iTulip consensus on 3D Printing?

[EJ]

Re: iTulip consensus on 3D Printing?

I agree. That said, and while the "at home" models continue to develop, places like shapeways.com may serve as a production bridge for producers/creators (currently mostly hobby pieces, trinkets, accessories).

Using a 3D printer one can print an object in "stainless steel." This fact might lead the techno-enthusiast to think one might some day be able to print a real firearm versus the 3D plastic zip gun that blows up in your hands that has gotten so much press. But printing in 3D is not forging nor lathing. The 3D printer glues grains of metal together; the finished output of the printer is only as strong as the glue used to hold the grains together whether they are made of metal or plastic. In ten minutes in the plumbing, lighting, and tools departments of Home Depot one can collect the parts for a reliable and lethal zip gun that can never be made on a 3D printer. Not in 10 years or 100. But the project will not capture the popular imagination.

When you think of a 3D printer ask, What can I make out of sand and glue? Prototype parts and rough ones at that, but this can be quite powerful if the machine being designed in conceptually complex.

[RebbePete]

Re: iTulip consensus on 3D Printing?

Things I've made on my 3D printer (all designed in OpenSCAD, except for the angel and toroid clamp):

• Cover for outside vent, complete with grating
• Rain barrel tap for downspout
• Decorative angel for a friend's garden (downloaded from Thingiverse)
• Pole-mounted mulberry picker
• Cap for olive oil bottle
• Old-fashioned bathtub drain plug
• Stand for a small fan for power supply testing
• Clamp to hold down custom-wound toroid for switching power supply (designed by mechanical engineer in Inventor)

It's a Solidoodle 2, and I've only had it about two months. I'm still on my original spool of thread.

A 3D printer is one of those things that opens up possibilities the more you have it and the more you use it. It's a different mindset, and my understanding is still evolving.

Projects I'm considering:

• Knee brace for our older dog (price for commercially available version: $300 )
• Chassis for small robotics
• Enclosures for various electronic gizmos

It's been a lot of fun, but I agree that we're at the hobbyist in the basement stage. What's needed is better software (particularly easier to customize standard designs), a wider range of materials, and better use of double-head or even triple-head machines so the design of fabricatible parts wasn't so tricky (overhangs are to be strongly avoided!).

[c1ue]

Re: iTulip consensus on 3D Printing?

Things I've made on my 3D printer (all designed in OpenSCAD, except for the angel and toroid clamp):

• Cover for outside vent, complete with grating
• Rain barrel tap for downspout
• Decorative angel for a friend's garden (downloaded from Thingiverse)
• Pole-mounted mulberry picker
• Cap for olive oil bottle
• Old-fashioned bathtub drain plug
• Stand for a small fan for power supply testing
• Clamp to hold down custom-wound toroid for switching power supply (designed by mechanical engineer in Inventor)

Can you give an approximate materials cost and printing time cost for the above items?

If design was involved, a rough estimate of time spent on CAD.

[RebbePete]

Re: iTulip consensus on 3D Printing?

Printing time ranged from about 20 minutes for the olive oil bottle cap to about three hours for the outside vent cover (it was for a 3 inch pipe). Material cost is hard to estimate per piece - one spool costs about $45, and, like I said, I'm still on my first spool. The vent cover was the most expensive, since I went through about five revisions of it. I'd say that maybe cost about $8.

Design time went from zero for the angel (since it was downloaded) to about five hours for the vent cover (it was a very complicated design) and three for the mulberry picker (since I was using it to learn how to do polyhedrals in OpenSCAD).

By the way, you can see the vent cap cover on Thingiverse if you do a search for RebbePete. I haven't gotten around to uploading the other designs, although, by the time you read this, they may very well be there.

What I see as exciting about the technology isn't the printer itself, but the emergence of open source design of physical things. Even though OpenSCAD is quirky and has a relatively steep learning curve, it does provide the opportunity to develop parametized, scriptable designs that can be used as the foundation of other designs. For example, the vent cap cover has a series of parameters at the start of the OpenSCAD file that allows someone who isn't real good at CAD to set up the dimensions of the object and have a good chance of success since the logic in the OpenSCAD script does all the hard math.

[akt]

Re: iTulip consensus on 3D Printing?

