To be clear, there seem to be 2 kinds of anti-vibration. There’s whatever came with my stock X1C, and I’m assuming (?) it’s the same as what’s currently for sale in the bambulab store:
and then there is the voxelpla version, which claims to be superior:
I would love to hear what someone who’s actually purchased one of these thinks. Until then, it looks like another overengineered gimmick to be honest. At $13, it’s not much of a risk though. I got the feet from Bambu and they did not help or hurt, the just fit poorly and ended up falling off each time I tried to move the printer so I got rid of them.
Although I am not an expert in vibrational analysis, from my experience in creating systems meant to withstand vibrational harmonics onboard moving vehicles for the military, there are two schools of thought. That being, vibration attenuation which these feet seem to try to accomplish and then there is vibrational isolation.
We discussed some of this in another thread not too long ago.
Since that thread, I’ve stumbled across a number of solutions that appear much easier to implement using squash balls.
The first ones are useless, they are unstable and when you push the printer then these feets pop out of the holes. The other ones I don’t have experience with.
Just wanted to hop in to clarify. VOXELPLA and voxelab are 2 different companies. VOXELPLA is located in California and the other is located in china.
Thanks for the correction! I just now went back and edited the name reference to be your (the right) way.
Or almost 
Print these: HULA Anti-Vibration Feet for 3D Printers by thrutheframe - MakerWorld, equip with the appropriate bearings, install and send a few more than very well deserved Boost’s to @thrutheframe like I did. They do indeed work 
When I stumbled across this thread: Anti-vibration feet and misconceptions (Vibration Tip), I remembered my past studies in Sound and Vibration and enjoyed being able to share some background 
However, I also wanted to play around a bit. In particular looking at the difference between Vibration Isolators and Vibration Absorbers. So as a quick experiment and - not being much of a designer - being able to try out a contribution to MakerWorld, I made these: Anti-Vibration Pad Mk I by EnoTheThracian - MakerWorld. DO NOT print these for anything permanent. Unless of course you do just want to play around a bit. You can indeed make a true vibration absorber that way.
I had planned to take that work a bit further, but then ran into long lasting issues with my X1C. They were only solved by a replacement machine. But that is another long and painful story of endorphine withdrawal (fortunately almost fully and completely over now).
When it transpired that a replacement machine would come soon, I stumbled across the HULA … and was electrified 
. Extremely well thought out, just as complex as needed with every likely overcomplication removed! Kudos to @thrutheframe for this work . I would not have gotten anywhere near that 
.
Even though they are quite effective, there may be further tweaking opportunities:
No further smoothing work required .=> I’d love to, at some point in the future, have a the chance to calculate the spring stiffnesses to use 8 HULA’s with modified springs (4 with ~5% increased k, 4 with ~5% decreased k) in order turn those Vibration Isolators into a single Vibration Absorber. And maybe remodel the height a bit to limit the printers height when sitting on it. Alas, it’ll be (quite) a while. My X1C failure led to 5 months of print idea backlog growing into a mountain. And a lot of that requires my extremely limited design capabilities… But maybe @thrutheframe or another fellow enjoys the experiment?
And a final, only moderately related thing I had wanted to say for a couple of weeks: @Olias : Many thanks for your initial Onshape recommendation in some post in 2023 . Starting to learn it by doing now. Already further in my design capabilities after a handful of hours than after years of bumbling around with FreeCAD .
I think these things are mostly “snake oil”. They “decouple” the printer from whatever the printer is sitting on. For sure, that’s going to reduce how much vibration is transferred from the printer to that surface. So maybe the printer sounds quieter. But in doing this, it reduces the “solidity” of the printer’s connection to the surface it’s sitting on. The printer actually moves around more.
By way of an extreme example, consider “anti-vibration feet” made of really soft silicone rubber. The printer would wobble around like crazy as the print head moved back and forth. The printer’s motion system can’t compensate for that added motion. The soft mounts behave like springs, they have “wind up”, energy driven back in to the system when the force that caused the mount to compress is relieved. Printhead stops moving, soft isolation feet unload and shove the printer a little in the opposite direction.
