Hey 3D printing fellas,
Are you worried about failures that can lead to disaster like printer catching on fire and burning down firniture and house? Do you use any kind of protection against fire?
I know metal enclosures are the best, but my printer is in the Ikea Lack enclosure. I checked connections and everything looks great, but I soldered cable on the heated bed anyway. Im not super worried tbh, but Im thinking about buying Stovetop Firestop and mounting it inside the enclosure just in case. This one is triggered with open flame only, so probably false activation is not possible. I would probably buy 2 more for kitchen.
There are also balls and other extinguisher shapes, but the one from the picture seems more recommended. Bad thing is I cant find that one availabls in europe. There are also smoke detectors, but they can only alarm you or cut the power.
What do you use? Can you recommend any good automatic extinguisher available in europe?
The best protection is a machine that is well build:
We have ovens in our kitchens that are designed to reach upto 400°C (for cleaning) and nobody is afraid of them catching fire. Why? They are engineered to be safe.
Similiar a 3D printer that has good engineering is safe and doesn't require an automatic fire extinguisher.
If we talk about low-end China printers then the answer is they might not be as safe but the solution is to fix them instead of adding the fire suppression system.
Thx for input.
I agree with you mostly, but there are also unfortunate examples even with big eu brand as well. Im not paranoid, but home 3D printer is more like production machine than kitchen appliance imo. They have moving parts and print failures happen sooner or later. Fire in a kitchen is not that rare it seems anyway.
Before reading comments, I wasnt aware that prusa is selling fire suppression system, but I guess there is a reason for that
Cars are a very high-vibration environment with km of wiring and some carrying high currents, flammable liquids and hot parts. With e-autos there is even more including a 50'000 Wh energy storage waiting to catch fire.
While cars do catch fire it is unlikely to the point where they don't need fire suppression systems.
Some cars have fire suppression systems but those are race cars. Built differently to maximize performance. (or military vehicles)
Similiar there are 3D-printer that might benefit from a fire suppression system but the run of the mil 3D-printer won't need it.
Not convinced? Look at CNC-mills or swiss lathes. Those are designed to run nonstop for years in a production environment at the highest speeds to maximize production. Most of them don't have a fire suppression system (they do have a mist extraction/collector to prevent them from exploding).
Bambu had to recall one of their printers for a faulty bed heating wire that either was causing or had the high likely to cause fires. We have robots with flame swords that we've trained to not burn our house down. Yes some robots are better built or trained than others but it's still a robot with a flame sword nonetheless.
I like BambuLab. They handled the issue seriously. Resolved it and now it is fixed.
What I meant with low end China is like QIDI-tech having exposed 230V (not fixing it), Tronxy choosing high and low voltage wires with the same color and no PE connection to the chassis, Ankermake having issues with the heatbed insulation (not fixing that either) and crushed wires. That's just three examples and don't expect that other companies are better. BambuLab is a rare exception.
Once you teardown "industrial"/professional machines the point of view changes: PE connections, strain relief, drag chain rated cables with appropriate bend radius, crimped ferrules instead of solder on wire ends, ... they are built to last and run 24/7 without catching fire...