The the hottest thing in the 3D printing industry is currently undoubtedly Bambu Laboratory—and rightly so. In an otherwise stale consumer additive manufacturing (AM) market, Bambu Lab is leading the way with real innovations like active vibration compensation, Input designand print speeds that are staggeringly fast. Combine this with an Automatic Material Station (AMS) that allows multi-color printing and a very competitive price, and it becomes clear why Bambu Lab has become this way the company to beat.
One of the company’s newer offerings is this P1S, which is supposed to be a cheaper variant of the flagship X1 Carbon. At 3DPrint.com, We wanted to put the P1S to the test to find out what the printer is all about – and whether it lives up to the hype surrounding the Bambu Lab name. After weeks of testing the P1S, here are my thoughts.
Unpacking and setting up
When you get a P1S, the first thing you need to do is unbox and set up the printer. In addition to a range of tools you will need to get the device up and running, the printer comes with a booklet that shows you step-by-step instructions on how to properly unpack the printer.
The process itself was more difficult than I would have liked. Essentially, it involves removing sets of screws that hold parts of the printer in place during transport, installing tubing, and even connecting the LCD screen to the device’s front circuit board. Since I have a lot of experience using 3D printers, I consider myself quite talented. However, I found the process to be a bit confusing and difficult at times. All in all, it took me between 30 and 45 minutes to get the system up and running.
Once the printer and AMS are connected and ready to use, connect to the P1S using the company’s Bambu mobile app. It will help you walk through the setup process, which includes a full self-diagnostic test as well as some active vibration compensation tests.
From then on, things are mostly smooth sailing with the P1S.
Bambu Studio and printer user interface
If you want to start printing with the P1S, you have two options: either connect to the printer using Bambu Lab’s slicer software, Bamboo Studioor you can choose from a range of printables pre-installed on the device.
Overall, working with Bambu Studio was a pleasure. Although the interface can be laggy at times, the layout feels intuitive and gives you a lot of control and insight into the printer’s status and operations. Camera advance, while slow, is acceptable for the purposes of an affordable consumer printer.
One of the P1S’s biggest drawbacks is the user interface (UI), which is a low-resolution 2.8 monochrome LCD controlled via a D-Pad. Once you get used to it, it’s workable, but it’s quite clunky and awkward. It generally feels antiquated compared to the rest of the machine. Luckily, the Bambu Studio and Bambu Handy applications are quite comprehensive, so you could probably forgo the interface altogether if you wanted to.
First printing: Benchy
Like any good 3D printing enthusiast, the very first print I made with the P1S was a Benchy.
Although optional, every single print on the P1S begins with automatic bed leveling, which adds about five minutes to the process but ensures consistently high print quality. Printing with Bambu Labs PLA at standard speed, the Benchy took about 25 minutes to print and came out as good as any Benchy I’ve ever seen.
From left to right: Standard mode with Bambu PLA, Ludicrous mode with Bambu PLA, Ludicrous mode with third-party PLA.
Then came the part I was waiting for: Ludicrous Mode. Printing the same benchy again, but this time at the printer’s highest speed, was beyond impressive. This time the entire printing process took about 12 minutes, and the speed at which the tool head moved and deposited the material was simply mind-boggling. I’ve literally never seen a printer move so fast – I couldn’t believe it at times.
What was most impressive, however, was the printing result. When comparing the same Benchy in Ludicrous and Standard modes, it appeared that there was little to no impact on print quality. While it’s very likely that Bambu Lab has heavily optimized their machine specifically for Benchy printing, it’s still an extremely impressive result.
Multicolor printing and AMS
One of the greatest joys of using the P1S was the AMS, which is simple and easy to use. All you have to do is place the filament in one of the four slots and insert the filament into the opening. The AMS and printer work together behind the scenes to automatically load the material for you, making the process as straightforward as possible.
With a four-material AMS, the P1S is able to achieve this Multicolor printing. The color tool in Bambu Studio allows users to select which parts of their model should be printed in which color. The difficulty level of the tool varies depending on the model you are printing. Some of them allow entire areas to be colored simply using the fill tool, others require careful drawing of lines and boundaries – sometimes to the point that it is no longer feasible or worthwhile.
A three-color PLA print on the P1S.
When you get a successfully colored model, the system will do the rest for you. The AMS automatically changes materials and colors as specified in the slicer software, so you don’t have to do anything other than wait for the print to finish.
The biggest disadvantages of multicolor printing in my opinion were the filament waste, some errors that occurred, and the longer printing times. Every time the material is changed, the machine expels a significant amount of plastic, which is ejected from the back of the printer – a rather crude but simple and effective solution. Additionally, the biggest problems were occasional errors in switching that caused printing to stop. These errors are usually resolved by instructing the printer to retry the media change.
Overall, printing with multiple materials is straightforward and fun, but requires a significant amount of time to complete your print.
Third Party Materials
What I particularly liked about the P1S was its ability to handle third-party filaments. Although Bambu Lab has its own line of materials that it recommends, in my experience using third-party PLA had no noticeable impact on print quality or speed.
A three-material print with tree supports, consisting of two third-party materials and one Bambu material.
This even extended to multi-material prints, using a combination of Bambu Lab and third-party filaments in a single print. Here, too, there were no visible defects in the final quality of the part. As long as your third-party material fits into the AMS, you’re good to go.
Otherwise, you can load the filament into the printer sideways using the external spool holder. However, this prevents you from using multiple materials with the rest of the AMS.
It’s worth noting that my testing only consisted of PLA, although Bambu Labs claims to also support other materials such as ABS and carbon fiber.
Final thoughts
The question of what makes a good 3D printer is quite controversial and varies from person to person. For some, dimensional accuracy is the most important factor. For others, it could be the print speed. Some may ignore PLA printing entirely and only care about industrial and engineering grade materials.
I think no matter what your definition is, it’s clear that the Bambu Lab P1S is a very good device that serves its purpose as an affordable yet powerful consumer 3D printer. Although it has its drawbacks, namely the inferior interface, its printing capabilities are extremely impressive and its printing speed can be a bit difficult to understand. All in all, the combination of speed, quality, ease of use and price make the Bambu Labs P1S a highly recommended printer for anyone on the market
