The Revo is catching on.
The Revo is a new, advanced line of 3D printer hot ends produced by E3D. The UK company has long been a leader in hot ends and extruders, producing equipment not only used by DIY 3D printer makers, but also embedded into the 3D printer products by major manufacturers.
Their E3D-V6 hot end has become a de facto standard for many devices, as nozzles, mounts and other hardware accept the popular V6.
However, about a year ago E3D announced the new Revo line. The compact and highly effective hot end offered a number of advantages over traditional hot end designs.
One of them is the RapidChange nozzle concept, whereby a 3D printer operator can swap nozzles (for a different diameter or other property) with ease. These are even color-coded for easy identification.
The Revo system also has a new heating design that provides far more balanced heat throughout the hot end, leading to better print results.
While the Revo system is quite powerful, its introduction also required E3D to change their stance on open source licensing, which had been done for their previous products. Basically, they pledged to allow general use by individuals, but reserved the right for commercial production to themselves. This is not an unreasonable approach, but some did not like the move.
That said, how has the Revo been doing? We spoke with E3D representatives recently and learned that the product has actually been selling quite well, particularly the Obsidian version.
E3D has been working with several companies to provide mounting designs for plug and play use with, for example, certain Creality and Voron machines.
This week we also learned E3D has been working closely with Prusa Research on ways to incorporate Revo technology into the popular MK3/MK3S/MK3S+ 3D printers. On Prusa Research’s GitHub page for the latest release of Prusa Firmware, they wrote:
“We would like to thank all of the community members who provided their TM calibration logs with the E3D REVO! This really helped to improve the TM development for PTC/REVO hotends.
E3D and Prusa Research have also started a task force to work on the Thermal Model for PTC/Revo hotends.”
That’s very good news for those with Prusa equipment looking to get the advantages of the Revo system — like leak prevention and greater reliability — on their machines.
The stock Prusa equipment uses an E3D-V6-style hot end, and one might ask whether Prusa Research would ever offer a Revo hot end option. This might be possible, but I have a suspicion the demand may be insufficient for a major offering.
