The LATHON Dual Nozzle 3D Printer

lathon

Our friends at Freeside Atlanta have been keeping busy despite the city-stopping snowstorms they’ve been suffering recently. This time it’s a 3D printer with dual extrusion: the LATHON printer. [Nohtal] bought his first 3D printer only two years ago, but his experiences led him to build his own to overcome some of the issues he encountered with standard printers.

The LATHON keeps the bed stable and instead moves only the nozzles, using Bowden extrusion to reduce the weight on the moving parts. A key feature is the addition of a second nozzle, which usually limits the print area. The LATHON, however, maintains a 12″x9″x8″ build volume thanks to the Bowden extruders. [Nohtal] documents the majority of his build process on Freeside’s blog, including using a plastic from GE called Ultem 2300 for the print bed, and running the printer through its paces with a slew of materials: ABS, PLA, HIPS, Nylon, TPE, Wood, and Carbon Fiber. You can find more information on the Kickstarter page or at lathon.net

Check out some videos below!

24 thoughts on “The LATHON Dual Nozzle 3D Printer

    1. It’s the full-volume, dual-nozzle, stationary printbed construction that’s special here, not the printbed, and the fact that it’s not an off-the-shelf printer.

      1. The print bed isn’t stationary, nor is the bed mechanism novel. The images provided show a bed cantilevered from the rear edge and it moves in the Z direction, which is the second most common bed movement mechanism in inexpensive 3D printers. Dual nozzles aren’t novel either. It might be new to the price range for kits, I don’t know. He calls it cutting edge, but the only thing that’s relatively new to 3D printing is the bed material.

        There’s other things to not like here. Needlessly large enclosure for the build area. Plastic frame joints. A cheap appearance of the machine that doesn’t befit the price tag. The creator says it’s a $4000 printer, but I don’t see where that’s the case.

  1. I just can’t get over how much wasted space there is to the left and right of the platform. If he put the reels of plastic there instead of on the outside I’d get it, but as it stands it just looks weird.

    1. The pink and blue match the little dodads on top of the machine well. So more than likely wanted made it, then his dodads, then decided on a video where he would want to show something bigger and more attention getting so through the iron man mask back in and didn’t change the filament.

  2. Ultra cheap 80/20 extrusions, crappy chinese steppers, the STUPID belt drive system with more cheap chinese pulleys, add prefered arduino+toasty stepper drivers, throw in 5 bucks in acrylic, dude it is totally worth 4000$…
    And dont forget to order/copy the extruder that is all the rage this week, bamm 3d shaker…

    I mean printer.

      1. Nop. Actually better systems costs around 800E (Ultimaker 1).

        This machine is simple ***. Nothing new and quality isn’t a buddy of creator (pics, quality of printer, etc.)

        I had huge laugh when I found on Google Cache his topic… He described how he built it ROTFL. Look on google :) you’ll see why this guy is a joke.

        Next time another guy should use at least CNC to build something square (man I’m using CNC just for my private needs my rage turns on when my CNC cut with error bigger than 0.1mm, and this joke man tried to replicate 3D printer with ruler and other manual power tools).

        1. 800E is about $1115.92
          and looking up the ultimaker 1 it says 995E which is about $1400
          Now that is alright, but the ultimaker can’t print as many types of materials and only has 1 print head.

          I assume that the print quality will also improve as the production version is worked on.

        2. Use a CNC to build something square? By square I assume you mean the frame. Show me a CNC that has travel larger than 600mm in the X direction. I am surprised using a manual mill is not up to your standards because apparently it was good enough to build the Saturn V rocket.

          I documented the topic briefly on Freeside’s blog but if you would like to go into specifics on this forum I would be glad to. Please be aware that this is a multi-criteria engineering problem and there are only so many hours in the day.

          It interesting that you say there is nothing new in the design. I can see where you are coming from, but unfortunately you are mistaken. There is NO other printer out there that has all of the features I offer at my price point. I have taken the best technology in 3D printing and engineered a product that has all of these technologies working seamlessly together. The reason you do not see any other printer with my capabilities is because this “incorporate it all” strategy is extremely difficult to accomplish.

          The “ruler” you see in the picture is actually a machining tool called a “Vernier Caliper”. They use it when measuring high toleranced parts that are over a foot long.

          Any more questions?

          1. Thanks.

            I see where you coming from but please be aware that this kind of caliper has precision of 0.01-0.02mm and if you won’t use it properly precision may drop in very dramatic way.

            If you want to cut something under 90 angle best way is to use CNC if you’re building so “precise machine”.

            I have Ultimaker, Prusa i3 and built own. Either of these three can print at any material you would like (
            1. Cut on lathe/buy new hot end
            2. Print new hot end holder
            3. Mount
            4. Print

            Also you says that you did everything as you should. Are you sure ? Are you familiar with ISO 9001:2004 standards ?

            First.

            Your prints photos, looks awfully bad, that kind of prints I just throwing to bin.
            Any one who had 3d printer knows that some of your 3d printer prints are unsuccessful.

            Here is a big question. Did you post these pics because it was the best what you achieved or are you simply lazy ???

            Either option scares off potential buyers.

            I’m not saying that your 3D printer is really bad, my main concern is you. You clearly has no strength to keep quality as high as possible, not only to pass but also to exceed minimum requirements of any quality standards so your clients would get best possible quality.

            Don’t you think that you should give best to your clients ? Maybe you are a good engineer but you sucks in business, marketing and production.

            You should find someone to help you as I’m sure that you would achieve nice result with your printer IF you would have appropriate attitude (like too wide carbon activated filter, which looks awful with some generic fan, just an example).

            I wish you the best as I respect people who wants to do something with their life and tries to create something, but man, you should work hard on other aspects of this project….

  3. I like it. Its a dual head unit with a large build capacity. The resolution is respectable as is the variety of usable filament. Im sure the resolution will no doubt improve as it heads towards a production version. That among other reasons is why I decided to back it.
    I think this printer has started in a great place at a great price and as a community builds up around it, it will only get better.

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