I’m just wondering if anyone has an image of a bambu lab calibration cube they’ve printed on their A1? I’m having some bad banding issues with my new X1C and I’m thinking of just getting a refund and getting the A1 instead. I was debating these two when I ordered the X1 but the enclosure for both the printer and AMS swayed it. However, if the A1 prints as bad as my X1, then I may just give the whole thing up as bad job and keep my Ender 3.
Here’s the print from my X1C, as you can see not exactly the best.
I don’t have a full size A1 but I have the mini. Here’s a comparison between the A1 Mini, P1S (upgraded from a P1P) and the X1C. The X1C and P1S are around 2 years old and the A1 Mini is a couple of months old. These were all done with the 0.20 standard profile and a .4 nozzle. Now the P1S and the X1C both have the Panda Revo hotend but I don’t think it makes a difference.
You are giving me some thoughts about me going into the x1c from what i see in those pictures. The x1c cube is way worse and the best one is the one printed on the mini from what i can see.
How’s the accuracy on all those printers in relation to the cube?
They are all about around .02mm to .05mm off but my calipers cost $20 so you can take those measurements with a grain of salt You’re definitely right about the quality… now have I ever re-tensioned the belts? No. Have I ever cleaned the carbon rods? No. I’ve greased the lead screws pretty regularly but not much else. So after two years maybe I could make them better?
Many thanks for taking the time to upload those images, I really appreciate it.
On one side I’m more confused, but on the other much more assured.
My X1c has near perfect layer lines, but the most horrendous VFA’s. On yours I don’t see any VFA’s at all (obviously the colour could be helping here) but your layer lines are worse than mine. I don’t have the confidence in getting a replacement
For the A1 I don’t see the VFA’s again and the layers are much better, so if I do choose this route I’m more assured it could be okay. Especially when you consider a mini is £169 and an X1c is £919. That’s 5 minis for the same price as one X1.
No problem, I’m happy to help. So it was really hard to get a good representation in the pictures… and I agree with you and Square3d that the X1C is the worst but in person the layer lines on all three aren’t really noticeable to the naked eye. The one printed by the X1C has some flaws but for the most part is still acceptable. It seriously makes me want to re-tension the belts and clean the carbon rods and see if I can make them all look the same lol. The belts will be hard because I have to move the whole printer to get behind it and it’s in a tight spot. Having said all that you can’t go wrong with the A1 or the A1 Mini, especially at these prices. Do you ever need to print ABS or any of the hotter or toxic filaments?
No I don’t. The X1C really is too much printer for me, but I wanted it for the enclosed nature of it. I didn’t like my Ender as everything is exposed, it looks scruffy, it suffers with dust ingress, and the filament is out in the open, etc. All this led me to the P1s or the X1, I knew if I bought the P1S I’d wish I’d just bought the X1 so that narrowed it down for me. It was a treat to myself and a one time deal, knowing full well I would not get as much use out of it as the cost would suggest, but I also expected that when I did want to print something it would be easy and just work.
Imagine my disappointment with the sub par performance and rather excessive noise it makes while printing. The VFA’s on my example are frankly shocking, see here for the full story New X1C acceptable banding?, and I’m not able to use it late at night when I could happily run my Ender. 3 days in and the aux fan is also now vibrating to annoy me more. It does look nice though, so at least it ticks one of my boxes.
I missed that whole thread somehow. Yeah, those pics do not look normal. I hear you regarding the Ender, I have several Neptune 3 and 4s sitting around mostly collecting dust lol. If you don’t need the heat and filtration you would definitely do great with one of the A1s.
I’m not by my printer so I can’t check the actual version number, but it is definitely the latest one. I kept checking until no more updates were available, so I’d guess the same as yours.
The motors are quiet so the cancellation did it’s job. The fans are loud but running the part cooling at 90%, the aux fan at 30-40% and the chamber fan at 50% helped a lot and doesn’t affect performance, as in I can’t see any difference between that and stock setting other than the ringing in my ears is much less.
