so im a teen with not alot of money but i want to get into 3d printing, another community suggested the ender 3 original. it looks like a solid printer but who know im a noob after all. my budget is around 100$ or less. im looking into making mini figures and painting them or whatever nerdy thing i find. i know the budget is tight but im hoping there is something, also im debating on buying a used 3d printer because they seem cheaper.
also any tips for a noob would be great like what makes said model good or bad compared to other models and such.
If your goal is to make mini figures, what you want is an SLA machine. They are much better at making small detailed objects than FFF. However, it will definitely cost more than a cheap FFF machine like an Ender 3.
The Ender 3 variants are cheap and a great platform if you are OK with tuning/tweaking things. If set up properly they work great and are pretty reliable. But of you want something that works out of the box and doesn’t need any tweaking/tuning, you will probably be disappointed with it.
Also resin is kinda dangrous and more tedoius. Dont get resin on your skin and the fumes are pretty bad, you also need ventualtion.
You can get some surprising detail out of an Ender 3, especially if you pop on a smaller nozzle.
Sure, you can print minis with an FFF machine. But there’s a reason the mini printing folks primarily use SLA. For that particular application, it’s significantly better. I say this as someone who uses an Ender 3 and is quite happy with it. If my main goal was printing minis, I would probably want an SLA machine instead.