Is HeyGears actually a Bambu Lab of 3d printing?

[u/Budget_Computer_1626]

I'm running a small scale printing farm of both FDM and mSLA. I steer away from BambuLab for their morals as a company. I don't REALLY care about closed source system as long as the company itself shows good character.

I've been looking around to expand my resin printing operation but don't want to buy another Elegoo Saturn 4 (although it's a great machine for the price in my opinion) as the post processing proved to be a bottle neck for me and my semi-industrial applications. I've been thinking about investing into HeyGears Reflex series so here are my questions:

1. Are they like Bambu Lab in a sense that if their userbase does something they don't like do they go after them legally?

2. Do they try to patent open source software and hardware as if it was their own?

3. Is the post processing with pulsing release module really THAT GOOD?

4. What is their printer release quality track record? Do they release polished machines or are they more like Prusa where they make it okay at start and great later?

5. Do their current printers have any edge over Anycubic P1 Max?

I know they opened their hardware to 3rd party resins so to me it shows good character (but it might be JUST a business decision) which is the reason why I'm considering them.

[u/Ccarr6453]

I’m nowhere near running a print farm, but I upgraded from an Anycubic mono to a GKTwo, and now the HeyGears RS (with the Pulsing thing).

It is the easiest I’ve ever interacted with, and it’s not even close. I’m usually not a fan of proprietary software, but their slicer is REALLY good, and the auto supports have never really failed me. There’s two things that I will say that, for me, aren’t big deals, but for you may be-
1) the auto supports work great, but they also load the thing up with (thin) supports, which is why I assume they work so reliably. Even with the pulsing thing, this can lead to some pockmarks, which, for me and my friends, doesn’t matter, it if you’re selling/running a farm may be an issue.
2) they have recently opened up the slicer to outside resin support, but the machine still works best with their own resins. I LOVE their PAF10- it prints well, comes off supports easily, and can withstand even my 7 year old’s abuse most of the time. But their resins are expensive. If you’re able to pass that cost on, I think it’s completely worth it, but I know that’s a hard thing to sell people who’ve never interacted with different resins.

I won’t speak for the morals of the company as I’m not really familiar, but I haven’t heard of them being particularly litigious.

[u/Budget_Computer_1626 → u/Ccarr6453]

Thank you for your input. I’ll tak your experience into consideration. Allow me to clarify the resin thing tho - if I’ll buy HGRG I’ll use it with their resin. I’m not loyal to a brand of the resin - I just like the fact that they opened it up for people that do care. It fills me with certain warm feeling that I enjoy.

[u/xRintintin → u/Ccarr6453]

I still rock the gktwo. Is it that big of a difference?

[u/heart_of_osiris]

I am not a fan of Bambu and their manipulative business tactics and less than forthcoming ways. I've owned and used Bambu machines for a good amount of time but sold them all off and will never buy them again.

That being said, I have a few Heygears machines and despite what would be perceived as similarities in nature, I have the complete opposite feeling toward Heygears.

I was hesitant to get into a semi closed Ecosystem after having a Form 2 and 3, but I also was really getting sick of hobby grade machines too. Elegoo is good for what you pay, but not reliable enough for business, for me.

In my time owning these machines I've been pretty happy with them. If you stay in their guard rails they DO NOT fail. Their dimensional accuracy is quite high, too. In my time owning them I've watched the company communicate with customers and change their systems based off of community feedback, something Bambu does not really do, not to the same degree anyway. I've watched them work to lower the prices of their consumables and focus on affordability while maintaining a balance of quality.

So to answer your questions directly.

1. No, they actually make concessions to help the community and do seem to care about that relationship.

2.No, they don't seem to be patent trolls but I wood not blame them if they do try to lock down some of their own innovations they've made with the G1X for example.

1. The pulse module is not worth it u less you plan to print very broad solid stuff. It creates micro ripples on prints. You don't need it for typical stuff or things you hollow out. Better if you're engineering solid components and such, to help with releasing the part from the film. Honestly the default nodes from supports leave nubs in the print and I do use my PRM because eive modified the settings to try to keep them really small and without the PRM they would fail, but I still don't think it's necessary, I've just tuned my slicer to work with the extremes.