If you want to maximize print quality, IMO the right answer is to bolt the printer to something really, really heavy (and if you want to overkill it, put something really heavy on top of the printer, too). Then, the only motions the system has to compensate for are the resonances of the mechanics, which is what it calibrates for during setup…
Now, maybe if you had the printer on something that was vibrating like crazy, the feet would help. But the better solution is to move away from the vibration source, or if it’s the printer itself, get a more “rigid” table.
My printer sits on a very stout table, both were used on that table with the same file, same settings, same nozzle and plate as well as filament.
I use the bambu lab feet and really only notice any difference in the vibrations translated to the table the printer is on. I haven’t had any issues with them affecting the print. To avoid them falling out when moving the printer I simply glued them in.
I printed the ones sold by VoxelPLA and built them to direction. Used recommended bearings, and printed in PETG. I did get artifacts that went away after switching back. I cannot reproduce the issues, weird layer issues (some seperation, some looked like over extrusion) since going back. All variables were the same other than the feet. They’re neat looking, but the movement is so stiff that all vibration was transferred to the table.
The file does print well though.
Yep. On all of these points. Except perhaps the snake oil. The purpose is not primarily the print quality but the vibration isolation in order to reduce transferred vibrations.
Yes, but…
… why not? Relevant for the print quality is the relative frequency response between the print-head and the print-bed. By “taking away” the constraints (i.e. the feet), the system does not become more non-linear or dynamic. It is simply decoupled from the surface in the frequency range determined by weight and spring stiffness which is ideally the most troublesome Eigenfrequency. This drastically reduces printer internal, non-linear, peak bending moments. So the print-head to print-head Frequency Response Function becomes less non-linear.
Only for a high spring stiffness. If the spring stiffness is too low, it does not do much. Foam will work to some extent though but mainly due to the high impedance mismatch rather than being a dynamic system. However, springs for either a dynamic vibration isolation or a dynamic vibration absorption should to be tuned to the troublesome eigenfrequency of the system.
Mass is indeed the (!!!) quick and easy go-to solution when looking at vibration reduction. The why and how is explained in more detail in the links I provided in the long answer.
But that does not need to be an excuse not to play around with other aspects and solutions 
As I remember, the basic rules of thumb are:
This also shows why Bambus 01.07 update introducing the sound & vibration control was so effective. It combines points 1. and 5. while relying completely on existing parts. Only software. So there’s no actual additional recurrent cost. A really nice and effective solution in my opinion
To be honest, I am perfectly OK with the stock feet on a sturdy table with the current Firmware including active vibration control (and maybe a concrete slab ).
But I do love to play around with physics almost as much as I enjoy other people showing their skills in such a noticeable and effective way as @thrutheframe
Strange, I did get the very good movement of the printer out of them against the table. Of course, if they were stiff/stuck, there would be no good effect.
I can accept my print may have been faulty, although I can’t see where. I have no issues with other tolerance parts printed. Anything can happen and human error (especially me) is usually the first cause.
Thanks for the bit about the Active Control System (ACS) of the EH101 Merlin. I’m now in a rabbit hole on an old forum. I mean that, love getting lost in something I wouldn’t normally read about.
Nah, I think we are all in a similar boat here. To me, 3D printing is a matter of failing until I have altered my expectations to a level that I can achieve (and still be proud of it)
My pleasure 
That lecturer was quite a character. The other story I still remember after over 2 decades is the Lynx’s maiden flight. Apparently 100’s were watching the rotor spin up … until a loud “clang” boomed across the field. He had never seen so many grown up’s hit the dirt so quickly…
It left an impression because he had us calculate the kinetic energy of a spinning blade beforehand 
There is a possibility that the TPU you used is stiffer than ours. We have discovered that some 95A TPU are stiffer than 95A.
Do you have any photos of test prints that show the before-after difference of upgrading to your feet? As the saying goes, the proof of the pudding is in the taste.