Using a 3D printer one can print an object in "stainless steel." This fact might lead the techno-enthusiast to think one might some day be able to print a real firearm versus the 3D plastic zip gun that blows up in your hands that has gotten so much press. But printing in 3D is not forging nor lathing. The 3D printer glues grains of metal together; the finished output of the printer is only as strong as the glue used to hold the grains together whether they are made of metal or plastic. In ten minutes in the plumbing, lighting, and tools departments of Home Depot one can collect the parts for a reliable and lethal zip gun that can never be made on a 3D printer. Not in 10 years or 100. But the project will not capture the popular imagination.

When you think of a 3D printer ask, What can I make out of sand and glue? Prototype parts and rough ones at that, but this can be quite powerful if the machine being designed in conceptually complex.

EJ has this knack of asking the insightful questions when faced with a problem. Thank you once again for pointing out what seems obvious now.

[vinoveri]

Re: iTulip consensus on 3D Printing?

Things I've made on my 3D printer (all designed in OpenSCAD, except for the angel and toroid clamp):

• Cover for outside vent, complete with grating
• Rain barrel tap for downspout
• Decorative angel for a friend's garden (downloaded from Thingiverse)
• Pole-mounted mulberry picker
• Cap for olive oil bottle
• Old-fashioned bathtub drain plug
• Stand for a small fan for power supply testing
• Clamp to hold down custom-wound toroid for switching power supply (designed by mechanical engineer in Inventor)

It's a Solidoodle 2, and I've only had it about two months. I'm still on my original spool of thread.

A 3D printer is one of those things that opens up possibilities the more you have it and the more you use it. It's a different mindset, and my understanding is still evolving.

Projects I'm considering:

• Knee brace for our older dog (price for commercially available version: $300 )
• Chassis for small robotics
• Enclosures for various electronic gizmos

It's been a lot of fun, but I agree that we're at the hobbyist in the basement stage. What's needed is better software (particularly easier to customize standard designs), a wider range of materials, and better use of double-head or even triple-head machines so the design of fabricatible parts wasn't so tricky (overhangs are to be strongly avoided!).

Are you satisfied with the SolidDoodle? Am trying to narrow down purchase options and Solidoodle is cheap - I'd rather use PLA and Solidoodle appears to work with both although ABS preferred (have you tried PLA yet?) http://store.solidoodle.com/index.ph...&product_id=56
Is their their spool unique (can you verify whether or not it works with other spools?)thanks

[shiny!]

Re: iTulip consensus on 3D Printing?

EJ has this knack of asking the insightful questions when faced with a problem. Thank you once again for pointing out what seems obvious now.

"If you want the right answers, ask the right questions." This is why EJ's analyses are so much better than most others: He comes up with different conclusions because he begins by asking the right questions; questions that most people don't think to ask.

[c1ue]

Re: iTulip consensus on 3D Printing?

Printing time ranged from about 20 minutes for the olive oil bottle cap to about three hours for the outside vent cover (it was for a 3 inch pipe). Material cost is hard to estimate per piece - one spool costs about $45, and, like I said, I'm still on my first spool. The vent cover was the most expensive, since I went through about five revisions of it. I'd say that maybe cost about $8.

Design time went from zero for the angel (since it was downloaded) to about five hours for the vent cover (it was a very complicated design) and three for the mulberry picker (since I was using it to learn how to do polyhedrals in OpenSCAD).

By the way, you can see the vent cap cover on Thingiverse if you do a search for RebbePete. I haven't gotten around to uploading the other designs, although, by the time you read this, they may very well be there.

What I see as exciting about the technology isn't the printer itself, but the emergence of open source design of physical things. Even though OpenSCAD is quirky and has a relatively steep learning curve, it does provide the opportunity to develop parametized, scriptable designs that can be used as the foundation of other designs. For example, the vent cap cover has a series of parameters at the start of the OpenSCAD file that allows someone who isn't real good at CAD to set up the dimensions of the object and have a good chance of success since the logic in the OpenSCAD script does all the hard math.

Thanks for the info.

[LorenS]

Re: iTulip consensus on 3D Printing?

Another use I can see for 3D printers is to offer some competition for replacement plastic paneling. Instead of paying an auto dealer for some plastic cup holder or what not that breaks, you could print one out. The problem is, there will likely be IP issues there.

I would like to see this. Maunfacturers put out a lot of stuff that is basically disposable because you can't get repair parts. It would cost them very little to put the CAD files online for many of the most commonly replaced parts (battery compartment cover, for example). This would actually save them money in the long run, my son just returned a $40 device because the battery cover didn't survive it's first use.

As for metal parts, sintered metal can be quite strong. There is no "glue", the metal granules are fused together by heat and they form a metal foam or matrix where the bonds from one granule to the other are small welds where the granules touch. For a gun barrel this kind of structure would be far from ideal, for a trigger or hammer, or even a frame it would be fine.

