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63 About this deal
Does this actually matter that much to warrant an entire new device? It does matter because you get more pixels in the same area (as the first Photon printer), so the models should be far more detailed (there is a huge difference between 2K and 4K). And if the price remains roughly the same, then the Anycubic Photon Mono 4K should be a great replacement over the roughly five-year old resin 3D printer. The resin vat itself had a few surprises that caught me off guard, but were welcome changes from the typical featureless rectangular vat that I was expecting. For one, the vat has a graduated volume legend embossed directly onto the walls which lets you determine the rough amount of resin in the container with just a glance. It also has a pour spout (and a lip) on one corner, which means that the process of pouring resin out is a much cleaner operation than with a hard edge which liquid will spill over and get onto the bottom of the FEP film. When you look at the model itself, it could actually be printed flat on the build plate because there aren’t any parts of the model that overhang much, meaning that it has enough support built within the model the whole way through. The Photon Mono did not have a fan despite having some cut-outs that may suggest otherwise and it seems that the manufacturer has kept the Mono 4K fanless as well. This does mean that it should be more silent, but you will still be able to hear the movement of the elevator (Z-axis). The good news is that it’s surprisingly quiet, with just that characteristic low-volume squealing noise – since the Anycubic Photon Mono 4K will not end up in your bedroom (a garage is the more likely room), it won’t matter that much how noisy the printer is.
The average between over 80 user submitted normal and bottom exposure times for the Anycubic Photon X (4K monochrome screen) was a bottom exposure time of 15.6x the normal exposure time. The best exposure time ranges from 6-14 seconds for standard resin 3D printers with a 2K LCD screen, while powerful 4K monochrome screens can have exposure times from 1.5-3 seconds depending on the color of the resin and the printer’s UV power. The Photon Mono 4K has both high power for fast printing and low power for longer printer life. The resin printer supports 30-100% UV power settings and can be adapted to resin printing with different UV energy requirements to meet your personalised printing needs.
Resin 3D printers will differ in what settings work best. Some of the resin settings change with the change in resin brand and color as well, but most of the settings are ideal for almost all types of resin and application.
A layer height of 0.05mm against a layer height of 0.1mm would double the number of layers for your model, meaning your print times will significantly increase. Changes in the structure or design of the model can harm the model’s strength and integrity, and it can also result in a print model with visible surface lines as well. There are quite a few lifting and speed settings with resin 3D printing, but a good value is something that is fairly slow. People tend to go with a lifting speed of 1-3mm/s or 60-180mm/min. Lifting distance is simply how far the build plate raises up from the FEP film after each layer is cured. Anycubic Mono 4K uses a monochrome grid with a contrast of more than 350. The high contrast makes the image in the exposure area more accurate and the print margins more sensitive, which improves the print quality and success rate and significantly reduces the residue in the resin container.
If you have wondered how to calibrate your 3D printer resin, this is an ideal way to get it done. Resin exposure calibration or a resin calibration test is what people do to properly dial in their settings. By including their Photon Workshop software with the Photon Mono, Anycubic has clearly put work into the out-of-the-box experience for new users. However, I did find the software somewhat limiting, and I preferred using the Chitubox software that runs natively with the Elegoo Mars 2 Pro.
A layer height of 0.25mm is a perfect mix between amazing quality and a fairly good printing speed. Best Exposure Times for Resin 3D PrintingAn ideal light-off delay setting is quite hard to come up with because it depends on your 3D printer. General settings tend to fall between 0.5-2 seconds, so I’d take a mid-value of that, being around 1-1.5 seconds. You want to avoid having a light-off delay too low because it is known to reduce the overall lifetime of your LCD due to overheating. Have a read of my article Best Orientation of Parts for 3D Printing for more details. Best Light-Off Delay Settings
Photon Mono 2 is equipped with a laser-engraved aluminium alloy platform. This features outstanding flatness, which greatly improves model adhesion and therefore printing success rate. The laser-engraved platform prevents the model from falling off or warping. In some cases, you can even hear the suction from the FEP film with every lift. You want to have a fairly low lifting speed to be on the safe side. Many resin 3D prints have failed due to a fast lifting speed, which is not worth the reduction in printing times. If you use image blur for the same water ripple model, ChiTuBox found that anti-aliasing + gray level 4 + image blur 2 + possibly an increased exposure time works the best. Prints generally felt like they took less time to print, and usually wrapped up around the 3-hour mark. However, upon comparing the specifications, the Photon Mono 4K has a print speed of 1.97 in./hr, whereas the Photon Mono performs at a MAX of 50mm/hour (1.97in./hour). So, it seems like they technically operate at the same speed. With that being said, the specifications of the Photon Mono state that it can print at 50mm MAX, which leads me to believe that it isn’t always consistent or might be slightly slower. The Photon Mono 4K is also delivering much higher detail, which is worth the upgrade in my opinion. If you’re going to have to wait the same amount of time (maybe slightly shorter), then I would rather get more detail out of the unit. Final ThoughtsLight off delay is how long the printer keeps the light off before curing the next layer, though the true light off delay time includes the total time for the up and down movements of the build plate. The connectivity options for our two contenders are identical, with both limited to a lone USB port.
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