QIDI TECH Shadow 6.0 Pro 3D Printer, UV LCD Resin Printer with Upgraded Matrix UV LED Light Source, Dual Z axis Liner Rail, 2K HD LCD Screen, 5.11‘’(L) x2.75‘’(W) x5.90“(H) Printing Size

I have long wanted to get a resin printer, to test the quality, dimensional accuracy, and hardiness, among other things.I have had this printer for a few days, and have already printed almost one whole 500 g container of resin.I have not noticed a strong smell, and it is fairly quiet.The instructions are a bit hard to understand, there are some issues both in the booklet that come with it, and with the video, however putting it together was very fast and not hard.There were no instructions on how to actually put the resin in, or other things that someone who never used a resin printer would not know how to do. But this is also available with some internet sleuthing.The quality of my prints are SUPERB. It looks like the actual 3d file, there is no visible digital artifacts.The software they recommend is not bad, and the supports they have created have worked for me, and removing them was not difficult (you may have to do some light sanding for supports.The print bed is bigger than previous models, but also fairly narrow. This is something to take note of if you are expecting to print a medium sized print that is uniformly distributed.To get started printing right away, you WILL need resin. I recommend trying QIDITech resin, however their white resin post-cures (i'll get into this) a bit beige.Once you set up your printer, installing the vat (carefully not sliding, as to avoid scratches) and the mirrored build plate, you will need to level. Leveling is under tools, under manual, and then once it is set you can rezero the Z index. The leveling firmware was a bit buggy for me, it would only let me level after homing, but I was able to overcome that. You want to very slowly (use small z steps) as to not slam into the screen, level the printer, so that a piece of paper (included) has some resistance when removing. I had to loosen the build plate some since I was experiencing non-uniform pressure across the plate.There are two bags for filtering the resin fumes in the machine that look like they are for removing, but are actually to filter the air.Once all of this is done, you can lower your build plate manually so that its somewhat in the vat, give your resin a little shake, and pour in your (UV 3d printer) resin. You probably want to pour about 1/3 - 1/2 full of the vat. Remember that when the build plate submerges there will be displacement of fluid. You can use the provided pre-sliced 3d voronoi piggy bank (too small to be an actual piggy bank, but you can find a properly sized model online) to test printing. this took about 3 + 1/2 hours (i havnt quite figured out what drives the time of models like this, but i believe it has to do with height of the model, and not actual amount of material). You can also download the slicer Chitubox, and load in a model. I found the slicer easy to use, you can enter in your printer, and change the resin settings to be within the frame recommended by your resin, which requires some experimentation to achieve good builds with as little time as possible. I altered my resin settings slightly for longer first layer cures and shorter subsequent layers. I also like to hollow my print, put some holes in the print to allow resin in the hollow model to pour out, orient as much as i can on the plate safely, remove the bottom supports, and change the rest of the supports to light (then generate the supports, slice, and put the sliced model on a usb file). Once this is done, use the gloves to remove the build plate, and use the provided tools to try and pry the model off. The model prints upside down. Be careful to not get resin on your skin, and try to keep a clean and ventilated workspace. If you are printing with supports (for a different model) now, or after the alcohol bath, would be the time to remove them (instead of after post cure when the model is much harder). Once you have cleaned your model using either isopropyl alcohol, or some other cleaning solution (you may choose to do this in an ultrasonic jewelry cleaner if you wish, or to skip this step entirely). You can then cure your model even more. I bought a uv protective acrylic case, and a little spinner, but there are lots of post curing solutions on amazon. You can even leave it outside. Using a uv light to finalize the print makes the print much stronger and better. So at a minimum you should buy, some Resin (grey shows a lot of detail) Isopropyl alcohol (and either a plastic pickle container or an ultrasonic jewelry cleaner). A UV light (and possibly a case to shield your eyes from the harmful semi-uv light, its not the same spectrum that will give you a bad sunburn but its close to it.) I also use some 3d-printing tools like pliers and cutters and some sanding gear, as well as crazy glue and uv curing glue. Nitrile gloves, a mask (which everyone has these days) and a small plastic funnel might be good buys too. I am soon going to try out a second vat for changing out colors of resin soon. Cleanup is a bit more involved than with other types of printers. Dont scratch your UV display, try not the scratch the FEP film or the vat. Run the printer with the top on, you can always click pause to see the print halfway (printed upside down) and to add more resin. Try not scratch the build plate either, although it happens. There can be leftover resin on the plate in between prints, but try to remove any cured material. Also, there will eventually be failures in any 3d prints, however I have printed a wide variety of things so far, and have had really only one minor failure. Overall I highly recommend this printer for the price.Update, after printing for a few more days, I want to re-emphasize the important of ventilation or a filter system. Also I finally had a totally failed print, that printed ON the FEP film of the vat. Luckily I had bought extra FEP film and was able to replace it faily easily, (take about an hour)

