(Image credit: Tom's Hardware)
One thousand Prusa CORE One INDX Founder’s Editions have shipped, giving a lucky few first access to Bondtech’s revolutionary toolchanger mod. The Founders Edition is a special limited run, intended for early adopters and Prusa fanatics.The INDX toolchanger promises multi-material printing without the headache of prime towers and massive purge waste. Since toolchangers have a dedicated nozzle for each filament path, they don’t need to clean out the nozzle between color or material swaps; however, they do need to “prime” the nozzle to make sure the filament is flowing at the right pressure. Before the INDX, this meant printing a smallish, unavoidable prime tower. The INDX has been precisely tuned to purge only tiny crumbs of waste into an internal tray, then wipe the nozzle on a silicone pad.
(Image credit: Tom's Hardware)The INDX, invented and patented by Bondtech, uses an induction heater to rapidly bring each nozzle to temperature in a few seconds. This allows the Prusa Core One with INDX to have some of the fastest color swap times we’ve seen.Tom’s Hardware was sent an eight-tool kit so we could share our first-hand experience with the INDX. It took the better part of a weekend to strip down our existing CORE One and modify it. This involved completely removing the Nextruder, replacing it with the INDX carriage, then mounting a rack to hold the eight tool heads. Eight spool holders were mounted on the sides, using preexisting screw holes. A calibration sensor was mounted to the front corner of the build platform, and an internal waste catcher was installed.
