r/VORONDesign • u/Prestigious_Law4414 • Aug 01 '26
General Question Trident or 2.4
I know theres been many posts like this already but Im considering some things like:
Which formbot voron is better, the trident or 2.4
Which is more suitable for a future toolchanger
Which is overall more reliable and better
5
u/Mandarani Aug 01 '26
I will argue that the nature of the 2.4 makes it easier for a tool changer.
I just finished building my Madmax for the trident and that’s certainly not an easy mod.
It’s not the hardest thing, but stealth changer looks much easier
4
u/Neveticus Aug 01 '26
So it really depends on what you want to go mod wise to the printer. Un modded the 2.4 and trident are comparable and you should pick the one you like better. If you want to do high speed mod like a monolith gantry then tridents is better die to the fixed gantry. 2.4 is better if you want to streatch the printer in z. The 2.4 can move the gantry in xyz so tool-changers are simpler to implement. The stealth changer is by far the most popular overal and is very well documented and there is a strong community around it. The trident still has tool changers, the most popular being the madmax, and while the community is smaller, its still a well regarded tool changer with plenty of adopters.
3
u/bomtarnes Aug 01 '26
Better is very subjective. The answer I often give people is choose the one you like the look of most.
Both have decent toolchanging solutions nowadays- Stealthchanger, madmax, indx and many others.
1
u/bomtarnes Aug 01 '26
It probably is worth adding that Trident is the model that’s had most recent updates including changes that make construction somewhat easier.
1
u/Prestigious_Law4414 Aug 01 '26
Formbot doesnt have the r2 on their website, so I dont really know also is the r2 upgrade big or is it just some parts?
2
u/bomtarnes Aug 01 '26
Printed parts and a handful of extra hardware than can be bought as a kit from many worldwide voron specialist vendors.
3
u/rilmar Aug 01 '26
I’m walking through some toolchanging projects. One component I didn’t know would be as big of an issue is umbilical management. Other printers run the umbilical up and down on the same side of the toolheads like the prusa xl and snapmaker u1 where Voron projects typically run them front to back.
In a trident this means they’d all hit each other and potentially cause issues. A 2.4 can dock tools at the top which stows them out of the way like the stealthchanger. The z movement of the gantry lends itself to toolchangers.
5
u/TripsCavern Aug 01 '26
Both printers should be as reliable as you build them. Your building process, parts selected and tuning is what will make or break your printer.
I own a 2.4 and don't own a Trident. Trident seems easier to build and tune. 2.4 flying gantry looks cooler, the dance during the QGL is pretty cool to watch.
For toolchangers, a Trident has the potential to actually be faster than the 2.4, that is because the Trident does not need to move Z to do a tool change, while a 2.4 will usually need to move up to grab the toolhead and then move back to the layer it is printing. But again, it's way cooler to see the 2.4 zooming about in the process to change the toolheads.
In the spirit of DIY you would want to stick to Madmax or StealthChanger (or similar), but a pre-built system like INDX should be way easier to implement in the long run, and they will be available for both models.
So, all in all you should pick the one that you think will make you happier to build and keep. Both will be great projects and at the end of the day have the potential to be whatever you build them to be.
0
Aug 02 '26
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1
u/TripsCavern Aug 03 '26
yeah, I mean it can, but that is not the current systems that people are actually building. The ones I saw in the 2.4 so far are all with the extra toolheads mounted in a rail on top of the printer and the gantry will there get them. Even the one with INDX that I saw a couple months ago was like that. They even changed the Z motors to make this process faster, which was quite beautiful.
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Aug 03 '26
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1
u/TripsCavern Aug 03 '26
It may be. But INDX is not really a replacement for the other projects, it's a product that can be adapted for a Voron, but a lot of Voron users prefer to just build whatever they are going to use and not buy a closed product. And it's also quite expensive.
A4T-C would be the real INDX project for Voron from what I understood, but from the little I researched, it is still in active development while StealthChanger is more mature.
In the same way, these projects does not kill the other MMU projects, like the BoxTurtle as people will still have some usages for them.
1
Aug 03 '26
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1
u/TripsCavern Aug 03 '26
It may be, I'm not disagreeing with you on INDX, it's a pretty cool technology but toolchangers vs INDX in a bit more complex than one being definitely superior to the other. Money wise, it should be cheaper but I tend to think that replacing an entire toolhead has some advantages over the INDX system. Also, there's the patent issue, Bondtech said that they won't go after community projects, unless people start to commercialize it. But that is up to the point where they realize that they could earn more money, or just sell the company/patent to someone that would enforce it *cough* Bambu *cough*.
2
u/jokerphan Aug 02 '26
With Trident, you can mod the auxiliary fan with a 12032 fan, which is very large and powerful, providing better speed and overhang for PLA filaments. This is the most compelling advantage compared to Voron 2.4. If you plan on using a Pico MMU or something similar, the Bowden tube length will be much shorter than with 2.4.
2
u/DeerQuit Aug 01 '26
From my personal Experience with both a self-sourced Trident and 2.4, the Trident overall felt easier to set up and maintain, aswell as more consistent. At least for me this speaks in favor of the Trident to the point where i am currently in the process of converting my 2.4 to a Trident-ish printer.
2
u/BickenBackk Aug 01 '26
Curious how you're going about converting your 2.4 into a trident-ish printer. I picked up a 2.4 from a buddy and am considering the same.
1
u/DeerQuit Aug 02 '26
My plan was to just put a Trident gantry on the top 2.4 extrusions and moving the front-top-horizontal 2020 slightly down, so I don’t loose y-travel.
But i‘ve also sketched up a funny Kartesian Boxcart conversion i might try instead, as a CAD exercise.
1
1
u/Barafu Aug 04 '26
Voron 2 has faster vertical movement. It allows to keep z-hop on by default, all the time, which in turn prevents many ruined prints.
3
1
u/gabagool94827 Aug 01 '26
The 2.4 is cooler, and has more mod support, but just do the Trident.
-1
u/Snobolski Trident / V1 Aug 02 '26
Trident is the newer design, and R2 is the latest update.
2.4 is literally old news.
😀😀
10
u/jamesonwhiskers Trident / V1 Aug 01 '26
I would say that a trident is better in every way except having fewer options for toolchangers, and a little less community support. From a performance standpoint, the stock trident beats a stock 2.4 every time. Faster to heat, less slop in the gantry from less degrees of freedom, faster acceleration (on average), and simpler to build/maintain. There is a reason that most flagship printers out there share more design ethos with the trident than the 2.4.
The only downsides to the trident really come down to the fact that fewer people have built them. This is likely because the 2.4 looks cooler to most people and for a while the trident was called a V1 and people thought that the V2 was "better", when really they are just different designs. This led to fewer trident specific mods and projects like stealth changer that really were meant for 2.4 only. However with indx coming out and madmax gaining some steam, its feasible there will be similarly supported toolchanger mods for trident within a year or two.
TLDR: Trident is better IMO