Next time your printer is printing, randomly bump it on the side while the job is running. See if that has an effect on the print quality.
The energy returned when the system unloads excites resonances that aren’t well correlated to what the motion system is doing. The resonance calibration can’t help, it looks like random input.
It’d be different if this was a servo control system, but it’s open-loop stepper.
Your experience with vibration seems to be more towards heavy equipment. Mine is digital servo control. Precision positioning systems. But I am in no way an expert on the subject. I managed people who were experts. 
That’s brilliant! I’m going to steal that phrase if you don’t mind. 
Entirely possible. I know it’s 95A but I can’t remember the maker. I did dry for around 10hrs before using.
I didn’t save the prints. Never thought I’d need them, kinda didn’t think I’d be discussing them.
Either way, it’s just my observations and not meant to be an authority statement on their usefulness. As always YMMV
I just saw this post and I wish to take this opportunity to share the back story of my journey for HULA.
My X1C and P1P (both with AMS on top) were placed on an Ikea 140x65cm study table. When both were printing, the table started to shake a lot especially when hitting those infills. So I decided to try some anti-vibration feet that BL sells and printed feet with squash balls. While my table did not vibrate as badly as before, both printers were wobbling, and being top-heavy with the AMS, I was not very confident with the setup.
So I decided to design a set of dampener feet that:
I managed to solve the decoupling requirement using a thrust bearing with the smooth side facing the ball bearings. This provided an omnidirectional movement of around 3mm.
EVA foam was initially used as dampening material at the start but it deformed after some time. Silicone moulding was not an option because it was messy to work with and efficiency is dependent on how it’s mixed, degas, poured and cured. I wanted something printable, hence TPU was tried and tested.
Designing HULA and its dampener took a long time (this project started in 2023).Tested with several different combos; P1P, P1P+Arc enclosure+AMS, X1C, X1C with AMS and subsequently, with A1mini and A1. Friends helped test fitting with Prusa, Creality and Voron printers and provided valuable feedback to improve the prototype. To make it a maker’s project, a lot of considerations were taken. ie user guide, printability, dampeners hardness, even fasteners. For example, the initial design uses M3 brass inserts, but I was advised to use M3 nuts as not everyone is comfortable using a soldering iron.
There are many approaches to anti-vibration dampening and HULA is by no means a one-size-fits-all solution to vibration management. When making HULA into a maker’s project, I realised I jumped into a rabbit hole. There are so many variables in play, making dampening requirements different and unique for each individual. I have yet to come out of that hole because there is always room for improvement for more efficient/effective updates and I am on it. Thank you all for the feedback, it guides me and allows me to learn more to improve my designs.
Aha. So, surely, you have before-after photos then?
From a certain point of view, just having feet that don’t fall off would be an improvement, so from that perspective the bar for success is pretty low. But if on top of that it could demonstrate improved prints, it seems like it could be a winner.
Hi @NeverDie
Not sure whom the comment was addressed at. In my case, I did not print the HULA to improve print quality. I doubt I’d actually be able to see a difference as the X1C prints quite nicely with the stock feet already. And the issues that would be nice to improve for me are not not something the feet can do anything about (VFA’s, seam quality, warping/curling).
I just wanted the printer to be on my PC table without the printer rocking my camera during GMeet’s without having a concrete slab in my office. HULA’s work quite well for that as the video on the HULA page shows
I did however have one accidental test when printing overnight. The little one got up way early and remember the balloons we hid on a shelf above the printer. When climbing up on the table, she must have really rocked the boat. The running print was a bit delicate, but it completed without a mark. I like to imagine that the HULA’s had a part to play
As for the original feet, my replacement X1C arrived in May with the feet having been glued in. So the loose feet issue seems to have been addressed. And yes, they do rock my table much more than with the HULA’s. I expect they’d be really useful for somebody with multiple printers. Expecially with a concrete slab between the HULA’s and the printers. Foam works sufficiently, but HULA’s are more fun