Artillery 3D is a Shenzhen company established in 2018 to fabricate quality 3D printers. The company got its lead with one of the recently designed Artillery Sidewinder X1 printers, a streamline designed casual 3D printer. The machine incorporates all the existing features of a Cartesian 3D printer, making it accurate for experiencing a splendid printing process.
This rock-solid 2020 printer holds a handful of values with the cables that are well routed and held out of the way. Therefore, compared to the Creality 3D printers, they have gained a successful position in handling cable management issues.
It is a highly affordable model offering speedy heating along with quick operation within the budgeted range.
How was Our Review Made?
The review has been documented using the specifications along with the product reviews based on several factors. A few customers tape the uncooperative behaviour towards the product while the majority falls with the pragmatic state of the product.
The article records the valuable features keeping in mind the virtues and shortcomings, making the audience choose the brand wisely.
While 3D printers are available to suit all budget preferences, one affordable model that seems to be a hit with many users is the Anycubic Mega S 3D printer.
This makes it easy to assemble and pull-apart this 3D printer.
If you are familiar with the previous versions of Mega series printers, this new version – i3 Mega S features many upgrades while keeping some basic features.
Winning points include an affordable price point, a simple design, ease of assembly, and ease of use.
It features an extruder that is better compatible with flexible filaments such as TPU. It has changed the positioning of the filament sensor to allow for better usability.
Technical Specifications
- Print Technology: FDM or Fused Deposition Modeling
- Frame: Aluminium
- Build Volume: 210 X 210 X 205mm
- Layer height: 100 to 400 microns
- Layer Resolution: 0.05 to 0.3mm
- Filament Diameter: 1.75mm
- Supported Materials: TPU, ABS, PLA, HIPS, and Wood
- Mechanical Arrangement: Cartesia-XZ-Head
- Bed Levelling: Manual
- Extruder Type: Single
- Max Extruder Temperature: 275° C
- Nozzle size: 0.4 mm
- Print Bed: Heated base with Ultra Base
- Max Heated Bed Temperature: 100° C
- Connectivity: SD card USB stick
Some users have found the fans on this printer to be slightly noisy. Anycubic sells upgrade fans and upgrade kits online. If you find the noise levels inconvenient, you can upgrade your i3 Mega S version.
Best Features and Benefits
- Setup
The Sidewinder X1 comes pre-assembled in an organized box with only a few screws required to fix the gantry on the top of the printer. Moreover, a ribbon cable needs to be plugged in along with a filament holder bolted on the top.
The machine lacks inclusion of a proprietary slicer as it does not have users looking for open-sourced slicers like cura. Cura is a featured base which creates an environment offering a full-fledged service to complete the processing along with a fine-tuned setting build-up.
The entire manual setup and assembling do not look like a complication as the product comes with a detailed manual to fine-tune the settings. Therefore, the machine works exquisitely for beginners, providing them with a better print quality at a contracted speed and print timing.
- Print Bed
The product puts forward a glass surface coated in ceramic with a large 310 x 310mm print area. The sufficient heated bed volume provides an improved layer fixing along with empowering PLA prints devoid of heat. This great bed adhesion comes with the heated plate expansion and shrinking while it gets cooled down.
The machine dispenses an efficient print quality which comes with an encased silicon heater alongside a thick piece of insulation material. Accompanying the improved print quality, it allows the print process to get completed within mere seconds based on being directly proportionate to the temperature. The maximum heated bed temperature can go up to 80o with the potential of extending up to 120o based on the printing material.
- Framework
Sidewinder X1 has a metal sheet base with a 60 x 20mm aluminium ejected Y-axis for stable print access. The well-built Y-axis rail is something most commonly found in the recent Cartesian printers, while the 60 x 20mm extrusion on the X-axis is a rare case. Increased weight on the extruder requires a stable and rigid base on the X-axis.
The Z-axis, on the other hand, convoys a 40 x 20mm extrusion on the base unit, fully equipped with the anti-backlash nuts for proper synchronization. This coherence gets stronger with the connecting belt holding a pulley to ward off wobbling on the axis.
This dual lead screw setup does not serve the best possible purpose but works as a decent fixer to avert the desyncing issues throughout.
- Extruder
Sidewinder X1 comes supplemented with a direct drive Titan Aero Extruder and a Volcano hot end to allow a quick heat-up of the print bed to the maximum temperature. Although the maximum side can go up to 270o it is advisable to keep it limited to 250o for a safe cold end extruder.
The Volcano-style hot end has a broadened melt zone giving access to the nozzles with a far-reached diameter of 0.8mm or 1mm. This eruption comes with a high flow rate, making the process effective and efficient.
Moreover, the extruder is provisioned with two fans wherein one is to cool the extruder while the other is to cool the print. There are certain changes required towards the fan used for cooling the print side, as it will work efficiently with the smaller as well as the larger pieces.
- UI & Connectivity
Sidewinder X1 trademarks a 3.5-inch colour touchscreen that casts colour variants with each submenu. Moreover, it is fully supportive of both USB and Micro SD. The computer needs to be directly plugged into the printer for easy access to the prints rather than consuming time transferring the files all along.