It's not like "old" technology is so bad, though:

www.smithy.com

[photon555]

Re: iTulip consensus on 3D Printing?

Materials Science will be the key to the progress of this technology. Software, design, and the development of the machine itself can progress rapidly, but new materials and/or modified/adapted materials that enable the output to solve a greater range of problems will need to be developed, and that will take the greater amount of time and research. Thus the consumables will come to limit the applicability of 3DP since they will be patented to protect the expensive R & D required to develop them. As the patents expire or are superseded (or widely licensed) and the advanced materials are widely available at a reasonable price we will see 3DP become ubiquitous. More people will have a home unit but they will not become near as popular as the home computer. Instead you will go to the nearest Home Depot, Lowes, Walmart, or some local store to use their 3DP. And just as today when you have a key duplicated the quality will be determined more by the operator of the machine than the machine itself. I wonder if the store will redo the printed part for free if it doesn't fit or work properly like most stores do today for duplicated keys.

With even more advanced designs and materials we may finally see some Manufacturing on Demand systems set up for relatively low cost applications on a widespread basis. This will offer a previously unavailable level of customization to the average person. When 3DP is taken for granted it will have arrived as a mature technology, of course, but will it be a wholesale change in the way we live or just one more technology that improves our lives incrementally?

[c1ue]

Re: iTulip consensus on 3D Printing?

As for metal parts, sintered metal can be quite strong. There is no "glue", the metal granules are fused together by heat and they form a metal foam or matrix where the bonds from one granule to the other are small welds where the granules touch. For a gun barrel this kind of structure would be far from ideal, for a trigger or hammer, or even a frame it would be fine.

Sintering does work great, but it also requires a great deal of energy. Or in other words, is operationally quite expensive and much more dangerous.

[LorenS]

Re: iTulip consensus on 3D Printing?

Sintering does work great, but it also requires a great deal of energy. Or in other words, is operationally quite expensive and much more dangerous.

My impression was that current additive manufacturing (3D printing) with metals uses a laser to sinter the metal powder into a solid object. I don't think this is particularly high power, though it could be somewhat dangerous. Generally high power lasers are operated at a fairly light duty cycle (100W pulse at 0.5% duty cycle only consumes ~1W average power with a 50% efficient laser).

http://www.optomec.com/Additive-Manu...-Manufacturing
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0nk8wOJQViM
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SYbw1oSzPVA
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zApmGFDA6ow
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i6Px6RSL9Ac

[gbsjls]

Re: iTulip consensus on 3D Printing?

The following site describes on of the many new methods where this will replace hard tooling. A mid size stamping die can cost $1.5 million, if the volume is not there this is a serious option and will only get better. http://gizmodo.com/fords-new-prototy...to-c-659217381

[c1ue]

Re: iTulip consensus on 3D Printing?

My impression was that current additive manufacturing (3D printing) with metals uses a laser to sinter the metal powder into a solid object. I don't think this is particularly high power, though it could be somewhat dangerous. Generally high power lasers are operated at a fairly light duty cycle (100W pulse at 0.5% duty cycle only consumes ~1W average power with a 50% efficient laser).

melting point of resin: about 300 degrees Fahrenheit
melting point of iron: 2,800 degrees F
melting point of aluminum: 1,221 degrees F
melting point of bronze: 1,742 degrees F

You're trying to tell me the metals melting temperature is safe?

[LorenS]

Re: iTulip consensus on 3D Printing?

melting point of resin: about 300 degrees Fahrenheit
melting point of iron: 2,800 degrees F
melting point of aluminum: 1,221 degrees F
melting point of bronze: 1,742 degrees F

You're trying to tell me the metals melting temperature is safe?

The volume of material that is at the melting point is very small. At any given time the feedstock is a room temperature powder. It is much safer than lost wax casting where the metal is poured in. A lot of artists in Colorado work with molten brass/bronze to make sculptures. A 3D laser sintering printer would be much safer.

I guess it depends on your point of view. I started working with a forge when I was about 7. I was arc welding by 8 and had full access to my dad's welder and Oxy-Acetelyne torch by my early teens. So, comparatively speaking, a 3D metal printer is quite safe.

If you have incandescent light bulbs in your house you have metal filaments at well over 3000 degrees in every light fixture. A natural gas stovetop would be even worse.

Plastic is OK for a start, but this technology needs composites and metal to reach full potential and we're well on the way.