Ol' Flashy is practically a legend. The FlashForge Creator Pro, AKA the Makerbot Replicator Dual knockoff, er... Ah, hem - improvement on the Replicator Dual... kinda helped desktop 3D printers become a thing.
Get your own Creator Pro!
Now... I'd be lying if I said I wasn't tempted to build a Voron... And resin printing is f'ing amazing... But at the end of the day the damn thing just works!
It's like the Toyota Camry of 3D printers?!
Mine was born in 2015 and has seen over 6,000 hours of work. That's roughly equivalent to 2/3's of a year of continuous use. Or about 3 years of "standard" work hours. Flashy did get an intern, the QIDI Tech 1- AKA "Ralph", in 2018 and together they're just shy of 10,000 printing hours!
((There were a few others that are no longer with us... but that's a story for another day...))
I also think it's interesting that you can still buy a new Flashforge Creator Pro (even though the Creator 3 pro is now out) but you can't buy a Makerbot Replicator 2...
All that lovey dovey gushing aside, there were some things I changed which is why we're here today.
Today's upgrade is a filament run out sensor. This should have been included from the factory IMO. And honestly I really didn't know what I was missing until I got a printer that had one and it is sooooo nice to not have to babysit the printer when it's getting low on filament.
Link to the run out sensor:
Here's a quick video of the installations and testing of the sensor:
Some other updates I've made to Ol' Flashy over the years that I recommend:
Flexplate bed - Sooooo much better than glass. Things stick when they should and come off when you want them too.
All metal hotends - Originally just one of Flashy's hot ends was metal so I could print high temp materials. But honestly, after running the Micro Swiss metal hot end for awhile and being convinced it worked for all materials I just got tired of dealing with the PTFE tubes and replaced all of Flashy and Ralph's hot ends.
The only other things I've really had to do to it in the last 8 years was replace the heatbed and replace the X axis wiring.
The heatbed was replaced in 2021, the connector eventually failed and caused it to short out. Flashforge has updated the connector on the newer versions. More info here if you're interested https://www.makerneer.com/post/ol-flashy-gets-a-new-bed
And the x-axis wire is a known failure point, it wears out over time and you start to get layer shifts. I replaced it just last year, https://www.partsbuilt.com/cable-x-motor-creator-pro-flashforge/
Seriously, that's it for major maintenance.
Bearings and rails are still original, belts are still original, the cover has seen better days... but it glued back together just fine after a humpty dumpty moment...
And that's why it's the Toyota Camry of 3D printers, the damn printer will probably go another 6,000 hours without complaining!
Get your own Creator Pro!
*Note - some of the links in this post may contain affiliate links. Nothing changes on your end, but as an affiliate I earn from qualifying purchases. Thank you for helping support this blog!