The Creality Ender 3 S1 is a deluxe model of the favored Ender 3 type of 3D printers. It has a direct drive, twin Z axis, auto mattress leveling, silent stepper motors, a detachable flex plate and a colour show display. It’s filled with little touches to make life simpler, like a slot for a full sized SD card, tensioning knobs and a built-in drawer to stash your instruments.
The one factor lacking is an all metallic hotend, which is reserved for the Creality Ender 3 S1 Professional.
Retailing at $429 on Amazon, the printer comes with a facet of sticker shock. Sure, this printer is a discount when in comparison with a Prusa MK3S+, but it surely’s practically double what you count on to pay for a typical Ender 3.
Older variations of the Ender 3 had been beloved for his or her low value and moddability. You’ll be able to simply decide up an Ender 3 Professional for $200 and add the upgrades you want finest for a customized machine. However it will take about $288 price of elements from the Creality retailer to carry an Ender 3 Professional as much as the extent of this machine.
I had the Ender 3 S1 out of the field, leveled and printing in about half-hour. This can be a good printer for makers who wish to bypass all of the tinkering and get proper to the printing.
Specs: Ender 3 S1
| Machine Footprint | 487 x 453 x 622 mm (19 x 18 x 24.5 inches) |
| Construct Quantity | 220 x 220 x 270 mm (8.5 x 8.5 x 10.5 inches) |
| Materials | PLA/PETG/TPU/ABS |
| Extruder Sort | Direct Drive |
| Nozzle | .4mm (Interchangeable) |
| Construct Platform | PC Coated Spring Metal Sheet, heated |
| Filament Runout Sensor | Sure |
| Mattress Leveling | CR Contact |
| Connectivity | SD card, Sort-C USB |
| Interface | Coloration LED display with Management Knob |
Creality Ender 3 S1: Included within the field
The Ender 3 S1 comes with every little thing you might want to get your printer arrange. You get instruments to construct and keep the printer, facet cutters, a metallic scraper, a nozzle cleaner, a spare nozzle, an additional Z restrict swap, and a full sized SD card with a USB adapter. There’s additionally a small pattern of white PLA to print your first mannequin.
The SD card has three brief movies on assembling the printer, utilizing the auto degree and do a guide degree. You additionally get a PDF copy of the guide, a duplicate of Creality Slicer 4.8.0 and fashions in each pre-sliced .gcode and .stl format.
Design of the Creality Ender 3 S1
The Ender 3 S1 has developed into a cultured wanting machine with a smooth black and grey body. Gone are the binder clips and zip ties that held earlier fashions collectively. Flat cables in neat mesh sleeves exchange all that cumbersome wiring, and the mattress is stored in place with magnets. That is the primary Ender 3 to return geared up with a direct drive, the Creality Sprite, which additionally eliminates the necessity for tubing.
There’s no ugly QR code plastered on the X gantry this time round. If, for some motive you overlook the place your printer got here from, a extra delicate QR code could be discovered printed on the entrance of the hotend.
The twin gear Creality Sprite was developed in home and works superbly. It’s just a little industrial wanting in comparison with the remainder of the machine, however the lack of plastic housing serves to chop down on weight. It’s not fairly good – the drive remains to be lined with a PTFE tube, which limits its most nozzle temperature to 260 levels. In case you want increased printing temperatures, the even newer Ender 3 S1 Professional has an all-metal hotend.
I ought to point out the Creality Sprite Extruder is shipped unmounted and attaches with a couple of simple to achieve screws. It’s meant to be easy to take away, so you’ll be able to swap it with a laser equipment, bought individually. We’ll be reviewing the laser at a later date.
One factor I didn’t like is the awkward front-mounted elements cooling fan, which makes it arduous to observe your first layer go down. The machine additionally comes with a run out sensor mounted close to the spool holder and energy loss restoration.
The Creality Ender 3 S1 has auto mattress leveling, however stored the guide springs and knobs for backup. Talking of springs, Creality lastly upgraded the Ender’s infamous weak springs for stiffer orange ones, which means this machine will maintain its mattress degree for fairly a bit longer. An additional Z axis swap is included, however is barely wanted if the CR Contact system fails and you might want to swap to all guide leveling.
A last intriguing addition is a twin Z axis improve, one thing usually reserved for bigger printers. The 2 lead screws are stored in sync with a belt for added safety. The additional Z axis ensures smoother prints by giving the X gantry extra help.
I’ve a combined response to the equipped construct plate – I like that they upgraded to a metal flex plate, however am dissatisfied that Creality gave it a ridiculously sticky PC coating. I had a number of silk PLA fashions lose their bottoms to this plate. Utilizing a glue stick appears to assist, however you’ll wish to use excessive care with delicate prints. You too can exchange the construct plate with, for instance, a clean PEI flex plate from Comgrow for $24.
The show display is identical because the Ender 3 V2, which nonetheless makes use of an old style knob selector. The menu system is easy to learn and makes it simple to search out what you want.
The Creality Ender 3 S1 is generally pre-assembled (one other first for the Ender 3 line) and comes along with a handful of neatly labeled bolts and screws. The paper guide is barely appropriate for eagle-eyed prospects; everybody else ought to observe the bigger PDF or video directions included on the SD card.
