The future of 3D printing?

I do think that the media has over sensationalised a lot of the recent news about 3D printing. Its hard to agree with the argument that intellectual property infringements is a risk given that 3D printing has been available for so long. Even for the masses it's possible to buy items from 3D printing services for the price of a takeaway meal.

The recent developments I've seen in this area are those which should make it more mainstream rather than hardcore nerd.

• A greater range of printers that are just plugged in and are ready to go.
• Printers that take a memory card and can print without a printer.
• Also new materials such as wood based filaments and glow in the dark filaments.

Colour is not to be dismissed either, although full colour printing is not quite there yet there are more colour options and techniques such as tiedied colours.

The 3D printed gun I also think is a bit of a non event. The design behind that could have been made using more traditional machining techniques such as a lathe and mill and the print quality is still not quite there for people to make one at home and have it work correctly.

There has also been a few new services partnering printer owners with people needing prints made opening up over the last year. This could be many people's intro to 3D printing or via a service such as Shapeways.

makie.me is an interesting development where they are using 3D printing to produce a customised model for people. I'd be surprised if there are not a more of these customised products appearing over the next few years.

3D printing has a very long way to go before it is a useful mainstream production rather than short run/prototype technique. I got quite excited by the Stratasys Mojo printer but when I looked more closely it's still a filament extruder with only a 5" cube envelope. About £6000.

I think it's the cheapest (how shall I say this nicely) ready to use machine from an established and experienced supplier.

If you want something bigger or better (like laser sintering) you are very quickly over $100,000.

These machines are still slow and can only handle a very limited range of materials.

I looked recently at making an instrument case by printing, if the finish from the Mojo (or similar) is good enough it might work out for small volumes (few 100s per year)  (you can get nice curves that CNC machining from solid struggles with) but I fear that extra finishing operations like smoothing and painting will push the cost up.

I don't buy into the "everyone will build their own stuff" concept, even if I had a complete set of parts I don't fancy putting my next car/washing machine etc together myself.

MK

http://www.inc.com/magazine/201305/sam-wagreich/just-press-print-the-new-industrial-age.html

>3D printing has a very long way to go before it is a useful mainstream production rather than short run/prototype technique

It might never be suitable for mass production, it's the short run / "everything is custom" is where it can excel.

I also agree that it won't be a case of everyone building their own stuff in the same way that everyone does not cook their own food.

I personal believe that desktop 3d printers can and will help in more then just engineer/hobbiest prototypes with a low buget. As the technologie evolves we've started seen a drop in the cost of desktop 3d printers and finding ways to me high quality smoother prints. I also think they can be used in third world countries; from printing out cases for water fillers, cups, spoons, cantines etc. As for the infringment/intellectual property it's going to be like anything on the internet. We will always have a site like "thepiratebay" hosting 3d files that big companies cring over. As for wepons being printed it's something that will always happen with new technologies and I honestly don't see anything wrong, human beans like to do things just to see if we can, it's in our nature like andy said you can build a weapon pretty much out of anything, the only down fall is how the weapon is used. I do see a day when a desktop 3d printer will being in homes like paper printers are today. but that's just my 2 cents on the mater.

F/S

@ Andy,

My browser (Firefox) blocked that page (---inc.com----- as an "Attack Page"

MK

When I look at 3D printing I see a very interesting tool for everyone with an inquiring mind.

You now have a device that can make just about anything you can imagine so that you can look at usability issues and assess size and weight issues.

Beyond that, I saw several really good posts where the 3D printer model was used to make castings for metal parts, which is very very interesting.

Think about a colony set up at a remote location, or planet, where you can essentially build any part of your system if it should break.

You could also experiment with variations of parts in a nice controlled way.

I also like the possibility of using large versions to make concrete housing.  Just enter the style you want and the 3D printer will make the structure using pliable concrete.  For single floor dwellings, you can proabably even get by without rebar.

So I think it is still very early to assess the full range of 3D printer uses.  We have just begun to think about the utility of the technology.

The size and scope of the models built will also change as we experiment with different materials.  Just imagine what you might build out of carbon fiber, nanotubes, molecules, atoms, subatomic particles, etc.

The more we use the 3D printers, the more uses we will find.  Many new technologies will be invented and innovated.

These devices are just too cool.

Just my opinion,

DAB

Michael,

here's just the text from that page which is blocked.

