Creality K1 / K1 Max

Nebell

Nebell

2[H]4U
Joined
Jul 20, 2015
Messages
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This is Creality answer to Bambu Lab P1S / X1C with better specs, just cheaper. I ordered and received K1 Max and the thing works like a champ. Prints beautifully too. Might post some prints later.

Early adopters had some problems with a bad extruder on K1 (but Creality sent them a gift package for €3 with a camera, 1kg filament and a new extruder).
K1 Max is sent with a fixed extruder and my K1 Max had no issues whatsoever.
This is also my first FDM printer. Had a couple of resin printers before and I hate the mess they create. Fine if it was just a normal liquid, but all that toxic shit and there's no way to avoid the mess.

I paid €900 for my K1 Max, while X1C would set me back €1200. It's also a really great looking machine.
Not the tinker machine unfortunately as Ender for example, but right now I don't have time to deal with tinkering and I like high tech stuff.
 
Looks slick and if I were to be hard core printing all the time, or have dedicated space, that would be a strong possible contender. Good to hear a positive review for it.
 
modi123 said:
Looks slick and if I were to be hard core printing all the time, or have dedicated space, that would be a strong possible contender. Good to hear a positive review for it.
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I don't print hard core and I'm not sure if these/Bambu Labs are workhorse machines.
These are the boring machines for those who use tech like Apple. Something that works but is hard to fix or tinker with.
 
Nebell said:
This is Creality answer to Bambu Lab P1S / X1C with better specs, just cheaper. I ordered and received K1 Max and the thing works like a champ. Prints beautifully too. Might post some prints later.

Early adopters had some problems with a bad extruder on K1 (but Creality sent them a gift package for €3 with a camera, 1kg filament and a new extruder).
K1 Max is sent with a fixed extruder and my K1 Max had no issues whatsoever.
This is also my first FDM printer. Had a couple of resin printers before and I hate the mess they create. Fine if it was just a normal liquid, but all that toxic shit and there's no way to avoid the mess.

I paid €900 for my K1 Max, while X1C would set me back €1200. It's also a really great looking machine.
Not the tinker machine unfortunately as Ender for example, but right now I don't have time to deal with tinkering and I like high tech stuff.
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How is it going still? Looking at possibly upgrading my printer to a P1S but the K1 has some good sales.
 
Tengis said:
How is it going still? Looking at possibly upgrading my printer to a P1S but the K1 has some good sales.
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Mine is working well, but I don't use it very often. Printed some neat stuff like a huge dinousaur (about 1.5m long) and Quest 3 wall mount as well as many other things.
I heard people have issues but I'm not sure if it's just them expecting too much or tinkering too much and getting something wrong. I rarely change settings on mine and usually just print on default unless I want 0.2mm or supports.
 
Nebell said:
Mine is working well, but I don't use it very often. Printed some neat stuff like a huge dinousaur (about 1.5m long) and Quest 3 wall mount as well as many other things.
I heard people have issues but I'm not sure if it's just them expecting too much or tinkering too much and getting something wrong. I rarely change settings on mine and usually just print on default unless I want 0.2mm or supports.
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I have had my K1 for a few months now, joined STLFLIX, and printed many of them designs. Never a failure. That was with the .28 firmware that so many were blaming for their ineptness. :) I just downloaded today the next firmware 1.3.2.20, which seems to be working very well. Knock on wood. I had to quit the Facebook K1 groups because it was painfully obvious that most complaintants were just completely uneducated as far as printing and slicing goes. I just got burned out trying to help them. I think introducing a fully automatic printer to novices as well as tinkerers is asking for trouble. You see people giving help and telling them so many different cures including rooting the printer. The K1 is an excellent printer if you just let it print.
 
Nebell said:
Mine is working well, but I don't use it very often. Printed some neat stuff like a huge dinousaur (about 1.5m long) and Quest 3 wall mount as well as many other things.
I heard people have issues but I'm not sure if it's just them expecting too much or tinkering too much and getting something wrong. I rarely change settings on mine and usually just print on default unless I want 0.2mm or supports.
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When you print the supports, use Organic Auto tree supports in Orca Slicer. They come right off with no marks.
 