It’s the carriage that makes all the noise. I seem to get chatter/vibration from both axis (I’ve cleaned the carbon rods twice now, following the guidance to the letter, which did help a little) and it’s just generally noisy. That’s probably not describing it very well, there’s just more actual mechanical noise than I was expecting. I print with the door closed and the lid on which dampens the noise of the fans as well, so then I just hear the carriage moving. I think it’s probably just the travel accelerations, as in the start stops that makes all the noise. I’ve taken a few videos to highlight the noises which I’ve sent with the support ticket but I don’t have anywhere to upload them to, and I think most would just point out the fan noise anyway, for some reason the noises I hear are worse in person than on my phone.
I did further testing yesterday. I tried the bambu generic pla and generic high flow filament profiles hoping it was something in the eSun profile, but the cube actually came out worse. I then ran a max flow test in orca slicer just to check my filament was able to keep up. I used the default 5-20mm and it passed that with flying colours, but even here the VFA is quite prominent.
Thanks for reporting back . Indeed, it was a very low probability off-chance that led me to my question on the firmware. There was a recent case where update issues led to the printer claiming it was on the latest firmware when in truth it had not updated at all as was visible by comparing versions.
But what you are reporting really does indicate that there is something seriously wrong with the mechanics and either a replacement or a refund do sound like your best bets
Overall, the X1’s seem to be quite reliable and good. My own X1 is just 2 days short of the 2,000h mark but I have seen other users report up to 4,000h on theirs.
But I can attest that there are lemons out there, too. My first X1 got teething problems at around 1,500h and blew its mainboard just short of the 1,800h mark. I was fortunate in getting a replacement under warranty.
I do hope that support is able to find a solution that is workable for you. In my experience with support, I found it important to clearly spell out what I wanted (i.e. replacement under warranty or refund) while of course holding my temper in check (as difficult as that can be in the circumstances).
Certainly looks a lot better than mine. I think I can maybe see some slight lines in the first image, but that could just be the light or the colour. Regardless it’s nowhere near the problems I’m having and I’d be very happy with those especially at 125%.
I have a similar issue, albeit mine doesn’t appear nearly as bad as yours (although this could be just your lighting/angles).
Firstly, I would consider trying to tighten the belts and clean the carbon rods, especially if you plan on talking to support about this. These are the basic steps for VFA issues and the easiest cause to address; if you’re lucky, doing these could fix your problems and again, they’re very easy to do. Here’s a guide as per the wiki that has instructions and a video on how to do both.
Secondly, if you’re able to, try a different filament. There’s a small possibility this could be a filament issue rather than a hardware issue.
That’s really all I can suggest. I’m far from an expert on this- but I’ve been trying to fix this myself and those are troubleshooting steps certainly worth trying.
I have an A1 and a P1S. That being said, I’m actually currently printing these cubes on both in order to see if my problem is an issue with hardware, or if it’s an issue with the way the model slices. So, once both are done, I’ll update you with pictures of how my A1 printed it in similar black filament.
I’ve actually got two threads going, one about the actual issues on the X1 and this one comparing the two in case I go for an A1 instead.
The printer is just 1 week old and i have now cleaned the carbon rods 3 times (I even bought a new bottle of ISO 99.9% just to make sure it was working properly) and re-tightened the belts the same number of times. I even then tried my best to get the belts running centrally on the pulleys. I’m currently ongoing with a support ticket and the issues are showing on their test model. I’ve tried a few different filaments and different settings and it’s still there, it’s just it shows up the best on this black pla, but it’s visible on them all. Looking back to the very first print I did, the usual benchy, it’s actually on there as well. So this is a sliced model on the internal storage, ruling out slicer issues.
Hopefully you’ll be able to show me that your P1S prints it perfectly so I know they are able to print it well.
Did you manage to run the tests on both? Just curious how they turned out. I’ve requested a refund on my X1C, so interested in how the A1 prints compared to the others.
My A1 produces horrible prints no matter if PETG or PLA is used. Currently haggling with support, who is convincing me all issues are caused by wet filament.
You’re definitely right about the quality… now have I ever re-tensioned the belts? No. Have I ever cleaned the carbon rods? No. I’ve greased the lead screws pretty regularly but not much else. So after two years maybe I could make them better?
I then ran a max flow test in orca slicer just to check my filament was able to keep up. I used the default 5-20mm and it passed that with flying colours, but even here the VFA is quite prominent.
. Indeed, it was a very low probability off-chance that led me to my question on the firmware. There was a recent case where update issues led to the printer claiming it was on the latest firmware when in truth it had not updated at all as was visible by comparing versions.
