MendelMaxPro

This professional-grade printer is a cut above its kin, but is it ready for your living room?

Torture test print. Click to view large.

THE TRINITY LABS MENDELMAXPRO IS ONE OF A RECENT SPATE OF “RETAIL REPRAP” PRINTERS (see the Lulzbot AO-100), but this unit has two great things going for it. First, it’s the newest in its class, so it benefits from “standing on the shoulders” of earlier efforts. Second, founder Ezra Zygmuntowicz has extensive experience with the MendelMax, having built countless versions before developing this one as a product.

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3D Printers Buyer's Guide — 15 Reviewed
Getting Started in 3D
Learn the Software Toolchain
3D Design for Beginners
3D Printing without a Printer

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We want to hear from you! Share your experiences with this machine, what you like, what you don't like, where you think our test team got it wrong. We hope you’ll join in the discussion. We’d also love to see the things that you design and print out.

Primo Features 200W glass build platform heats up fast, high-grade linear motion components, LED backlighting, LCD user interface
Print volume 9″×10″×7″
Print speed Very fast,
+150mm/sec
Print material PLA, ABS, PVA
Resolution (z-axis) 0.5mm–0.3mm
Machine software Pronterface
Slicing software Slic3r
OS supported Windows,
Mac, Linux
Open Source Yes
Price as tested $1,295
Pedigree RepRap
MendelMax
Print without PC? Optional, SD card

5 Responses to MendelMaxPro

OhmEye on November 13th, 2012 at 9:41 am said:

Wow. I see at least 7 specs that are dead wrong in that bullet list! Print speed can easily be higher than 150mm/s. It prints ABS as well as PLA. It uses not only Repetier but Pronterface or any host software. The preferred slicing software is Slic3r. It is NOT Windows-only, it fully supports Mac and Linux. It _IS_ Open-Source, not proprietary in the slightest! You _CAN_ print without a PC using the LCD control panel only. How can you possibly make this many mistakes in the basic feature list?

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Gareth Branwyn on November 13th, 2012 at 1:12 pm said:

This was not meant to be live yet. That was placeholder copy, not the actual copy for this printer. Fixed now. Sorry for the confusion.

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- ohmeye on November 13th, 2012 at 1:44 pm said:
  
  Good to know, thanks! Now only the resolution spec seems to be wrong. The Z axis isn’t limited to 0.32-0.3mm, it’s not really limited at all. 0.1-0.5mm layers are perfectly practical depending on the nozzle size in use. 0.2mm is a common layer height for this printer.
  
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David Vaughan on December 1st, 2012 at 10:33 am said:

Is this product available? All I see on the Trinity Labs site is the Aluminatus.

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Dennis on March 4th, 2013 at 2:47 pm said:

Agreed. Something seems significantly wrong. Trinitylabs.com doesn’t list a MendelMaxPro. All links are either to Make magazine or a guy named Ezra who has a lot of cool YouTube videos….of something we apparently can’t purchase.

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