- Usability
The vibrant yet uncomplicated menu has proven to be highly responsive to the product, making the print process easy with a mere touch. The further instilled features like the filament runout sensor or the resume printing have worked great deals with the printing. The filament runout sensor holds the print, allowing the bed to stay heated for longer hours and the print to resume without the fear of detaching.
In case of a power outage, the print bed cools down without causing any trouble to the prints. It can be resumed from where left off.
- AC Heatbed
One of the major features of the Artillery Sidewinder X1 3D printer is the AC powered heatbed which allows accelerated heating compared to DC heating beds. There is a quick shift to a higher operating temperature due to higher power and voltage, ultimately reducing the DC Power supply load to three times.
This AC heatbed feature entitles the user to operate the temperature of the printing process along with the cooling phase. The reduced temperature between the filament and the bed due to such a power supply marks well-fitted adherence.
Additionally, the product does not comprise any levelling effects. The smooth and flat glass-ceramic heated bed allows us to escape the auto-levelling feature as it fixes the bed at one particular level manually.
- Design
The Artillery Sidewinder X1 is one of the unnumbered Creality CR-10 styled printers with a sleek finish given to the model. This product based on its installation and appearance comes as a complete repulse to other existing 3D machines.
It has been inspired by the Creality CR-10 3D printer. But despite its inspiration, it incorporates a power supply, mainboard and a touchscreen stockpiled in the base unit. The conspicuous design gives it a sleek and professional look, making it outstand the existing similar budgeted models.
The machine is entirely built using metal parts to vouch for the stability and rigidity of a finer printing process. This metal frame also consists of a flexible spool holder which can be manually adjusted and supports a filament roll of around 3 kg at the top.
This comes as a smooth machine for empowering professional prints due to it being structured and fixed using a thick and durable aluminium belt along with the screws and nuts to hold the framework. The machine is 95% pre-assembled making the user fix up a few screws to hold on the main assembly rail to the base.
- Cables
The use of ribbon cables makes Artillery Sidewinder X1 outstand other 3D printing machines. This resultantly gives a push to the product’s designing, making it stand amongst the top marked models. Unlike other overly priced printers which come with cartload spaghetti cables, Sidewinder X1 strays with the systematically assembled large ribbon cables.
Due to the previously faced issues considering the breakage of the ribbon cables, Artillery Sidewinder X1 has comprehended spare ribbon cables to overcome undue impairment. Alongside, there are supplementary ribbon cables provided to make sure of the restricted contact with the machine.
- Print Quality
The level of quality with Artillery Sidewinder X1 is admirable as it makes the perfect curling visible on the print. Despite a few imperfections marked due to the shaking of the frame, the filament pulls up the tool head to cover up the deformities and result in a creditable print.
The dual Z-axis stepper motor into the printer allows the print resolution setup emanating the variants of filaments like ABS, PLA, TPU and PETG. The precision that comes with the dual Z-axis is unmatchable to that of the X and Y-axis.
The threaded rods on the dual Z-axis provide stability to ensure a fine print pattern by bringing down the burden on the mechanical components. Moreover, the stepper motors share adequate support and activeness to avoid uneven printing. The ultra-quiet stepper motors on the other hand make the machine workable both in the domestic as well as corporate premises.
- Touch Screen Control
The Artillery Sidewinder X1 features a 3.5-inch colour touch screen panel that gives control to the machine for hand-picking the objects to be printed from the SD card directly. Along with the micro SD, it also supports the USB connectivity to make the users available with diverse platforms to choose the print pattern using the touch screen control panel.
- Filament Detection
The Artillery Sidewinder X1 3D printer comprises an in-built filament detection sensor to instantly hold back the system when the filament fails. This breakage does not hamper the printing process as it gets resumed once the filament issue gets settled.
Likewise, it also incorporates a power loss sensor along with a recovery feature to allow the printer to retrieve from the power cut-off and resume the print process from where left off. The recovery feature works in favour of reclaiming the data in case of any defect or fault occurrence.
These exemplary features make the machine outstand other 3D printing products and work towards better prints at the inconsiderable power roll-out.
- Ultra-quiet Stepper Driver
This stepper driver was built to take an edge off the Idle current through the motor windings. This minimizes the artifact upshots on the object’s outermost side. This motor also brings down the singing noises made within the stepper motor, further turning down the non-essential uproar made by the machine and the motor.
Pros: Things We Love!
- Sleek and lustrous designing.
- Offers a fast heating process.
- Restrained operating procedure.
- Precise and stable printing under high-speed conditions.
Cons: Points of Improvement
- Smaller filament holder than other 3D printers.
- Irregular heat depletion.
Final Verdict
Sidewinder X1 has turned out to be a magnificent product of cartesian printers. The machine is seen generating innovative and adequate results at a nominal range. The AC heated bed and the stable direct drive extruder specifically allows the product to stand out amongst other printers within the given budgeted price.
Nonetheless, Artillery Sidewinder X1 takes up a minimum amount of interference due to a silent operating noise level. This creates the best possible results near to a decent print quality along with an add-on print capability of providing stellar prints.
Sidewinder X1 appears to be a fine-tuned budgeted product allowing trouble-free assembling along with an escape from retrofitting the machine every month. Moreover, the testing and comparison with other existing 3D printers have made the product stand out as it marks the speedy bed heating from 22o to 60o in about 47 seconds.
An experienced user would never counter the recommendation of this magnificent product.