Sam Wagreich | Inc.com staff Apr 30, 2013

Just Press Print: the New Industrial Age

3-D printing technology is all the rage. How useful is it for your business?

In his State of the Union address earlier this year, President Obama argued that 3-D printing could "revolutionize the way we make almost everything." His speech echoed a sentiment that has been gaining traction among entrepreneurs and techies for some time now.

Three-dimensional printing, also known as additive manufacturing, has been around since the late 1980s and has produced some exciting advances. Companies in the industry have printed aerospace parts, industrial manufacturing equipment, and even human stem cells. One company is working on a technique to print functioning human organs. Although all of this is promising, 3-D printing technology still has a long way to go.

The industry is poised to grow to $3 billion globally by 2018, up 56 percent from 2012, according to a study by the market research firm Global Industry Analysts. So far, big companies have dominated the sector.

"If you're talking about using 3-D printing for actual finished products, it's really aerospace and the medical industry driving most of this growth," says Terry Wohlers, president of Wohlers Associates, a firm that provides consulting services to the 3-D printing industry.

The average 3-D-printed product costs roughly $4 a cubic inch to produce, according to Wohlers. Generally, it's cost effective to print only items that can be produced in low volumes with high markups--such as airplane parts or hip replacements. When it comes to more commoditized items, such as children's toys or the casings for TV remotes, mass-scale injection molding in China is still significantly cheaper.

At this stage, prototyping seems to be the most effective 3-D printing application. Stratasys is an Eden Prairie, Minnesota-based manufacturer of high-end 3-D printers that allow companies like BMW to innovate on the fly. For example, BMW uses Stratasys printers to create new thermoplastic tools for its assembly-line workers. The tools are more lightweight and ergonomic than traditionally made tools.

"Being able to print new components for their factories as fast as they can innovate is already making manufacturing firms incredibly agile," says Bruce Bradshaw, Stratasys's director of marketing. "As a result, companies will be less tempted to outsource manufacturing to places that lack the expertise to use this type of technology."

Matthew Tran is the co-founder of Boosted Boards, an electric-skateboard manufacturer based in Sunnyvale, California. He is fortunate enough to share office space with a robotics company, which has given Boosted unfettered access to a number of 3-D printers. The company used 3-D printers to generate a plastic enclosure for an early prototype of the skateboard's hand-held remote controller. "You get the part within hours, depending on what size it is," says Tran. "If you had to machine that part, it could take a couple of days."

To some degree, even businesses that don't have access to industrial 3-D printers can still take advantage of the technology. Start-ups such as MakerBot and Formlabs have introduced a number of consumer-level 3-D printers that cost less than $3,000. The consumer models don't offer the same precision and features that industrial printers do, but entrepreneurs can still use them to create parts and components of finished products.

Wohlers offers a tempered vision of 3-D printing. "It won't be bringing back manufacturing to the U.S. in the traditional sense," he says. "But it's going to lead to a whole host of new business models and a different way of thinking when it comes to start-ups."

That trend has already started. Last December, Staples announced a partnership with 3-D printer manufacturer Mcor Technologies to provide 3-D printing services in Staples stores. Down the road, small companies could sell digital files for their products online. Customers would print their purchases at the local 3-D print shop and have them delivered to their homes that same day.

So will 3-D printers produce just about everything one day? That's a long shot, says Bradshaw of Stratasys. "There's a lot of talk that eventually your mom is going to have a 3-D printer in her living room," he says. "I just can't see that happening."

DAB, I'm looking into using 3D prints for casting aluminium parts. Firstly as conventional patterns for sand casting in ABS but it would be also interesting to build structures in PLA to be burnt out by the hot metal. A RepRap expert at IMakr advised me that this smells a bit like popcorn when burnt.

http://www.workshopshed.com/2013/05/3d-printing-pattern-for-sand-casting.html

Andy,

The post I saw was from a guy with fifteen years of casting.

If you try to burn out the PLA, you get noxious gases, some poisonous in closed spaces.

Also, you get uneven burning, which could spoil the casting.

Everything I have seen indicates that using the wax method is the only cheap and reliable way to sand cast a metal part.

If you check the web, I saw a good post on how to make your own "machinable" wax for use in a CNC application.

So do a lot of research before you try to do this.  It is very dangerous.

DAB