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Hello! I have been looking at getting a new printer in addition to my Powerspec Pro(Flashforge Creator Pro) for a while. I think I've finally decided on the Max V2 but I have talked to a few people on reddit and looked through posts on here and I was curious about the common upgrades to start.

I was thinking about getting the e3d v6(or lite?) and the FSR setup to build from the get-go but was curious what knowledge there was involved there. Is there a good starter post for that info?

Is there any reason not to go with the e3d v6 over the lite?

I'm not 100% familiar with the FSRs but neither of those sounds like something it would be absolutely critical to do out-of-the-box. The hot end should be a pretty straightforward swap-out any time.

In addition to the lower price point, the PTFE liner in the Lite6 (which is the reason it has the temperature limitation that would keep it from using the more-advanced thermoplastics) would also tend to make it more forgiving (i.e., less likely to jam) in using the plastics it will support.

Oh, interesting, I figured the V6 would be less likely to jam than the lite6.

PEI bed is a must for convenience (search for PEI on the searchbar and you will find it).

Find a couple of good connectors, those are convenient when you want to remove the hotend assembly.

You may want to upgrade to a heater cartridge if you are going to use the stock hotend but read JhonOly's post. They designed it with resistors because of safety concearns. if the resistors fail, they fail and you get a ruined print. If the heater cartridge fails (or more accurately the rambo board fails, the mosfet gets stuck in the ON mode, so you heat up untill you end up with a catastrophic failiure).

I personally would recommend thicker wires going to the heated bed. I have 10 AWG wires between my rambo and my bed at the moment, but that is kind of a botchup job as the RAMBO manual rates the connectors for 14 AWG (as geneby pointed out). Get the silicone coated multi strand noodle wires. Thy are much nicer to play with.

Many are not content with the power supply. You can get a 12V normal power supply and wire that if you are not afraid of zapping yourself. Or you could get a 24V power supply and use that only for the heated bed, then the stock power supply should also suffice as the majority of the load is removed off it. (you can use an SSR to trigger it). This hastens the bed heatup time.



You may want to invest in a digital angle gauge or a builders square that is really 90 degs during the build. A micrometer and a caliper are also handy to have as tools.


There are also some mods that you can print later on but that is the tinkering part.


All of the above are my personal opinions only. The printer works out of the box, the above is about 50-100 usd worth of stuff that i have found to be indispensable for my needs.

I have some connectors so that's doable. Whats different about PEI than glass? I love using glass(borosilicate) to just put slurry on it and go.

So you don't think the FSR/hotend are worth to start?

Oh, I did not say they are not worth for a start. I bet they are. I do not have any experience with them therefore i do not have an opinion. I just provided a list that i believe are nice to have features.

With a PEI bed, you do not need any adhesives slurries glues etc... heat it up to temp, print on it, wait for it to cool down, take your part off and repeat.

Have a quick read through the thread.

Ah, well I used to have a bed that stuck well but every time I tried to pull something off of it it would mess up leveling or warp the part, and I didn't wanna go through that again.

I'm very fond of my carbon fiber arms, but they were replacing the plastic arms on a rostock max V1, so I can't comment on the stiffness of the newer V2 arms. Also, modding the extruder to work with a geared motor is a must if you're switching to an all metal hotend, you'll need the extra torque.

What does a geared motor run? May start out with the lite6 and then if I ever want to upgrade to the v6 I'll put the lite6 in my other printer.

My suggestions:
If your kit has an ATX supply, a larger, modular power supply is a great thing, and they come with a heavier duty cord, so you don't have to worry about it overheating.
PEI bed. The increased adhesion is worth it. If you do it right away, the hairspray, gluestick, and acetone savings will pay for it quickly.
All metal hotend (I like the E3D, with 713's mount. Had no issues myself. Do yourself a favor, get some of the hardened or stainless steel nozzles, so you won't have to worry about erosion). The increased temp tolerance, as well as heat time decrease, are wonderful. If you don't get it, get a cartridge heater anyways.
Get a screw in thermistor, a thermocouple, or a PT100 sensor. Personally, I like PT100's just for the ease of use with rambo's (E3D is pretty clear about how to go about doing it, and they mount very well) If you don't, the thermistor potting will come lose at some point. Avoid the hassle by frontloading that. E3D's style hotends are easy to mount screw in's on, just get one that fits where the capscrew goes.
Aluminum heat spreader. They make bed adhesion better, no matter what you're using as a bed surface, by evening the temperature. Trick laser sells them if you don't have a machine shop around.
Cap screw in the EZ-struder spring. The extra compression helps a lot.
If you plan on working with a lot of ABS, or other high temp stuff, as well as large parts, pick a heated chamber design, and go for it once you can start printing.