Me and a coworker picked up some K1 Maxs. Its everything ive wanted in a printer. They took all the upgrades i would do to a printer and applied them out of the box. Printer straight up gets down.

I rooted mine and flashed open source klipper over top and fixed the input shaper. Just need to figure out why the camera isnt showing up in fluidd and mainsail. Otherwise its been great. Only mods i plan to print for mine is the top glass spacer and maybe the 270 degree front door hinges. Might stick an aftermarket drop in hot end in it for increased flow and top it off with a ruby tipped nozzle and just leave it be and print.

We paid $683.05 delivered for them.

1700603421100.png
 
German Muscle said:
Me and a coworker picked up some K1 Maxs. Its everything ive wanted in a printer. They took all the upgrades i would do to a printer and applied them out of the box. Printer straight up gets down.

I rooted mine and flashed open source klipper over top and fixed the input shaper. Just need to figure out why the camera isnt showing up in fluidd and mainsail. Otherwise its been great. Only mods i plan to print for mine is the top glass spacer and maybe the 270 degree front door hinges. Might stick an aftermarket drop in hot end in it for increased flow and top it off with a ruby tipped nozzle and just leave it be and print.

We paid $683.05 delivered for them.

View attachment 615220
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I want to get one of these instead of the P1S, I just constantly see people saying they own both and prefer the Bambu printer for a huge variety of reasons.
 
Tengis said:
I want to get one of these instead of the P1S, I just constantly see people saying they own both and prefer the Bambu printer for a huge variety of reasons.
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Same here. And as my 1st printer. Klipper seems to be where you want to go in a 3D printer nowadays and the more I read up on Bamboo and its going toward closed source and proprietary crap...K1 it is, when I save up enough lol
 
bluestang said:
Same here. And as my 1st printer. Klipper seems to be where you want to go in a 3D printer nowadays and the more I read up on Bamboo and its going toward closed source and proprietary crap...K1 it is, when I save up enough lol
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Closed source and proprietary doesnt necessarily mean bad. Ive been researching mods for the P1S already - a hot end upgrade from China to use V6 nozzles will be my first mod if I get one at a cost under $20. After that, there are some nice screen upgrades, fan upgrades, lighting, etc.

Video about the nozzles:

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qBvTWFEd7rk

Ive spent more time screwing with my modified Ender3 then I have printing.
 
Why buy bambu to upgrade? Then you're just going to be back at square one of "oh man this doesn't work".

It's a bit odd for people to be like "oh man they're perfect" and then go "but I'm going to upgrade X,Y,Z"
 
NightReaver said:
Why buy bambu to upgrade? Then you're just going to be back at square one of "oh man this doesn't work".

It's a bit odd for people to be like "oh man they're perfect" and then go "but I'm going to upgrade X,Y,Z"
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It still works as expected, it just ups the speed you can print reliably at and at a lower cost. If you watch that video I posted he explains it.

As far as I can tell, there is virtually no printer on the market at this price point that works as well. I see very mixed reviews about the K1, and the unbelievable amount of ads in their app and slicer blows my mind.
 
Tengis said:
It still works as expected, it just ups the speed you can print reliably at and at a lower cost. If you watch that video I posted he explains it.

As far as I can tell, there is virtually no printer on the market at this price point that works as well. I see very mixed reviews about the K1, and the unbelievable amount of ads in their app and slicer blows my mind.
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That's why you just replace their crap with real Klipper....

Idk. If I wanted to upgrade a printer I'd rather it be a cheap one and wind up with something better than bambu. With the added bonus of no bambu baggage.
 
NightReaver said:
That's why you just replace their crap with real Klipper....

Idk. If I wanted to upgrade a printer I'd rather it be a cheap one and wind up with something better than bambu. With the added bonus of no bambu baggage.
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How does Klipper improve the K1? Ive been Googling but havent found anything really but how to do it, not a list of how it improves the machine.
 
Tengis said:
How does Klipper improve the K1? Ive been Googling but havent found anything really but how to do it, not a list of how it improves the machine.
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Well the K1 already uses creality's cut down version of klipper. So if you want the full experience and to be rid of the creality software you can just root it and install normal klipper. I hear it's a fairly popular thing to do on the K1 max.
 
