Creality Original Ender 3 Direct Drive Upgrade Kit, Comes with 42-40 Stepper Motor Hotend Kit, 1.75mm Direct Drive Extruder Fan and Cables Support Flexible TPU Filament

The media could not be loaded. So I’ve waited to review this product until I had a good amount of time to test and determine its reliability and performance. I’ve had it installed and running for a week now and run through about 6-8 prints.The Sprite SE kit is actually pretty good for a budget inspired upgrade.Remember this is NOT the Sprite PRO.Note: This was installed and running on an Ender 3 V2.I wanted to upgrade to a direct drive extruder because I wanted to print more TPU 95A. As you know pushing TPU through a Bowden tube is like pushing wet spaghetti in a straight line. Even though I have had some success with TPU in a Bowden tube before, it caused some issues I’d really like to avoid in the future, hence the upgrade to direct drive.Installation: The instructions, as limited as they are, give sufficient enough information to be able to install the Sprite SE within 30 minutes or so (may take longer if you are not very experienced with the machine).I did run into a small hiccup while installing where the bottom roller on the extruder frame got lop-sided and became loose and wiggly causing all sorts of problems off the get go. I went through the set up again and finally discovered that somehow, the offset spacer on the bottom roller was opposite of what it should be. After fixing the offset spacer, by rotating into its correct upright position, the roller frame finally sat snug and tight against the X-Axis rail.I continued the installation steps and got to the part where you have to “write and save” your own G-Code to recalibrate the firmware extrusion E-Steps. Default is 93 in the Extrusion e-step settings. The change needs to be made to Esteps/mm value to 424.9.**Newbies don’t get scared at this point!Just open a blank notepad on Windows or Mac and copy/type in the text exactly as they have it on the instructions. Then you insert your micro SD card into your printer and run the g-code as if you were going to print that file. Nothing happens, it just configures the esteps and temporary saves it in the firmware.Another issue I ran into was that the Ender 3 V2 firmware DOES NOT save the new estep setting if you turn off or disconnect power. You will need to run that file each time you start up the machine. That’s when I learned that if you flash the firmware and install Jyers firmware you can run that estep reconfig once and it saves it indefinitely. Nice, plus installing Jyers is easy and really awesome, wish I would have done that a year ago. It has great features that really should be in the default Creality firmware.Now after all that, the direct drive works great and does what I wanted it to do in the first place.It runs all sorts of filament types and makes changing filaments easy and fast.I have been using it to do color changes mid print as an alternative to buying a multi-color printer (for now). Filament color changing is easy enough to do and setup in Cura Slicer via change filament or pause at height script.I hope this long winded review helps some of you looking to upgrade. I wanted it to sound simple enough and intuitive, that new users wouldn’t be afraid to go for it. It was a minor pain to get running perfectly but after some time and tuning, it’s working great now.I do recommend this Sprite Extruder SE kit if you’re looking for a modest and budget friendly upgrade.Happy printing folks.

I directly added this to my Ender 3-v2. Works well, I had to look up how to "retune" the firmware for this new setup, and all of it took many hours as I am not a very smart guy, but I enjoyed trying my hand at this conversation and happy I did. Nozzle/hotend is same as Ender 3 and ender 3-v2 just red anodized instead of silver look. Performance difference, zero, but allows a bolt on direct drive, that is the advantage of the Bowden tube factory setup with is also great, but DD is great for TPU filament

I bought this so I could began printing tpu. I was shocked at how well designed and built this assembly was. I usually refrain from doing printer upgrades because I hate having to do extreme, hacks to my printer (changing firmware, cutting or modifying the circuit, cutting or modifying the frame, modifying the belts). This piece is super easy to install onto the frame, If you loosen the bottom wheel, your old one will slide right off and your new one will slide right on, this is nice because you dont have to take your frame apart. I like that all the cables match the originals and there are no extras. Snap a picture of the circuit board before disconnecting your original, look at the picture and copy it with the new one! No looking at schematics, or having to solder and heat shrink. I like that the cable utilizes the original frame notch for securing. I like that the extrutruder cable is an extension to the original. You dont have to mess with the braided sheathing and take a chance at messing it up, you just plug the male end of the extension , to the female of the original. This keeps the printer looking good because your still concealing the majority of the cable in braided sheath. The MTA connector connecting two can only be plugged in one way and feels tight and snug. The head is fully assembled with a .4 nozzle, the head feels strong, and durable, bearings feel good. The images are right after I installed the head. Re-leveled my bed, and this is the first print to come out, it was my test print. I only made ONE change, I adjusted the temp up 30 degrees up to 250. No other printer changes or slicer changes. With as good as this part was designed, I plan on checking out other OEM Creality upgrades. I give this an A+ and cant wait to try other OEM upgrades.

Print quality diod improve , it is quieter , No moe stringing . I like it and would recomend it . Now the bad , The extruder gear set screws came loose in the middle of a 36 hour print and the gear walked too far and the filament slipped off the gear ruining the print . i was able to fix the gear and retighten the set screws( I have seen other people saying the same thing so If you get this check the set screws!) No other trouble with this unit at all , very smooth nice layers !Install is not "easy" and its not hard but it is tight in the box where you need to remove and replace wires and Ender hot glued the terminals and taped the harness . You need to gently remove the hot glue and take the tape off harness. All in all took about an hour . Vids say 10 minutes ....No ,I am happy with this upgrade , happy to get rid of the bosan tube . Prints do seem sharper with no stringing .

This works great on my Ender 3 v2. I would say that it's the best upgrade I have done so far. I printed a bracket to hold a tube from my filament dryer to the top support, then let the filament drop direct into the extruder. It now feeds clean, has less retraction, and allows more precise prints. After months of printing with this I don't see any extra wear on the gantry rollers either.