Sovol's M1D: an IDEX printer with a tool changer, chasing clean multi-material on a budget.
Sovol's M1D pairs dual independent extruders with a swappable second head for up to seven materials - and almost no purge waste - from $1,399. Here's the catch.
Sovol, the value-FDM brand, has announced the M1D - and it's a genuinely unusual machine: an IDEX printer (two independent X carriages) that also has a tool-changing second head. Sovol claims it's the first to combine the two, and the goal is multi-material and multi-colour printing without the giant waste pile that AMS-style systems produce.
What it is
One head is fixed; the second swaps in around five seconds, so the printer can pull from up to seven different filaments without cutting and purging between colours the way a single-nozzle multi-material system does. Being IDEX, it can also mirror or duplicate - running two copies of a part at once. Build volume is a roomy 300 x 300 x 350mm, with quoted speeds up to 600mm/s and camera-based print monitoring.
Why the no-purge bit matters
If you've used a Bambu AMS or similar, you'll know multi-colour prints generate a startling amount of wasted filament as the nozzle purges between colours. A tool-changing/IDEX approach largely sidesteps that, so for multi-colour work the M1D could be far cheaper to run per print - and over time that running-cost saving offsets a chunk of the up-front price.
What it costs
Pricing is pre-order: around $1,399 to VIP reservers, $1,499 super-early-bird, $1,799 at retail, via Kickstarter. There's no confirmed UK price yet, and as with any crowdfunded import you should factor in VAT and possible duty on top of the dollar figure - so budget above a straight conversion.
What it means for you
For a UK maker who does a lot of multi-colour or multi-material work and resents the waste, the M1D is one to watch - the running-cost saving is the real story here, not the speed numbers. Temper it with the usual crowdfunding caveats: it's a new, mechanically complex machine (IDEX plus a tool changer is a lot of moving parts to get reliable), shipping and UK support are unproven, and 'first to combine' also means first to debug. Promising - but it may pay to let the early backers find the teething problems first.
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