NEMA 14-50 receiver hitch cover - 3D print

[Athrun88]

Interesting. I looked at 3D printers a few years ago but didn't really have a use for one other than playing around.

What printer would anyone recommend and the price? Also what plastic inventory to get and cost?

I probably wouldn't spend too much unless I knew more about what designs are on the web for free. Thanks.

Without highjacking this thread, just want to add. There are plenty of free designs made by casual and professional designers. I have little to no CAD experience outside of what I did back when I was in college, but there's very little need to design your own or even pay for designs to print. If you have a need, there's sure to be someone else out there that had the same need and released a design. You can browse through printables, thangz, makerworld, or thingiverse to name a few to see what you can find.

In terms of hardware, this is a whole other can of worms. You have your fanboys/fangirls who swear by 'their brand' but it will require some time investment on your end to determine what product/brand offers you the best balance. Do you want a machine that is endlessly customizeable and upgradeable? Prusa is probably top on that list. One that offers decent capacity while being low priced? Elegoo won me over there and I used (and continue to use) the Neptune 4 Pro as my first printer. Do you want a 'works-out-of-the-box' experience like an Apple? Then go full out and look at Bambu Lab.

I started with a value oriented Elegoo Neptune 4 Pro because I didn't know if this 'hobby' was going to work out. When I realized I spent more on filament than the printer, I knew I wasn't stopping. Took a few more years, but I ended up upgrading to a Bambu Lab H2D recently because I was tired of constantly troubleshooting and tuning the Elegoo. I still use it, but it's more for non critical prints whereas the Bambu Lab H2D is fully kitted out with several AMS's to enable multi-material and multi-colour prints.

It's definitely a rabbit hole (and sorry for hi-jacking the thread) but like said above, things are all over the map. If you want some suggestions to get your started, I'm sure people in this thread: https://www.f150lightningforum.com/forum/threads/3d-printing-fun.19620/ would be more than happy to help!

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[bc1]

Thanks guys. This shouldn't be a hijack as this thread is about 3D printing things for the Lightning. This forum has a separate place for people to place ads to sell something but I'm assuming the OP isn't doing that.

I looked around and saw one Bamboo X1C on sale for around 865 bux. Looks like a roll of filament in one color can run around 14 bux or less if bot in bulk. I see the Neptune 4 Pro on Amazing for about 300 bux. That's about all I'd want to pay for a hobby that the wife will complain about a large object on the shelf somewhere collecting dust. Already have plenty of those such as former 300 to 500 buck inkjet/laser printers are laying around ready for the dumpster.

Right now just an interest but I don't have any projects in mind. I do manage to break a number of plastic things that I wish I could duplicate sometimes. That would probably require some type of 3D viewer or something that could copy an object and make it out of plastic. I could probably come up with a number of projects if I could lay an object somewhere and duplicate it such as a plastic case, screw, etc. For example if I had a receiver hitch and asked it to print another one just like it. Maybe there is something out there but probably not in my price range.