I love 3D printing, my wife says I’m obsessed actually, but I enjoy it a lot and today I’ve got another 3D pen for review from a company called 3Design. The pen is well made, it’s simple to use and load and it can use PLA or ABS type filaments but best of all it can be powered by a standard USB port. Read on to learn more…

Specifications and Features

  

  

 

The pen is rectangular shaped but the edges are rounded for comfort. The pen is seven inches long, .75 inches high and .5 inches thick. The left side has two buttons for forward and reverse of the filament and to load and unload it. You can double click the buttons to make them stay on to make loading easier and two make using it for long periods of time easier as well. The right side has a slider button that is used to slow down or speed up the filament feed speed.

 

 

On the top of the pen is an OLED display that shows which type of filament you’re using, ABS or PLA, and it also displays the temperature. Next to the display is two buttons labeled with a plus and minus sign to adjust the temperature.

 

 

On the back of the pen you’ll find two holes, the one of the top is for the power connection on the USB cable and the one on the bottom is to load the filament. The front is the tip that gets hot where the melted filament comes out.

 

 

The bottom of the pen just has an ID label on it but the bottom can be removed is need be to fix a jam or change the tip.

 

I’ve used the 3Design 3D pen for several projects, one was just a rather simple penguin for my son who likes them but then I also made Wall E from the movie which took a long time to make. The pen works very well, it’s simple to load and it’s very comfortable to use.

  

 

Conclusion

I’ve very much enjoyed my time with the 3Design 3D pen, it works very well with either PLA or ABS filament and you can create most anything you want with it, the limits are just your imagination.

One of the things I love about the 3Design pen is that it’s USB powered, you can use a USB battery pack to make the pen mobile to be able to use it anywhere. One small issue is that the pen uses a proprietary power connector, not sure why they couldn’t have just use a common microUSB connector.

They do include five small rolls of filament with the pen, but there’s not much really, you can play with the pen and make some small items but you’ll want to get more filament.

The pen tip can be changed if need be but they don’t include any and I can’t find anywhere to buy them online.

All in all I can highly recommend the 3Design Pen, it’s very well made, easy to use and load, and it’s just really a lot of fun.

Pros:
+USB powered, can use USB battery
+Simple to load
+Fun to use
+Simple to use
+Uses PLA or ABS filament

Cons:
-No extra tips included
-Uses proprietary USB power connection
-Not much filament included

 

Grading	Scores Out of 10
Overall
Design / Aesthetic
Value / Price
Performance / Usage

Disclosure: This product was given to me for review by the company for review purposes only for free or at a discounted price.

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