Now, here are some upgrades that are nice, but not entirely needed:
Geared extruder: I don't use one, haven't had issues with my E3D V6. If you plan on using a lot of small nozzles, definitely go for it.
More fans: With PLA, or extreme bridging, fans are awesome.
Print server: A dedicated box of some sort. Many people use RasPi's with Octo print, I use an old quad core media center box I had laying around. Pick something modestly powerful, and put your slicer on it, as well as your host. If you use a full fledged computer, stick the Arduino IDE on it too.
Painting the edges: If you want a really sharp looking printer, there's nothing like painting the edges. The only real practical time to do that is right away. Take the parts out of the sheets, but leave the tape on them. Spray primer, then two coats of color.
Lights: they make it easier to see what you're doing, and illuminate/show off your printer. Conveniently, many run off 12V, which the power supply delivers the most of.
Cable sleeving, routing, and ties: The waxed cord Geneb recomends is good stuff. Combine it with cable mesh, and you should be able to keep cables coherent. Add adhesive back tie down points to keep it neat and well routed. Makes upgrades and trouble shooting much easier.
Spool holder upgrades: There's a really beautiful spool holder design that has bearings around. There are other fine designs, that are less fancy and entirely printable. It makes it less likely that you'll have feed issues.
IR temp sensor: Double check the hotend, watch for hotspots, and check the actual bed surface temp.
FSRs: They help some with calibration, and such, but they can be a pain to set up, and don't make a huge difference to actual printing.
Trick laser arms/trucks: They are very nice, but most of the benefits have been taken up by the main kit, or even surpassed. (self adjusting versus easier adjustment)

Glacian22 wrote:I'm very fond of my carbon fiber arms, but they were replacing the plastic arms on a rostock max V1, so I can't comment on the stiffness of the newer V2 arms. Also, modding the extruder to work with a geared motor is a must if you're switching to an all metal hotend, you'll need the extra torque.

The CF arms are great for me, too, but a friend who recently bought a newer MAX reports that the newer arms are better, so I'd recommend putting that off. Switching the arms out is an easy upgrade post-build, so there's no harm in delaying it.

I haven't observed that you need a geared motor for using an all-metal hotend. Maybe for very high print speeds? I've put 2km of mostly ABS through E3D V6 and Volcano hot ends using the stock EZStruder, and my only problems have been with ninjaflex and over-retraction of PLA. Neither of those were due to insufficient motor torque. I think the EZStruder is fine with direct drive.

gchristopher wrote:

Glacian22 wrote: I haven't observed that you need a geared motor for using an all-metal hotend. Maybe for very high print speeds? I've put 2km of mostly ABS through E3D V6 and Volcano hot ends using the stock EZStruder, and my only problems have been with ninjaflex and over-retraction of PLA. Neither of those were due to insufficient motor torque. I think the EZStruder is fine with direct drive.

You could have a point, I do tend to print a lot of things at .3mm and at decent speeds, as well as PETG which likes extra torque. So the geared extruder might not be necessary right off the bat. I do still love knowing that my extruder is never going to skip from lack of torque, ever.

Another question. If I haven't actually built a printer, only messed with my powerspec(replaced a few parts) Do you think it's better to start out with a Cartesian like MakerFarm or just dive into Rostock?

They will both have common problems and unique problems.

You can print pretty well with a rostock out the box.

But to utilize the full bed you will need a bit more playing around.


If i were to do it again, i would go for a rostock again.

Just dive in. The Rostock is very well documented, and probably easier to assemble than most Cartesian printers. Both Geneb and the folks at SeeMeCNC worked wonders with how easy it is to assemble and work with.