NightReaver said:
Well the K1 already uses creality's cut down version of klipper. So if you want the full experience and to be rid of the creality software you can just root it and install normal klipper. I hear it's a fairly popular thing to do on the K1 max.
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Ive read that it improves the machine and allows it to print better/faster, but I cant find what it actually does outside of just being better.
 
Tengis said:
Ive read that it improves the machine and allows it to print better/faster, but I cant find what it actually does outside of just being better.
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Ah, klipper in general? It just allows a lot of software compensations to allow printing faster. The most important are input shaping and pressure advance. The former reduces or even gets rid of ringing/rippling allowing higher accelerations while maintaining quality. The latter slows down flow rate as it approaches corners to reduce pressure. This eliminates the very common blobbing seen at sharp edges when printing faster.

There's a lot more tweaks in the klipper firmware than those, but those are the most important.
 
NightReaver said:
Ah, klipper in general? It just allows a lot of software compensations to allow printing faster. The most important are input shaping and pressure advance. The former reduces or even gets rid of ringing/rippling allowing higher accelerations while maintaining quality. The latter slows down flow rate as it approaches corners to reduce pressure. This eliminates the very common blobbing seen at sharp edges when printing faster.

There's a lot more tweaks in the klipper firmware than those, but those are the most important.
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Ive been dead set on getting a P1S but now Im second guessing myself.
 
 
Thanks for the newer source. I just pasted what was listed in a video from about a month ago. Things change quickly it seems.

Any word on whether Creality will ever start supplying these from the factory with fully unlocked Klipper?
 
bluestang said:
Thanks for the newer source. I just pasted what was listed in a video from about a month ago. Things change quickly it seems.

Any word on whether Creality will ever start supplying these from the factory with fully unlocked Klipper?
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Its not really locked, its just missing some modules. for the masses this printer is fine out of the box. Its so easy to add fluidd and mainsail and the other klipper fixings there is no need. Them going open source and giving root access imo is good enough of a win.
 
I snagged a K1 while it was on sale at Microcenter.

While my experience may not be typical, after having built a Voron 0.2 I felt I had enough experience to take this printer and really appreciate the fact that it comes nearly r2r out of the box.

Used the GitHub repo linked a couple posts up to do the listed tweaks and macro changes, along with installing moonsail because I prefer that over whatever limited web panel it was running stock.
After that I did take the time to get the bed as level as I could, because out of the box it was skewed 1.5mm across the plate. Kind of a pain with belt synchronized lead screws but it was worth the effort. Creality claims its auto bed leveling can deal with up to 3mm variations but I would never accept that as gospel.
image.png

It’s a bit noisy when the fans are on, akin to a gpu fan running full tilt, but it’s dead silent when idling.

Pretty happy and super impressed, Creality is trying to level up for sure. It’s pretty close to putting out prints that are on par with my Bambu P1P.

IMG_0436.jpegIMG_0438.jpeg
 
Checking in. My coworker and I have put a kg of filament through ours. Both are still flawless. I havent installed the microswiss hotend yet. Might do it today with my filament change.
 
I just got my MicroSwiss hotend in the mail the other day, The things i've printed have been as good a quality as what my P1P spits out, I don't regret getting one on Black Friday. I'll get around to installing the hotend today or tomorrow most likely.
 
Well, the install was pretty straight forward. Felt weird having it bob around until the nozzle was installed, but it's by design. PID Tuned and printing yet another voron test cube lol.

One thing that irks me, I get it, but it irks me is that they (creality) use glue on the connectors. It's a quick way to make sure your customers damage user-servicable parts. Ugh.
 
Jelly said:
Well, the install was pretty straight forward. Felt weird having it bob around until the nozzle was installed, but it's by design. PID Tuned and printing yet another voron test cube lol.

One thing that irks me, I get it, but it irks me is that they (creality) use glue on the connectors. It's a quick way to make sure your customers damage user-servicable parts. Ugh.
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It's just hot glue, hit it with heat gun for 2 seconds and pull it off. No one should just be yanking on things until they come loose.
 
On the toolhead side of things in the K1 it's a heat resisstant yellow goop. Has some elasticity to it, it's not as solid as the hot glued connections, I still find it annoying because they used what felt like decent JST connectors, so there was a bit more resistance than if not glued.
 
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