Anycubic Vyper Kliper upgrade, is it worth it?

General Discussion
1

Grumpy old Newbie alert. Run, run away.

I have been running an Anycubic Vyper for just a bit over a year. It has been pretty good machine, running almost 24/7. One reason I am looking to upgrade, Vyper #2 had a pretty big blow out. It had a clog, a bad clog, it blew the Bowden tube out of the extruder, then pushed a bunch of filament through.

I have to take it apart, replace several parts, do a few upgrades, new fans, direct drive mod with better shroud, ducting, bi-metal heat break, thermistor, all metal extruder may as well just go all the way, get the new parts, print the new direct drive mount on Vyper #1 and upgrade firmware to Kliper.

It looks like the Kliper upgrade will be around $200.00. The Berry pie 4.0 4gb, power supply, cables, housing, fan, heat sinks, monitor, frame, Micro SD cards and what ever else. As the machine is in a different room, I do need a screen next to the printer. That way I can watch the first couple layers, run the setup, calibration’s.

In the life of 3D printers, the Vyper is an old man. Would the money be well spent on installing Kliper? Would it be better spent on a new, bigger better printer that has Kliper?

When I start to put Vyper #2 back together, I want to flatten the magnetic sticker, it has ups and downs in it, you can see them if you hold a straight edge and put a flash light behind the straight edge. Then assemble so everything is 90-90-90. I know the tower is not square, it is wider at the top than the bottom. I will also add a diagonal support from the top to the rear to help support the frame.

I do understand the basic rules, cheap is not easy, easy is not cheap. I have been a DIY since before it was called DIY.

I have a post on 3D print, these two forums look a lot alike, if they are brothers, sisters, in the same family, please delete.

Thanks.

Dorky Doo

2

After upgrading a handful of older generation printers myself, these days I think it’s a questionable choice to do so. With machines like the Infimech available at such a low price point I think you can get more bang for your buck that way. You seem to want a new printer anyway and you probably still will after upgrading the Vyper.

I’d just put a half decent hotend in the Vyper and get it functioning again and buy the hardware for Klipper as it comes on sale on Ali express. The Btt Pi 2 comes up on sale quite cheap at times and they work great for Klipper. The raspi 5 is overkill in my opinion, they work great but they cost too much for me to justify using one on an older printer.

I’ll never go back to Marlin after using klipper, so for me it’s pretty much essential on all my printers. I just try to do it as cheaply as possible and and only do the bare minimum to the machine it’s running on so it’s a reliable work horse. It’s a mugs game trying to turn a Volkswagon into a Porsche, sure you can achieve similar performance gains but I think that money is better spent on something closer to what you want from the outset.

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Thanks. Sort of what I figured. Not that I “WANT” or as my Mom told me so very often, when I was little, " I NEEED" a new printer, I just see they have twice the size, twice as fast for a bit more than I would spend on upgrades.

I have done lots of work on old cars, taken apart to every last nut and bolt, clean, primed, painted everything, put new modern parts in, drove like a new car, still did not handle or run as well as a modern car.

Berry Pie set is around $80.00 to $125.00usd, plus the parts to fix it, if I shop around, $50.00-$75.00, if I get it all at one place, $100.00-$125.00 I saw the Berry Pie 5’s, laughed, yeah not for this project.

This shows you how much of a junk collector I am. I found an “OLD” Apple laptop in my bone yard. It is charging right now to see if it even works. Would I still need the Berry Pie if I have the that?

Can you run (2) printers off (1) Berry Pie? In an article I read about doing the upgrade, it was talking about how small a load this is for the Berry Pie, you could run (4) printers from just one. It did not go into “how” you could, just said you could.

I was just going to get a replacement hot end, it is $19.00, then add the bi-metal heat break. What hot end would be better?

Thanks.

Dorky-Doo.

4

I’ve been using BTT Pi 2’s lately, Aliexpress has them on sale all the time. With the BTT pi 2 you boot them once from an SD card and transfer the OS to the onboard eMMC (flash rom) and then they run from that and you can remove the SD card.
They have them for sale now for about $63 AUD which is roughly $42 US.

Not sure about the laptop I have done it with linux on a laptop but I’ve never tried with an Apple. You can run multiple printers from one Pi as long as you don’t attach too many webcams or other accessories.

I’ve been using a Bambu knockoff hotend on my bed slingers lately, they aren’t a super high flow hotend like a Revo or a clone but they’re more than good enough for a bed slinger. I print at about 150mm/sec and push it up to around 200 at times and they’ve never missed a beat. I use CHT nozzles and compared the previous generation hotend they’re a cut above.

I’m not sure if it’s appreciated to post links to products here, I’m sure someone will remove them if it not wanted.
BTT Pi
https://www.aliexpress.com/item/1005007013383692.html?utparam-url=scene%3Asearch|query_from%3A
Hotend
https://www.aliexpress.com/item/1005005193902909.html?utparam-url=scene%3Asearch|query_from%3A&search_p4p_id=202407100012308672067764522180002520954_5#nav-description

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Thanks for the links, is there an adapter needed to mount that hot end on the stock Vyper mount?

To put it together with a new shroud, direct drive, new hot end would be around $35.00. To upgrade to Kliper, better hot end, $140.00, with touch screen $200-$225.

Thanks.

Dorky-Doo

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