I guess we both got printers that were in stock (production date on mine is March 2024) and the heatbed was factory replaced before shipping them out now in May. That’s probably how to explain the stains, scratches and the missing heatbed protective film they originally came with.
So, it should be fine. But…
Purchased 3 A1s end of January.
Recall announced so I returned two to Microcenter and replaced them with P1Ss. Kept one A1 and sent my claim for heatbed replacement on Feb 6th. Claim approved same day.
As of today, May 16th, I have not received my replacement heatbed or a shipping notice. My last two support ticket messages have gone unanswered for over 2 weeks now.
Microcenter has agreed to return my remaining A1. No voucher but a full refund. I am loathe to do this be 1. It’s BL problem, not Microcenter’s and 2. I want what I was promised.
To date I have spent in excess of $5000 on BL printers, filament and accessories. From Microcenter and BL direct. There will be no more.
For those considering BL…. Keep my experience in mind.
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For me it was done in 15 days . I have choose the refound option 1 . I had a coupon for postage . Sent the a1 . I sent them the copy of email when the post said the parcel was at destination . And 3 days after got the refound and voucher .
My friend have choose to change the bed . He Received the bed 15 days ago , he have sent 3 pictures of the printer and got voucher . The printer work ’very well .
Thank you BL
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I just received an email from microcenter today saying that they no longer are offering replacement heat bed due to Bambus compliance concerns. Here is the body of the e-mail I just received.
We would like to update you on the current status of your Bambu Lab A1 Combo Printer. We are working closely with Bambu Lab and we truly appreciate your patience and understanding as we resolve this issue.
Due to Bambu Lab’s compliance concerns, replacing the heatbed is no longer a feasible option. However, we have partnered with Bambu Lab to secure new printers and can offer you an exchange.
Here are the next steps:
· To ensure we have an adequate supply, we are reserving a new replacement Bambu Lab A1 Combo printer for you. Inventory will be arriving in all stores by the end of next week.
· We invite you to your local store to return your existing Bambu Lab A1 Combo printer. You can then apply those funds towards a new 3D printer or any other purchase of your choice.
Whether you choose to make a new purchase or simply complete the return, please rest assured that customers who registered for the replacement heatbed, will still receive the promised $120 Micro Center gift card. You can apply your gift card to a purchase the same day if you wish!
Thank you for your understanding and patience.We value your business and are committed to ensuring your satisfaction.
Thanks,
Albert
Now with all this said IF I lived close to a micro-center this appears to be a great deal. But I don’t, I purchased mine when I was in Dallas on business. It’s gonna be a 300+ mile trip one way.
While I admit the A1 is the best bedslinger I’ve ever had, it still suffers from bedslinger issues. I wish now I would have bought another p1s and called it a day. Now I’ve gone from sitting for months waiting on a replacement bed that microcenter was going to ship to me to now having to pack the thing up and make a trip into microcenter to exchange the printer. The onus is on Bambu lab to make this right, not microcenter. WTF does Bambu now have issues with people that purchased from microcenter changing the heat bed but customers that purchased from them are seemingly capable of performing the repairs. This is bulls**t. And up until this point I’ve been about as big a supporter of Bambu as most but this is in my opinion a black stain on them.
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because a few incompetent people complained it was too hard for them to do , i think bambu now are trying to find another solution. Glad i can do simple basic things it took less than an hour to complete with their simple instructions but i think they gave too much credit to the community thinking they were capable of doing the simple task. Mine has been up and running over a month now and i got my $120 voucher
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Well I know I could do the repair, and I’d guess most people could besides the fact that people already had the choice to return the product or self repair. I’d wager people that are complaining opted for the self repair because you got a larger voucher.
As it is with the microcenter recall process you get that credit with microcenter not Bambu labs. And as far as I’ve been able to tell unless someone here can let me know otherwise I’m not aware that microcenter has sent any replacement beds out.
I’m assuming one of 2 things happened 1 Bambu hasn’t sent replacement beds to microcenter yet and people are complaining or 2 Bambu is sending new A1 units to microcenter before replacement beds are available which would piss off customers waiting for beds. Of course there could be other issues involved but it seems by the wording of the email and the discussion I had with microcenter support that they don’t have replacement beds yet, though they didn’t outright say that.
Basically Bambu should have made all of those waiting on heat beds whole before releasing the A1 for sale again. To me it says “hey we got your money, what are you gonna do? We will give you the parts when we are ready but we need to sell more printers so you can wait.” And remember here I was the guy defending Bambu when this came up. Now I feel kinda stuffed here. And it is kinda a what are you gonna do situation. You either do what they say or you’re out. It seems like microcenter is stepping up to where Bambu should have. Not only that but they are still honoring the $120 gift card to microcenter. Which is actually a better deal than the Bambu credit since it’s a microcenter gift card.
If I have to drive to Dallas to “exchange” the printer it won’t be for another A1, that is for sure. While the A1 is a great bed slinger I’ve still had more problems with it than the x1 or p1 printers I have and the problems are mostly related to it being a bedslinger. I have had far more nozzle/part failures than I ever do with the other Bambu printers. I remember why I swore off bedslingers. I’ll likely get a P1s combo since I think the P1S is the best value.
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yeah im not buying that the fact its a bedslinger made you have nozzle/part failures i have had zero issues and clogs nor any ringing issues with the gantry its built very stable i bought it on release, but whatever you need to do to make yourself feel good about it. im going to buy another myself cant beat the price and quality for a fast printer with multi color. good luck
Are the A1’s due a price drop like the A1 mini? I was going to buy one the day the recall got announced but after all bed issue and the fact the mini got a price drop I’m surprised these haven’t dropped in price.
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I would highly recommend the A1 combo.