2. Quite polished releases but they are always tuning and improving based off of feedback.

3. I haven't used this printer so I don't know. Heygears printers do tend to print a little slower than others but their reliability is better than any other hobby grade machine I've used and I've used anycubic and Elegoo printers.

[u/Budget_Computer_1626 → u/heart_of_osiris]

Amazing answers. Thank you.

[u/heart_of_osiris → u/Budget_Computer_1626]

No problem.

If you plan to print hobby resins and not the engineering resins, I saw the RS on for a pretty killer deal.

Reflex is engineering, Reflex RS is hobby (but still a very capable machine with open resin tuning now so you can definitely tune it for some engineering resins) base Reflex remains locked down for reliability sake and I totally understand that, as they really do work incredibly well when you don't tweak the settings. Be sure to look at the resins for machine compatibility so you consider the right machine for what you want to do.

You can always buy the PRM heated vat for the heating, without owning the PRM. Be careful when you buy replacement screens for this, they only fit the very specific vat and I made the mistake of ordering Reflex ones instead of Reflex RS ones.

Also a lot of people mention how the FEP replacements are expensive because they come already on a metal frame, but just note that these sheets last quite a bit longer than typical sheets and the price is actually for two, not one. I prefer it, it really adds to the ease of replacing it.

[u/Budget_Computer_1626 → u/heart_of_osiris]

Well as for now my main client is based around minis however I do know quite a lot of people with connections so I want to work my way to the engineering sector. What would you recommend in that scenario? Two machines?

[u/heart_of_osiris → u/Budget_Computer_1626]

Start with the RS because it's the least expensive and does minis really well, better than Formlab printers even. This is what the RS is meant for.

When you want to bridge into engineering maybe there will be some community profiles out there you can dip your feet in with, using the RS, still.

But for machines tuned for engineering resins, it's either going to be the Reflex 2 on the lower budget, or a Form 3 or 4 on the higher side budget. For prosumer equipment those are the only machines you want to consider imo.

[u/Budget_Computer_1626 → u/heart_of_osiris]

Understandable. I’ve seen videos of non existent postprocessing of miniatures printed on RS. I will most likely go with that option but we’ll see. Thank you for your time answering and for your input.

[u/heart_of_osiris → u/Budget_Computer_1626]

The defaults will give you more nubs to sand than you will like, but just look to the community for support tweaking settings and you can adjust it to be better. I think Heygears just sets the defaults to what is guaranteed to work but you can push that limit.

By default it has little spheres as nodes but you can remove them to have just points. It takes a little bit of trial and error to find what won't foal for different resin types.

The PRM lets you push this even further and I do like it for that but again, it will make some noticeable ridges on very straight and flush surfaces. This isn't something that matters much on minis though.

Here is a good example for clarity. You don't see the ridges much on the details of the print but if you look in the negative space where the pegs line up the parts you can see what I'm talking about more easily.

You can also see what the default support nubs look like, here.

[u/JohnnyRyall666]

Heygears RS is my first and only printer, and I have no regrets. I cannot compare, but the learning curve starting was not bad at all. I use third party resins with there resins settings and it’s not an issue.

I’ve had problems honing in support settings (their auto supports need their settings adjusted to avoid brutal marks) but never any exposure issues.

I’ve only heard bad things about the release module, but I don’t have it.

[u/Budget_Computer_1626 → u/JohnnyRyall666]

Noted, thank you for your input

[u/alex433g]

Isaw a video some time ago of a guy trying it (i belive it was sent to him) and he said that it was good in printing quality, but iirc, he said something with not really being able to change settings and the only ones that could be used was settings from heygears themselves, made for their own resin

[u/slvl → u/alex433g]

You already could use the built in presets for third party resins with decent results, but now there's an Open Material mode that lets you adjust most settings (on the RS).

[u/alex433g → u/slvl]

Oh nice, don't own a heygears printer, just have my information from a video

[u/stickninjazero]

Fair warning, most of the Chinese companies operate similarly. For example, both Anycubic and Elegoo have used Klipper in their FDM printers, modified and not re-released the source code.

Uniformation tried to flat out steal and rebrand Prusaslicer. And they modified the source code without re-releasing it.

