Hey all, I have an item I would like 3D printed, and I really don’t want to buy a 3D printer (and fall down the rabbit hole of printing everything or never touching it again). Are there any places that I can send some sort of 3D drawing to, have them clean it up and print it and then ship it to me? Curious what’s out there, what I should look for, or what I should trust.

There's plenty, where are you located in the world?

US, Texas

My local library has a 3d printer. Might be worth checking out what resources your local one has?

Have you tried to see if there's a local maker space that let's you use their 3d printers?

I run a small 3D print business that mostly does B2B, but I handle the occasional B2C. I charge $15 + 10¢/min for single color basic filaments (PLA/PETG/ASA) for B2C. I'm in Europe though but it could give you a price range idea.

A lot of libraries also have maker spaces now as well -though I don’t know if Texas has libraries

There's also:

!printmything@lemmy.world

Get connected with helpful Lemmy nerds who can print your thing for you. Including, not at all coincidentally, yours truly. (Shill, shill, shill.)

There are many businesses that fabricate one-off parts for individuals through a variety of processes. A lot of them advertise on maker or engineering channels on YouTube. PCBWay is one such business although I’m not endorsing them - I’ve never used any of them.

Luckily I live in an urban, relatively liberal (compared to the rest of the state) area.

I was just being a smart ass, I live in Idaho so, ya know, stones and glass houses

If you have a ready-to-print model, I've found treatstock to be a pretty inexpensive way to order prints.

Slant3d.com I've not used them, but I follow the founders YouTube channel where he has some good 3d printing tips

You could try your local library, if they still allow those in Texas.

My local UPS store has like 5 printers running all day.

There are quite a few in the US. Two off the top of my head are Slant3d and PCBWay. With all of them though, you may have to do some final post processing depending on what you are printing. 3d printing services just print the item, they don't do much beyond that.

I live in San Antonio. If that or Austin are where you're from, many libraries around here have 3D printing available. I'd offer to let you use mine, but I also don't want to invade your privacy online.

Libraries usually have a printer or two you can use.

PCBWay

only for small short prints, and you have to troubleshoot. Better off using a service like PCB Way.