Monoprice MP Select Mini Glass Bed Upgrade
The Monoprice MP Select Mini Build Surface
The Monoprice MP Select Mini V2 3D printer comes with a BuildTak-like (it is not branded so I do not believe it is genuine BuildTak) surface on the build plate. Out of the box, this surface works great. It offers great adhesion for just about all the material’s I’ve thrown at it including PLA, ABS, Nylon (with the addition of some glue stick), and metal-composite materials. In fact, if I have any criticism of the build surface, it is that sometimes the adhesion is too strong, requiring parts to be forcibly removed from the surface.
The quality of the build surface is one of the reasons I have been satisfied with the Monoprice MP Select Mini overall. However, after a couple hundred hours of printing time and over 50 printed parts, the surface on my Select Mini started to break down. The corners of the sheet lost some of their adhesion and started to peel off the aluminum plate underneath. The surface also became smoother, loosing some of the rough surface that allows parts to hang on to the surface.
Replacing the BuildTak-like Surface
Fortunately, the surface can be replaced. I chose to replace mine with genuine BuildTak. I simply peeled the old build surface off the bed, cut a sheet of BuildTak to the correct size, and stuck it onto the printer.
However, while this worked well initially, after only a dozen or so prints, this happened.
As you can see, the part I was printing warped quite badly, but not in the usual way. The part did not separate from the BuildTak, rather, the BuildTak itself peeled off the bed. The crazy part is that this part was not printed with ABS, this severe warping is occurring with PLA. However, I do not believe this is the fault of the BuildTak material.
When I removed the original surface from the build plate, it left a significant amount of adhesive residue. You can actually see some of this residue underneath the BuildTak in the photo above. I believe that the BuildTak did not stick because of this leftover glue. I could have removed the residue of course, but that would have required the entire build platform to be removed, cleaned, reinstalled, and the printer leveled again from scratch. I simply got lazy.
So, now that all the steps needed to clean the adhesive off the build platform need to be done anyway, I thought I’d try replacing the BuildTak with a glass surface instead of just replacing the BuildTak again. This post covers the process of removing the BuildTak material from the MP Select Mini’s aluminum build plate, cleaning the build plate, and installing a glass print surface, along with the results of printing on glass.
Get a Glass Sheet for your Select Mini
Because it will take a couple days to arrive, the first thing you may want to do is order a glass sheet for your MP Select Mini. The glass should measure 130 x 160mm and the corners of the sheet should be cut off in order to allow access to the leveling screws with the glass in place. You also want to use Borosilicate glass because this type of glass is specifically formulated to undergo rapid changes in temperature without breaking. I just ordered the part from Amazon.
Remove the Build Surface
The first step towards installing a glass build plate on your MP Select Mini is removing the printing surface, the stock surface with which the printer ships, or the BuildTak if you’ve replaced the stock surface like I did. There is nothing complicated about removing the build surface itself. Simply use a scraper, like the one you might use to free prints from the bed, to loosen a corner of the printing surface (mine was loose already). Then you can simply peel the material off the bed. This will take some effort as the adhesive is quite strong.
Once you get the build surface off the bed, you will probably be left with a good layer of leftover adhesive.
This will also take some effort to remove. I tried a number of different ways to remove the adhesive: isopropyl alcohol, a scouring pad, a razor blade, paint thinner. But product I found to be the most effective is Goo Gone. Just apply a liberal amount of Goo Gone
You can see that I surrounded the build plate with paper towel in order to avoid getting the glue/Goo Gone slurry on the printer.
After a whole bunch of scraping, your build plate will be free of all that gross adhesive mess.
Install the Glass Bed
Alright, now, at long last, we can install the glass plate onto the printer. This is really easy. First of all, installing the glass bed on the MP Select Mini is obviously going to result in a print surface that is closer to the extruder than the BuildTak surface. Therefore, we will need to re-level the bed. The good news is that the bed leveling screws have plenty of extra height to accommodate the glass bed. So, what you will need to do is tighten all four leveling screws as tight as they will go; in other words, the aluminum heated bed will be as low as it can go.
Then, simply place the glass onto the aluminum build platform. Secure it in place using a binder clip on each corner. You should fold the handles away from the bed so that they do not impede the nozzle during a job.
Level the Bed
The final step after installing the glass bed is making sure it is level again. There are numerous tutorials all over the place for this process so I will not repeat the steps here. Simply loosen each corner of the bed until a piece of paper is just contacting the nozzle when positioned near each corner.
Results
The performance of the MP Select Mini on the glass build surface has been superb. When printing with PLA in particular, the glass plate is a great upgrade because parts adhere well to the glass heated to 60oF without any kind of coating or preparation of any kind. So no tape, no glue, no juice, no hairspray. You just heat the bed and print your part.
Another great benefit of the glass bed is how easy parts are to remove. When the bed is hot, PLA sticks very well. But, once the glass cools down, parts simply pop right off.
Furthermore, because the glass does not require any tape or other coating, there is no cleanup to do or glue to reapply. You can get right into your next print job.
Overall, upgrading the MP Select Mini to use a glass bed in place of the default BuildTak option is a fantastic choice. Your prints will turn out better with less effort and less cleaning.