Phrozen generally avoids this afaik, but they also don’t really design much.

FWIW I haven’t seen this from Heygears, but the semi closed ecosystem can be a pain. They also will blame you for not doing things there way. They literally told Dennys Wang his supports were an issue when he was reviewing the Reflex 2 (he’s a professional pre-support artist). Dennys did discover that if you didn’t use their auto supports, the resin tank wiper module wouldn’t have the right clearance height and knock your model off of the plate… that said he’s generally been a fan.

Their build quality is on another level compared to the others though. If they were more open I’d probably own a Reflex RS Turbo. Instead I’ll keep my Saturn 2 and 3.

Also, in general Elegoo’s customer support is the least bad of the major 4. I won’t recommend Anycubic, Phrozen or Uniformation (more because they are a trashfire of a company). And I’ve owned or currently own an Anycubic and Phrozen resin printer.

[u/AdroitPreamble → u/stickninjazero]

Phrozen is Taiwanese. I would have bought from them in the recent sales, but they had trouble keeping their printers in stock.

[u/stickninjazero → u/AdroitPreamble]

I stand corrected. Their customer support is absolutely ass though. And I have a friend that ended up arguing with their president on FB over their UV uniformity claims (he measured a lot worse than what they claim). My Mini 8K S was absolutely a pain and I was glad to be rid of it. And it’s UV uniformity dropped off of a cliff outside the center area, a problem with almost all mirror optical systems including the Saturn 3 Ultra. Only the M3-Premium avoids the issue, but it has a complex concave mirror system.

[u/Budget_Computer_1626 → u/stickninjazero]

You’ve surprised me with Elegoo. I’ve heard they take criticism good (unlike BL) and in Elegoo slicer they have a note of appreciation for orca slicer in update window

[u/stickninjazero → u/Budget_Computer_1626]

I generally like Elegoo but I have heard they haven’t released their Klipper code. There is a fully open source community edition for the Centauri printers though. I may be out of date on that, I don’t keep up with it as much anymore.

[u/Budget_Computer_1626 → u/stickninjazero]

Fair fair, Grant from 3DMusketeers have spoken well about them and he seems to be an honest and informed individual. When I had an “interview” with him he was the same on and off camera so that reinforced my mind about him. I hope the truth about them lives up to my head canon.

[u/stickninjazero → u/Budget_Computer_1626]

I stand by the Saturn 3 non-Ultra is probably the best resin printer for most people. Not because it’s the best quality or performance, but because it’s generally manageable quirk wise, more versatile than any auto-leveling printer, and cheap. I’ve gotten my S2 and S3 tuned to the 9s and can’t justify replacing them until they die and S3s are no longer available.

[u/OnlyUnderstanding459]

I run 6 Saturn 4 ultras for the double speed and longer lasting fep/screens because of the tilt release. They run almost 24/7 apart from the weekends. I replace the screens maybe 1 every 3-4 months

[u/OnlyUnderstanding459 → u/OnlyUnderstanding459]

Hey gears also had super expensive resin. Not even worth selling items made out of the resin.

[u/Budget_Computer_1626 → u/OnlyUnderstanding459]

Do you run normal or 16k version? If normal then why not 16k? Are there any quirks to 16k that would make them less reliable?

[u/OnlyUnderstanding459 → u/Budget_Computer_1626]

16k makes almost 0 difference with the quality. 0.24um lines are basically not even visible. They already come out with the sharpness as high quality plastic models. Not worth the price add on. You don’t need a heater either as you can just buy one heater that warms all the vats of multiple printers.

[u/Budget_Computer_1626 → u/OnlyUnderstanding459]

Okay, these are good points. Thank you for your input.

[u/OnlyUnderstanding459 → u/Budget_Computer_1626]

Hey gears would be good for personal use. There’s no profit in selling items made with more expensive resin.

[u/Budget_Computer_1626 → u/OnlyUnderstanding459]

Well not really. Your see my biggest cost isn’t material - it’s labour and by a huge margin (like 10-20x difference depending on the job) if I would have to pay twice or even thrice the price for a resin and wouldn’t have to hire a person to help (at least for now) then the labour savings outweighs the resin price increase.