I put in the gantry first. It matches into slots on the bottom unit and is held in place with 2 screws and a couple of bolts on all sides. Then I fitted the hotend meeting onto the X gantry with 4 screws. The management display bolts to the facet with 3 screws and the spool holder snaps into place on the highest.
Wiring may be very easy as every little thing is already connected to the body and solely must be plugged in.
Final, flip the facility provide swap to match your predominant family electrical, which is 115V within the U.S. Creality positioned an enormous sticker to be sure you don’t overlook the hidden swap.
The Ender 3 S1 comes with a CR Contact put in, Creality’s reply to the favored BL Contact. It is a metallic probe that bodily faucets the construct floor and works with each metallic or glass mattress surfaces.
To degree the printer for the primary time, choose Degree from the principle menu. The printer will instantly go into its leveling routine with out preheating and faucet 16 factors across the mattress.
Subsequent, test the Z Offset. Click on Put together from the principle menu and scroll right down to Z offset. Slide a chunk of paper underneath the nozzle and modify the offset quantity till the nozzle simply scrapes the paper. After I leveled the Ender 3 S1 right here for testing, it didn’t want any adjustment, but it surely’s at all times good to test.
If the CR Contact is unable to degree the mattress, you will want to do a guide degree. Instructions for this are within the guide.
I’ve loaded filament into a number of direct drive machines, and the Creality Ender 3 S1 confounded me for a second. Like earlier Ender 3 fashions, there’s no filament loading routine within the management panel. I believed this was an oversight till I reexamined the guide.
The filament path on the Creality Sprite is so brief that you could load and unload the filament completely by hand. To load the drive, preheat the machine and put filament into the highest gap. Push the lever to launch the strain spring and push the filament in. Reverse the method to unload.
In case you’re altering colours, switching materials or operating cleansing filament, you’ll be able to nonetheless inform the machine to extrude a bigger quantity through the use of the management panel. Nevertheless, for many filament swaps, you solely want handy push an inch or so of filament via the drive.
Making ready Information / Software program for Creality Ender 3 S1
The Creality Ender 3 S1 comes with a duplicate of Creality Slicer 4.8.0. You too can use Cura and PrusaSlicer, that are each in style applications out there without spending a dime obtain.
The most recent model of Cura (4.13.1) doesn’t have a profile for the Ender 3 S1, however you need to use the profile for the Ender 3 Professional and modify the construct peak to 270. PrusaSlicer has a profile for the Ender 3 S1 able to go.
Printing on the Creality Ender 3 S1
The Creality Ender 3 S1 offers nice print high quality proper from the field. My first print was a pre-sliced Cat from the SD card. I used the equipped pattern PLA and it turned out nice, with one stray thread on the mouth from the overhang.
After a primary profitable print, I jumped proper into silk PLA (Matterhacker’s Construct Sequence Silky Blue PLA) and my favourite simple mannequin – Fred the Frog. That is once I came upon the brand new PC coated mattress is tenaciously sticky. You want rather less squish on this print floor–and a few glue stick for good measure. This mattress by no means releases prints by itself – you at all times need to flex or pop it off with a scraper. Fred left a couple of layers behind once I tried to snap him off the plate by hand.
After adjusting my Z peak to compensate for the stickiness, the Creality Ender 3 S1 dealt with silk PLA and articulated prints nicely. Right here’s a free Chameleon print from McGybeer, printed at .2 mm layers with Inland Rainbow 2 PLA.
Subsequent up is a Calibration Fortress take a look at print from YouTuber Maker’s Muse. This print is designed to emphasize take a look at your FDM printer, and the Ender 3 S1 handed with flying colours. The print in place maze nestled contained in the tower unscrews because it ought to, the overhangs on the draw bridge had been close to good and the print in place gate popped proper out. I printed at a 0.16 layer peak in Protopasta recycled PLA.
I used to be trying to find new calibration prints, and located this fascinating home from tmpx64. All of the fantastic particulars, together with the pesky gutters, printed nice. It printed at 0.2 layer peak in Printerior purple PLA.
I did a fast test with TPU, and as anticipated, the Creality Sprite direct drive had no issues with stretchy filament. This Benchy is printed at .2 layer peak in Matterhacker’s Construct Sequence TPU in translucent purple.
Backside Line
The Ender 3 S1 provides a close to good printing expertise that’s a welcome change from its price range minded predecessors. It’s simple to assemble and the CR Contact leveling system labored completely. I solely wanted to regulate the Z to compensate for filaments that want much less squish. You get superbly clean prints even at normal print settings.
The metal coated construct plate is a step in the best route. Nevertheless the coating is approach too aggressive. It’d put on down with time, however after a couple of weeks of printing, I nonetheless wanted to make use of a glue stick and quite a lot of care when eradicating prints.
In case you’re on the lookout for a cheaper printer with the identical construct measurement, auto leveling and direct drive, take a look at the Anycubic Kobra. Priced at $319, it’s an Editor’s Alternative and our decide for Finest Printer for Novices.