So I received the Z-axis upgrade a few weeks ago... A little over 1 week from order to delivery from the UK to the East Coast of the US.
Installed it in a little over an hour after dinner that day and proceeded to test it out over the next few days.
It's a VERY robust unit, well made and relatively easy to install, even for those that aren't super mechanically inclined. It came very well packaged to prevent damage. The instructions on YouTube are very clear and concise, follow those and you won't have any issues.
At first, the prints I was doing were only printing with minor improvement over the original Z-axis assembly. Had some self inflicted issues with the FEP, then finally got things squared away.
With a lot of help from Chris333 of this Forum, who sent me a few files that he had sliced and printed on his printer, I was able to print off some really great prints. Most of the issues I was having were related to the design of the parts, too thin a wall thickness for to high a part, as well as a few other issues.
Chris' parts printed great, with no bad features, waviness or odd artifacts. I've since printed a few of my own parts with great success.
Did this upgrade "fix" my problem? Hard to say, as I'm not sure I had a problem to begin with, at least one related to the mechanics of the machine. Did the upgrade give me "piece of mind"? Absolutely. I now know that the mechanics of the machine are sound and any issues I have with prints are self inflicted. I don't question the machine if I have an issue.
Was it worth the ~$160? For me, yes... Piece of mind is worth that much to me. It also gave me the confidence to stockpile parts (new LCD, a bunch of FEP) and get even more resin, as I think I'm going to get a lot of use out of this machine.
