Hi Alan,
Have you thought about one of the "build it yourself" printer "kits" widely available and inexpensive,
I myself started in the hobby with a GEEETech i3 kit, yes it comes from China, and you should always have the power supply checked by a qualified electrician especially if you are going to be working with youngsters, (I am qualified, and I did check it thoroughly)
That being said, this huge box of weird and wonderful bits and pieces accompanied by many nuts and bolts and fixings was fascinating to assemble. The build instructions were detailed, in good English, with loads of pictures, they even supply most of the simple tools with the kit to put it together.
I found that a few things not supplied were needed, but nothing that an Engineer or any good hobbyist would not possess.
1. A decent sized flat table to build it on.
2. An accurate square, a decent woodworking square is fine (I was lucky enough to have an M&W Toolroom engineers square, but that's just being posh, it doesn't need to be anywhere near that precise)
3. a set of long handled ball nose allen keys (not vital by any means but they save a lot of irritation because some of the screws are very awkward
4. some pointy nosed pliers (longer the better) for grabbing some of the awkward nuts.
And that's about it !
The kids will love it, I did ! I'm over 60 and I felt like I was about 14 again, being allowed to build this mad contraption that actually makes real "things"
DO IT MATE
The first time you hear the steppers start clunking and whining and tweeting (and noises I can't describe) The thing starts slowly but surely making solid objects that were just a picture on the computer.
YOU ARE HEREBY WARNED
3D PRINTERS ARE ADDICTIVE ONCE YOU START WITH THESE MACHINES YOU MIGHT NOT BE ABLE TO STOP
(I should know i've now got 4 of'em)
Best Regards, Mark
