As part of my bonus this year I decided to purchase some upgrades for my Creality CR-10S printer. These include a new controller board, new bowden tube and connectors, a new part cooling fan and a new build plate. These were all purchased from TH3D and are currently somewhere between Chicago and my house.

As a result of these upgrades I am going to have to print a new cooling duct to fit the 5015 cooling fan hence the facelift as the hotend of my printer will look a little different after the upgrades.

I will endeavour to print a benchy after each major change to show what, if any, difference the upgrades have. My current expectation is that I will get minor improvements from the controller board and the bowden tube. Will be really interesting to see what, if any, difference the fan makes. I am only replacing the fan because my stock one is really noisy. I don’t expect the change to the build plate to make much difference at all, although it will remove the scratches that turn up on prints from my current plate.

Watch this space for links to each of the upgrades as they are completed.

At the moment I am planning on performing the upgrades in the following order:

• Replace current glass/PEI build plate with new flex system including magnetic base and flex plate with PEI sheet
• Replace heat block insulation with silicon sock and also swap out the bowden tube with new tube and connectors
• Replace print head fans, both print cooling and hot end cooling. Will need to print a Petsfang for this
• Replace controller board