For awhile now, the Ultimaker line of 3D Printers has been incredibly successful. They have great quality, and they are super fast! The Ultimaker 2 also has a built in screen, with many other nice features. However, the Ultimaker’s have always had a few problems. The first problem is the retraction. Because the Ultimaker has always used a Bowden extruder system (the filament feeder is attached to the extruder gantry) it has always had a longer distance to retract the filament. This makes the retraction not very great. This Bowden extrusion system also makes filament loading/unloading a little harder than it probably should be. However, the Bowden extrusion system also has it’s advantages, and that is probably why Ultimaker has stuck with it throughout all their machines. The main advantage is probably the speed at which the extruder can move. The extruder can move much faster because the HEAVY filament loading system is loaded on the back of the machine and not on the extruder itself. Still, the Bowden extruder system definitely has its advantages and dis-advantages.
With the Ultimaker 2+, Ultimaker has fixed most of the problems that come with a Bowden extrusion system! They have done this by increasing the power and strength of the feeder (it’s a lot bigger). Now because the feeder is more powerful, some of the retraction issues go away! You can now also adjust the tension for your type of filament so it loads/unloads a lot easier. Another nice new feature of the Ultimaker 2+ is the swappable nozzles. The Ultimaker 2+ has swappable nozzles for fast low quality prints, or slow fast quality prints. This is a really nice feature, that not a lot of printers have. The final nice new feature of the Ultimaker2+ is the new Airflow System. Ultimaker has reconfigured the whole cooling system to create an airflow that is really optimized towards creating nice smooth prints.
Those are the main improvements on the Ultimaker, but there were probably many other small improvements. Ultimaker has upgraded its Original line (The Ultimaker 2), and the Extended line (The Ultimaker 2 Extended). The Mini Ultimaker did not get an upgrade however. Ultimaker will also be releasing an upgrade kit for the Ultimaker 2 and Extended, but the date for this kit has not been released.
So those are the main improvements for the Ultimaker 2 line. They now have a better feeder, swappable nozzles, optimized airflow, and more! With these new features, the Ultimaker 3D Printers will definitely be able to create some more epic 3d stuff!
Epic 3D Stuff 