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Wednesday
10Mar2010

Changing Prosthetics Forever

DateWednesday, March 10, 2010 |
Daniel Terdiman of CNET news writes a long article describing how 3D printing is "changing prosthetics forever". We've written several articles in this area over the past two years, and now it's become visible in CNET. 
 
Terdiman explains how the combination of amputee soldiers' needs, 3D scanning, 3D printing and individual manufacturing have opened up this field. 
 
Your limbs and other body parts are only yours. They are unique and replicas cannot be found in any mass produced factory. But 3D scanning allows us to capture the precise structure of the limb, either before the incident or by mirroring a surviving limb. 3D printing can then create a physical replica or prosthesis that is an exact fit for each and every amputee. 
 
Is prosthetic usage the "peak" of 3D printing today? Perhaps, but we suspect there's many more astonishing uses we haven't yet discovered. 
 
Via CNET
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Tuesday
09Mar2010

Fashionable 3D Printing

DateTuesday, March 9, 2010 |

A recent post by Core77 described how 3D printers are being used to produce one-off fashion shoes. While we are somewhat skeptical of the fashion score of these particular heels, the idea is interesting: print a newly designed pair of shoes each time you go out; recycle the material into a new pair for the next evening!

We suspect the number of 3D shoe designs might be exhausted within a few months, but on the other hand, there is Imelda.

Here's the interesting thing: the shoe-printing idea seems to have spread beyond the tech space. We noticed a followup article posted on "Diary of a Smart Chick", in the "Fashion" category, where writer Kathryn Vercillo muses on the amazing ability to create fashion right in your own home:

 

These printers have come down in cost enough to be accessible to small and mid-sized businesses today. Wouldn’t it be neat if they eventually come down in price far enough that individual people like you and me could have these types of printers in our homes. One product that we might want to design and print could be shoes.

Could we be seeing the leading edge of 3D printing knowledge starting to hit the mainstream?

Via Diary of a Smart Chick, Core77

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Monday
08Mar2010

3D Printing is Not China on Your Desktop

DateMonday, March 8, 2010 |

A 2008 quote attributed to Chris DiBona, Open Source Programs Manager at Google says: "Think of RepRap as a China on your desktop."

We strongly resonate with that image. Instead of receiving goods from China, which evidently manufactures all things these days, you can drop a 3D printer on your desk and manufacture things yourself. We Want To Do That!

But there are some issues:

  • The build quality of today's 3D printers (at least the semi-affordable ones) is not quite equivalent to mainstream Chinese manufacturers
  • The objects made in China have been professionally designed, tested and safety certified. Are yours? If not, where do you get the right 3D model to print?
  • The build chamber of many 3D printers is smaller than the object you want to print. Therefore you must print parts and then assemble them. In some cases, this could be difficult


But let's assume these and other issues are eventually solved. You have a quality printer, a great design and you can rapidly print out your item.

It's still not China.

That's because the unit price of printing items yourself will never approach the low cost levels of Chinese manufacturers. Your printer will be idle for much of the day, while Chinese equipment efficiently spins 24 hours per day, tended by low-cost staff, producing items at extremely low cost. Home printing can never match China on cost.

And that's the tradeoff we're all faced with: Design choice but expensive, or Inexpensive with limited choice. Choose one.

Image Credit: Joi Via Wikipedia under CC Attribution 2.0 Generic

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Sunday
07Mar2010

Will 3D Printing Win an Academy Award?

DateSunday, March 7, 2010 |
It's entirely possible! Two 2009 films nominated made extensive use of 3D printing in their productions: Avatar, nominated for Best Picture of the Year among others, and Coraline, nominated for Best Animated Feature Film. 
 
James Cameron, the man behind Avatar used 3D printing to produce figurines with which lighting tests were performed for "every shot in the movie". The figurines were produced by Legacy Effects.
 
LAIKA productions created thousands of objects used for extensive stop-motion animation in the movie Coraline. One of the fascinating outcomes was a system to create different facial expressions: 208,000 were possible. 
 
Both projects made use of Objet 3D printers. 
 
