So I didn’t need to buy a $50 hub to hook up my 2 AMS?
I just needed to print a PTFE manifold?
yup (25 characters blah blah blah)
So this is a blatant lie?:
Bambu Lab AMS - Automatic Material System
If you plan to connect multiple AMS units together, you will need to purchase the AMS Hub.
Well, I just did a search and see that I can answer my own question.
I wish I would have known this before I dropped the $50 on a hub.
It feels quite dishonest of BL to say “you will need to purchase a hub”
@Denidil Thank you for enlightening me.
It is when the answer is 16 + 8 = 24 + 1 external = 25.
Did you read the official answer from Bambu Lab that I provided in the official announcement video and materials?
It consists of 4 AMS units (AMS or AMS 2 Pro), 8 AMS HT units, and one external unit.
I did not find it in the link you provided, but I did read something somewhere about 16 + 8.
This is another scenario that just makes little sense from an end user perspective.
They advertise being able to print in 24 colors (ignoring the dual extruders) but to achieve that, the end user has to purchase (using current USD prices here) 4 AMS2 units (@ $349/device) and 8 AMS HT units (@ $149/device) for an “add on” total of $2,588 before tax and shipping.
Why the 8 HTs instead of 2 more AMS2s ?
The HTs seem kind of niche, advertised as " Specialized for
High-Performance Materials" and very unusual for the people looking to print something with 24 colors (99% of the time is PLA).
I think users looking to print in 24 colors would rather just be able to connect 6 AMS units… Cheaper and less fuss.
This is what I mean by the numbers just don’t make sense to me.
I agree with you, the idea of connecting 8 AMS HT units, designed for specialist materials, simultaneously is an almost impossible scenario to conceive yet.
I shudder to think of the first example.
They leave out the important “how are the AMS HT units physically connected to the device, we can guess, but that is it.
BTW, you needed to press the FAQ link.
I bought the 4-in-1 connectors that can be used in-place of the AMS, yet, I prefer the hub as it is convenient by being attached without considering how to mount it.
I agree it is misleading and at best disingenuous for BL to say you require a hub, which is full of electronics, unique ID numbers, which are redundant as some simple routing can replace it.
I have yet to mount the external spool adapter on any of my many P1S printers, but, when I do, I will put the 4-in-1 between the inlet so I can route multiple external input from my Sunlu S4 drier. I use my A1 mini for manual inputs like TPU 95A.
I have the new 90A & 85A which requires the glass lid removed which no external adapter will assist with.
I believe the 4-in-1 connector is a recent item (last year maybe). Before its release the hub was the only option Bambu offered. I too bought a hub when I ordered a 2nd AMS not knowing I could have gone with the connector for less cost. Wasn’t worth the hassle of trying to do a return though.
I think there is good reason to use the AMS Hub instead of the splitter. It has additional sensors at each inlet, so if filament gets stuck midway, it will detect it and throw a warning. With only the splitter, it will slam the next filament into the already inserted one. Possibly there are more errors that will be catched.
So as long as everything works as intended, you probably won’t see a difference, but if something goes wrong i think it is better to have the hub.
1 Like
Just out of curiosity: Is anyone planning to do prints with 24 colors? To me it feels like 16 is already far more than anybody would realistically want to use in a single print.
I added a second AMS for my X1C so that I have most filaments at hand with the click of a button instead of having to swap filaments all the time.
Under that light, having several AMS HT connected at the same time makes much more sense. One could be reserved for your PA12, the next for PPS-CF, then one for PET-CF.
You appear to have missed one of the points you go on to make.
You agree that the AMS is not always for using large numbers of filaments in a single print, but it is also beneficial for having filaments ready to use rather than in current use.
The other benefit of multiple AMS units is using spools of the same filament ready for redundancy in large or simply unattended prints to deal with end-of-spool runouts.
2 Likes
you only need one filament buffer. you don’t need the official hubs.
edit: oh nevermind i see you’ve already found it
yeah i got caught by that too, it’s not honest wording for sure.
got a citation for that [25char]
No citation, but you can see the electronics and with some electronics engineering background it is quite obvious. The corresponding circuitry that is once in the single inlet filament buffer exists four times in the AMS hub.
i hadn’t looked at the PCB in detail
It looks like the “AMS Hub” has 5 Hall effect sensors:
I am surprised the printer ignores the lack of feedback from these sensors when multiple AMSs are connected with an aftermarket filament manifold.
1 Like
I have a headache now with all the math lol…
So there are 4 colors per ams and then four ports on the hub. Total 16.
Then if you use the other extruder port with a 4 port hub, that only allows four more colors not 8.
not sure how to get the other
As I was saying not sure how to get 8 colors from a 4 port hub.
