time. The printer is currently unusable

1600€ for germans 🤪👎

You can tell a RU-vidr has watched _WAY_ too much YT if they say, "without further adieu" and/or "with that being said". 🙄

Shame on you for not mentioning the *Build Volume Dimensions.* Shame!

bro why you always making gay ass dragons?

Die cast frame?😂 Id doubt they'd cast the frame. Its probably aluminum extrusion profile. Something must have been lost in translation