Good luck to both films in tonight's show. 
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Saturday
06Mar2010

Purple Platypus

DateSaturday, March 6, 2010 |

As the 3D printer market grows, the sales model changes, too. At first we see manufacturers selling directly, but once established they expand their coverage by partnering with hardware resellers. Resellers are a very effective way to market products within a fixed geographical area because they can be much more attuned to local conditions and practices. Recent talk indicates a growing trend towards resellers.

An example of this is Objet's reseller Purple Platypus, which we think is perhaps the most memorable name ever in the 3D market. They are a regional reseller or Objet 3D printers (primarily the Alaris 30) located in the South West US, serving "Los Angeles, Orange, San Diego, San Bernardino, Riverside, Kern, San Louis Obispo, Imperial, Santa Barbara, and Ventura, as well as Arizona and southern Nevada."

One can imagine Objet and the other manufacturers gradually hooking up with numerous resellers across the globe. They'd have a sales force many times larger than they could ever hope to have on their own.

Via Purple Platypus

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Friday
05Mar2010

The Khan Academy

DateFriday, March 5, 2010 |

During the course of your 3D object design, you might require some knowledge you don't have, or perhaps have forgotten. Don't worry - there's a free service you can use to catch up: The Khan Academy.

It's a website jammed full of great short videos on a wide variety of topics, including many scientific areas possibly useful for 3D engineers: Chemistry, Biology, Linear Algebra, Trigonometry, Arithmetic, Precalculus, Statistics, Pre-algebra, Valuation & Investing, Probability, Algebra, Physics, Calculus, Differential equations and geometry.

There are 107 videos on Physics topics alone!

The site also includes many videos on standard test preparations and financial topics. From their tagline:

The Khan Academy is a not-for-profit organization with the mission of providing a high quality education to anyone, anywhere. We have 1000+ videos on YouTube covering everything from basic arithmetic and algebra to differential equations, physics, chemistry, biology and finance which have been recorded by Salman Khan.


Enjoy!

Via The Khan Academy

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Thursday
04Mar2010

ProMetal's Experience

DateThursday, March 4, 2010 |

ProMetal is an innovative manufacturing company that uses advanced techniques such as additive manufacturing to get an edge. In a wide-ranging interview and analysis, RapidToday profiles ProMetal and their recent challenges:

  • Identifying the right sales channels to meet the market
  • Enabling customized versions of products
  • Keeping consumer costs low


It seems that selling 3D items to consumers is not straightforward.

Meanwhile, it turns out that ProMetal is developing ways to print glass items with 3D printing. We've written about this before, but according to RapidToday, "none appear to be as far along as ProMetal, which has been working on the process for over a year." Check out the glass vase above (hand glazed).

Finally, ProMetal is developing their own 3D printer, the M-Print, intended to be released this year. The M-Print is intended for low-cost metal 3D printing, including iron and bronze and should be far less expensive than high-end competitors who focus on specialized materials or processes.

Via RapidToday

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Wednesday
03Mar2010

Two Metallic Announcements

DateWednesday, March 3, 2010 |

In recent days two announcements regarding 3D metal printing have emerged: Shapeways announced a new material and Materialise released new software optimized for metal additive manufacturing.

Firsrt, Materialise released the "Magics Metal SG" software package that should make life a little bit easier for 3D designers:

Magics Metal SG provides metal AM professionals with a comprehensive build support generation toolbox. This enables build supports to be fully customized and optimized for almost any part geometry. Magics Metal SG contains two new styles of robust build support structures and a range of build support editing tools, all developed specifically for metal AM.

The Shapeways material is "Alumide", which is not totally metal, but it provides a means to produce a metallicish surface:

 

Alumide is White, Strong & Flexible with Aluminum dust mixed in. It is made with the Selective Laser Sintering process. The material has a higher heat resistance than regular plastics. Its melting temperature is above 172 Celsius.. The surface is smoother than White, Strong & Flexible and is a matte grey with speckles of shiny aluminum dust thrown in.

This new material should enable designers to produce metal-like objects at far lower cost than using full metal. Just don't put the object in your dishwasher!

Via Shapeways and Materialise

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