By now, the 2020 Olympic Games should have been done and dusted, but oh no, some pesky virion has put that on ice. Frustratingly, this has prevented us from enjoying our quadrennial opportunity to see a bunch of amateurs attempt to jog, jump and jiggle their way to some highly auctionable metallic disks.
Like an uncollected child after school, unfortunately, we have to make our own entertainment in the meantime. Maybe even our own competitions. Using our imaginations, we’ve come up with one just now, actually. It’s called the Big Resin Race for Glory.
Yes, the starter pistol is loaded and ready to be well and truly fired on the “BRRG” (we should copyright that), with manufacturers racing to get big, new resin printers across the line and, well, onto some sort of consumer-approved podium, we suppose.
A few printers already entered into this event. Anycubic’s Photon Mono X is signing autographs as we speak, the Peopoly Phenom is being drug tested, the Epax E10 Mono can’t believe it’s here, and Elegoo’s Saturn is hiding in its hotel room. You can read more about those fellas here in our Best Large Resin 3D Printers Guide.
More big resin competitors are arriving by the day, and the next one to put its rubbery feet in the blocks is the Creality LD-006.
We’ve managed to do a little scouting for you on the new competitor, putting together this report that includes mentions of things like 4K resolutions, air purification, 60mm/h printing speeds, and, wait, what?! A resin vat that might be an actual person?! Curious? Do yourself a scroll down.
Features
8.9-inch 4K Mono Screen
Yeah, that’s pretty big. At 8.9-inches across, the screen in the Creality LD-006 should allow us to make some sizable prints. Like many new resin printers today, it uses a 4K monochrome screen, so it is possible to produce some lovely details on your prints, and the screen should live a long, healthy life too. To put it in numbers, the 3840 x 2400 pixel-sized screen translates to an XY-accuracy of 50 microns. Not a world record attempt, but tied with the competitors.
Print Space
We think the motto of the Big Resin Race for Glory would be “Big resin, big fun!” The LD-006 goes perfectly with that, given that it has a 192 x 120 x 250 mm print area, which is really quite a lot.
For reference, that’s a lot more than the stage-frightened Elegoo Saturn, a bit more than the charming Anycubic Photon Mono X, and nowhere near the Peopoly Phenom, which is an absolute mutant.
4.3-inch Color Touchscreen
Most of us nowadays are used to jabbing a screen to get things done. Most manufacturers of everything in the entire world have noticed this, so it’s perhaps no surprise that Creality has, too, installed a nicely sized 4.3-inch jab-station with which to tell the LD-006 what you want.
Fast Printing
Creality says the LD-006 will top out a maximum speed of 60mm/h when printing. Well, print speed isn’t everything, and many factors play into it, but with the monochrome screen, layer curing times of 1-4 seconds will be the norm, which should get it over the finish line pretty quickly.
“Stable” Z-Axis
If you’re going to buy a printer, you’d expect your Z-axis should be stable anyway. Creality is making a bit of a fuss about this, though, telling us that the Z-axis in the LD-006 is really very, very stable indeed, thanks in large part to dual linear guide rails. Shrug.
“Humanized” Resin Vat
This is where it all starts to get a bit weird. The resin vat in the Creality LD-006 has been “humanized,” leading us to believe that it’s possible it may have feelings, dreams, hopes, and fears. As a result, we’re going to be very nice to it here as we don’t want to upset it.
Basically, Creality has put a liquid level line in it, and vat stands should help prevent release film from being damaged. It’s probably not sentient, but if you think it could be, please email us, and we’ll have a little bet with you.
Price
Nothing official yet, unfortunately. Looking for clues, though. Anycubic’s Photon Mono X (which is very similar to the Creality here) is priced at around $750. So, in the interest of wanting to undercut a rival, we’d fancy the LD-006 to come in under that, but there’s nothing official yet. It’ll be more than the $499 asking price of the Elegoo Saturn (good luck finding one to buy), though, simply because it has a far larger Z-axis print volume.
Conclusion/prediction? We can see you paying somewhere in the region of $6-700. A couple of websites have it at around the $700 mark already, but it’s early days still.
Release Date and Availability
Again, nothing official to report here, but we know it’s in its final stages of development, so it probably won’t be long before you can put an order in for one. At least it’s not a Kickstarter, though, hey?
Tech Specs
GENERAL SPECIFICATIONS
- Technology: LCD
- Type: Resin
- Year: 2021
- Assembly: Fully assembled
- Manufacturer: Creality
- Country: China
3D PRINTING SPECIFICATIONS
- Build Volume: 192 x 120 x 250 mm
- Layer Height: 10 microns
- XY Resolution: 50 microns (3840 x 2400 pixels)
- Z-axis positioning accuracy: 0.01 mm
- Printing Speed: <60 mm/h
- Bed-Leveling: Semi-automatic
- Display: 4.3-inch touchscreen
- Third-Party Materials: Yes
- Materials: 405 nm UV resin
SOFTWARE REQUIREMENTS
- Recommended Slicer: Creality Slicer
- Operating system: Windows, Mac OSX, Linux
- File types: STL
- Connectivity: USB, WiFi
DIMENSIONS AND WEIGHT
- Frame dimensions: 325 x 290 x 500 mm
- Weight: 14.3 kg
- Boxed size: 430 x 400 x 600 mm
- Weight (packed): 15.8 kg
Similar Machines
We’ve mentioned a couple already, but here they are again in handy list form. For more information, feel free to check out our Best Large Resin 3D Printers Guide.
Anycubic Photon Mono X
We’ve tested this printer and found it to be capable of producing some really good quality prints. It’s basically the first large, affordable resin printer that got out there and one we’d be quite happy to recommend. When it’s our turn to test the Creality LD-006, it’ll have to see if it can beat the X.
Elegoo Saturn
If the Elegoo Saturn was a friend of yours, it would be the friend who you love spending time with. Good, right? Well, no, actually, because that same friend is also the one who never turns up to social events, doesn’t text you, and could be in Bali for all you know.
Announced in early 2020 it yet awaits roll-out of more than a few testing units. Having had our hands on one, we really liked the printer, but it could already be lapped by the time it shows up to the race.
Epax E10 Mono
Unfortunately, we haven’t been able to test this printer out ourselves just yet. Still, it has a pretty tasty spec sheet, virtually identical to the Creality in this article, but with one noticeable difference – it’s compatible with different screens.
Epax will be releasing a 10.1-inch 5K screen for it sometime in the not too distant future, so even greater detail will theoretically be possible.
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