Hello All,
I have been a fan of Bambu Labs since the early days, that is until recently. I have more than 4,000 hours on my X1C, having bought one of the first to be sold. What precision, what joy, what a great functioning machine. The best at its price point. However, as a product manufacturer myself, having a great price, great functioning machine is only two thirds of what makes a product great. The remaining third is all about servicing. That is where Bambu Labs drove off a cliff, and crashed on the rocks below. I’ll explain…this machine was developed and manufactured in China, which has become 'the world’s factory. I have nothing but respect for its people, their hard work and the ambition that is the driving force propelling their great accomplishments. But Bambu Labs has some serious flaw, flaws I have brought to their attention, flaws that they have turned a deaf ear to, which is an adult phrasing that means they won’t listen. Assuming that the western market is a good chunk of their global market, they have made two serious mistakes. First, the design flaw I will get to momentarily. Second, one this flaw was brought to their attention, they did not correct. 4,000 hours is a lot for any machine; its expected that parts will wear out, break, or both. As users, we are told to consult the Wiki; a great place with video instruction, clarifying information, you name it. But their are fundamental differences between East and West, that cause problems; in short, Americans generally have larger hands than Asians. This isn’t ignorance talking. I discussed this with my Chinese-American friends, and the consensus is, that if you are gonna work on these machines, you need slender fingers, I’m not overweight, not a bit, but working 1.5 mm screws in spaces in which you have to turn the machine sideways and hang upside down to remove/install some of the important parts. Its also extremely hard lining up screw holes for installation/assembly and there is no room at all to eyeball it. The plug behind the TH9 motherboard, for instance. The Wiki is good info, but toss the instructions. The best way to replace the TH9 boards, with/without a new micro lidar is to remove the front and back of the toolhead and carefully insert the lidar plugs into the TH9 mother board, THEN put the boards into place and screw both boards down, Next, insert the remaining plugs into the respective sockets. Oh, yea, screwing the boards onto the tool head is not overly difficult. But working 1.5 mm screws into the toolhead’s receiving holes??? That is no 10 minute job. I spent hours trying to line up holes, and used a lot of words not suitable around children. Here’s how I did it: assemble side and rear toolhead covers, placing them into position on the toolhead. Next, unless you have three hands (forget it, there’s no room for a third hand in the square space, with the glass top off.), use zip ties to hold the rear and side parts of the toolhead cover together, in place. Next, while you can see the holes in the toolhead cover, you cannot see the underlying holes that the screw anchor into. I have a gooseneck inspection device with a lit optic cable feeding an image onto a monitor.
Now, going on would just be ranting. Bambu expects its user to do all maintenance and repairs, and be competent service technicians. HA! I say Bambu needs to construct this machine so you can 1. See what you are doing, and 2. Have parts larger than 1.5mm. I took physics and quantum mechanics in school, not shop class. ARE YOU LISTENING, BAMBU LABS???
The point I’m making - fan worship isn’t warranted by any manufacturer of anything… it is all just stuff. But, Bambulab pulled off quite a feat with their stuff – even if some things are fiddly to repair.