Despite having my replacement bed since the end of April, I only did the bed replacement yesterday and that is because I was giving that printer to my brother and he doesn’t monitor his printers enough while in use. He’s the type of user who would start a 10 hour print, then leave and go to work. So I did it just in case, but there was absolutely nothing wrong with the bed I removed. That machine had printed flawlessly since the day I received it in mid January.
When I took the printer over to my brother’s, we set it all up, disconnected it from my account, connected to his and printed the single colour Benchy from the SD card. It was the first time he has seen a Bambu printer up close and seeing a printer move that fast for the first time can be jarring. He said it’s like watching a video of his Creality POS v2 in fast forward.
I just received my new A1 combo the other day. The first printer I’ve ever “bought” using internet points, felt pretty good. I’m very grateful that this one was delivered by FedEx and not UPS as UPS service in my area is horrible. As with my first A1, this one went together super easy and is printing like a dream.
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Hi, how are you finding the new bed replacement Dr? I waited for a while before changing the new bed, like you said, 'they was nothing wrong with bed!
Cheers!
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Well, I gave the printer to my brother and after we did the replacement and printed the benchy, the latest firmware update came up so we installed it and then I left. He moved it to another spot it in his house (we did the bed replacement in his living room) and set it up there.
The next time he tried to print, he was given an error “The build plate is not placed properly, please adjust it.” After checking everything over, he was convinced there was nothing wrong with the build plate so he started checking other possibilities and he found it to be a firmware issue.
I’m 100% sure the issue was caused by me skipping version 01.02.01.00 with the heatbed temperature failsafe.
What he ended up having to do was downgrade the firmware and reinstall each version one at a time. He now has the latest firmware and it’s working perfect.
How is yours working?
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Why? How about the fact that any investigation of a house fire that determines the cause to be a recalled printer is going to have your homeowners insurance company doing everything in their power to deny your claim?
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Or consider the more likely scenario that the CPSC (and perhaps the equivalent government agencies in Europe) are not agreeing with Bambu Labs that a home repair on a device like this meets with their approval.
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update after 2 weeks. did the update and ignored the message. no problems here! been printing non stop for the last 2 weeks and nothing wrong with the printer!
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The only thing that I have found is a report from a consumer on January 28, 2024 on saferproducts.gov which is reachable from the CPSC website.
https://www.saferproducts.gov/PublicSearch/Detail?ReportId=4605622
I responded Feb 10th as well but haven’t heard anything for about a month now and that was just a “Thank you for your patience” email. This is getting frustrating.
i would fill it in again, i had a reaction within 24 hours.
|### Winnie Graham wnngraham@gmail.com|13:00 (12 minutes ago)||
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|to Dr
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Hi Dr,
Thanks for your reply.
Everything went smoothly replacing the new bed, no issues. Completed the bed leveling, tramming etc.
I do find that the heat bed seems to print differently from the previous bed, could be, just me. Or, it just needs a little tweaking! The updates were ok, with no faults there.
Have you noticed, they have added a new feature, a ruler! I would like to see, few more tools, not too many. A tool where you could add straight lines when editing your model. It would be very useful.
Thanks once again Dr. Best Regards.
Happy Printing!
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The biggest risk a bed slinger has is moving mass, and I’ve been printing long enough to form my opinion that moving mass as it gets taller has a higher risk of failure. That being said I have been playing with the x hop settings to improve the issue. Perhaps it’s my specific printer that is having issues the higher up it gets having a better tendency of part/nozzle collision. I’m only a few prints in with it using modified x hop settings so only time will tell. Also I have never had a nozzle clog on the A1 only nozzle/part contact knocking the part off the bed. The other night I was sitting at the desk slicing files for the next day and heard a very Loud crack of the part being knocked from the bed that it was previously very well attached to, and it only had maybe 30 minutes left before finishing, the mirrored part was still firmly attached to the build plate.
I can also say with a high degree of proof that the multiple x1c, p1p and p1s machines I have rarely if ever have a part collision. It occasionally happens but it’s rare. Usually it’s because I forget to change the infill to gyroid or rectilinear.
And finally I’ll repeat that the A1 is still the best Cartesian printers I’ve ever used, and that includes some of the highly modified ones I had in the past. When the parts survive you can’t tell which printer it came off of.
I’ve also had issues with the AMS lite, mostly with position 2. It fails filament changes a lot. Most of the issues with the standard AMS can be modified or repaired pretty simply though the standard AMS has its own list of issues as well.
I had hoped that the A1 would be close in reliability to the core xy printers so I could have a dedicated pla printer with multi color option the few times I want it. Now I wish I’d have just bought another p1s combo for a couple of reasons, some due to the design and some for the space requirements for the AMS lite.
The A1 was a smart move by Bambu, and it is at a good price point for the value. The problem I have is the core xy printers are just better, in my opinion, and take less space, a fact due to the space required for bed travel and AMS lite.
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There are a couple of reasons why it could be difficult for a homeowners insurance to deny a claim based on the recall status of the A1.
First is not everyone knows about the recall, my daughter didn’t because she doesn’t use the forums and all of the emails for microcenter automatically go to spam.
Second it was a voluntary recall with a just in case message. If it were a dire situation Bambu would have locked the A1 from being able to cloud print with a huge message when it was attempted before moving forward or not slow it at all and they would have plastered the information everywhere. Instead they have been releasing information in blogs and occasionally here. I found out about it nearly a week after by accidentally watching a YouTuber which again not everyone does.
All that being said I wouldnt put it past an insurance company to try to deny a claim in hopes you’ll just take them at their word but I’m not sure they could legally deny the claim. It’s also not like hundreds of printer burned down peoples houses, thank goodness, so the issue has been limited.