First thing I have to say is how great Qidi tech support is, very fast response, even over weekends, they are comprehensive and thorough, coherent English, they even follow up to make sure your issue has been resolved! The way tech support should be! (I didn’t need to contact them about this printer, I bought another one used of the same brand and had some issue with it... fantastic support, very pleased.)Next, to qualify one of my ratings, 3D printing in itself isn’t geared to the beginner, but this printer is easy to use, and has consistently high output quality without requiring a lot of user effort or knowledge.Now in hopes of helping other beginners, some things that did not seem highly intuitive to me...1. The Z axis is the largest dimension. So the output hangs down up to almost 6” from under the build plate. The Chitubox software does some annoying automatic scaling, rather than refusing to slice, which can waste a lot of time.2. You must go into the supports tab in chitubox and click a button to add supports to your models. The actual supports are generated automatically but only if you push the button. Without them your model will be something between warped and saggy to unrecognizable, unless it is small enough to lay on the build plate.3. Different resins need different exposure times, I really like the Siraya resins but they require a little bit more than the default, which is apparently based on the Qidi resin (which costs about 25% more and doesn’t come in as many different types and colors.)4. When you pry your model off the build plate, hold onto the plate itself, not the adjustable shoe that holds it on the printer, otherwise you will have to re-level the build plate every print5. The resin is nastier than I thought it would be, you might as well order a box of gloves with this printer, you’ll need them.6. You’ll also need alcohol to clean up your prints. For whatever stupid reason, ethyl alcohol is illegal in Cali, where I wish I didn’t live. Luckily isopropyl alcohol (IPA) also works, you’ll want at least 90%, 100% works better. (Some resins say you can use 15% alcohol with them, haven’t tried them yet.)7. A complicated model (in this case, 5 separate parts all on the plate) that uses nearly all of the size capacity takes more than 14 hours to print. I’m using almost 140 mm of the 150 mm max, some models might take a little longer to print, since each vertical layer takes more time to print. But again the resin I use needs a longer exposure, you might cut print time by 20-25% by using a different resin.8. If the printer isn’t on a level surface some prints may be distorted. (That actually is fairly intuitive, but thought I’d throw it in anyway.In conclusion, I’m pleased with this purchase, it does what I need it to do, it’s well built, and in combination with industry leading tech support, it’s hard to go wrong.

The positive reviews about the support and price on this product are what drew me to purchase a QIDI Tech 6.0 Pro for myself. The product arrived quickly. We setup the printer and noticed that the allen screw on the platform was too tight to level it. The platform was already leveled but we wanted to be sure. Support at QIDI quickly sent us a new platform and a free FEP film( acts as the base of the resin vat and allows UV through. Can get smudged over time. ) The new platform arrived 3 days later. We have successfully printed several creations so far. Very pleased with the product.A note to beginners, there are some support materials you will need for any resin printer to make your experience smoother. I advise getting a small plastic tub and filling it with a roll of paper towels, latex gloves, funnel, two pans, metal scraper, mythl alcohol and a high quality face or gas mask. All of these items go into the process of repouring the left over resin back into the original container, cleaning the resin vat, scraping off the printed parts and cleaning the printed parts while wearing the mask.

After a negative experience with support on another brand of printer, I was pleasantly surprised by the after-sales support I received from QIDI TECH. My printer experienced an issue with the screen, but I had a near instant response from support via Skype and the replacement part was shipped immediately. I was pleased to note the part had been shipped on a rapid delivery service, so my wait was minimal. In comparison to the response I received from another manufacturer of a similar printer, the after sales service was nothing short of incredible. The Shadow 6.0 Pro is a great printer and is delivering excellent results. It's easy to use and the build quality is far superior to my other printer. Unfortunately, the hobby 3D printing market is full of companies who offer nil or negligible support after the sale, so it's been great to find a company which looks after their customers.

I Just wanted to say that the after sales service with technical issues has been excellent and really prompt (probably more important for novice users like me).

Works out of the box. Had an odd noise from machine on every startup, Amy from Qidi sent out a replacement part after 1 contact via email.Part swapped, machine is great, great prints every time.

Great little printer. High fidelity, reasonable print speeds.Worked well straight it if the box but with some tweaking of settings (mostly exposure time and layer height) you can get even crisper detail than youd expect.Amazing little printer that really out does itself