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Entries in reprap (22)

Saturday

06Feb2010

RepRap Grandchild Produced

Saturday, February 6, 2010 |

Maker Erik de Bruijn has already persuaded his RepRap 3D printer to produce parts for a "child" printer, as have others using the RepRap design. That's one of the main objectives for the RepRap project: a self-replicating machine. This was first accomplished in mid-2008, as we reported then.

On Friday Erik announced on Twitter the next brave step:

It's alive, it's moving, it's alive, it's alive, it's alive, it's alive, IT'S ALIVE! My second #RepRap child! My first RepRap grandchild!

We're not sure if this is in fact the *very* first RepRap grandchild, but it's quite an accomplishment, nevertheless. Erik continues:

It's name is Leo. His father's name is Charles, both from the Darwin family. #RepRap It will be demonstrated at #FOSDEM

FOSDEM is the Free and Open Source Software Developers' European Meeting, taking place today and tomorrow.

Via Twitter

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$100K For a Better 3D Printer!

Tuesday, February 2, 2010 |

The Foresight institute has announced their version of the X-Prize, the Kartik M. Gada Humanitarian Innovation Prize. The idea is to award a hardworking team who can develop a drastically improved RepRap 3D printer design. There will be an interim award of USD$20,000 on December 31st, 2012 and a grand prize of USD$80,000 on December 31st, 2015. The interim award requires teams to meet the following startling characteristics:

Print at least three different materials, including one that is usefully electrically conductive.
The ability to print electronic circuit boards.
Print beds must be of a material which may be reused with minimal refurbishment for at least 20 print cycles.
Maintain a total materials and parts cost under $200 and that 90% of the volume of the printer parts be printed.
Demonstrate a build volume of the printer above 300x300x100mm in order to insure that items daily utility can be printed.
The capacity to print a full set of parts for a complete replica of itself within 10 days unattended save for clearing no more than one printer head jam.
The ability to print autonomously without a PC attached.
Uses no more than 60 watts of electrical power.

If that weren't enough, the grand prize characteristics are even more amazing:

That the cost of the material used for printing does not exceed $4/kilogram.
The capacity to print a full set of parts for a complete replica of itself within 7 days, including the time for reloading, and clearing of printer head jams.
Maintain a total materials and parts cost under $200 and that 90% of the volume of the printer parts be printed.

If these lofty goals can be achieved, it will be a momentous change, as many commercial barriers will have been broken. They're clearly trying to drive the technology to a point where commercial ventures will strongly take hold. Thank you, Foresight Institute!

Good luck to all teams!

Via Foresight Institute and Make

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Saturday

30Jan2010

The Tyee on 3D Printing

Saturday, January 30, 2010 |

There's a long article introducing 3D printing concepts appearing at The Tyee, a British Columbia-based electronic newsmagazine: "The Replicator, No Longer a Star Trek Dream". The article contains interviews with Neil Gershenfeld, Director of MIT's Center for Bits and Atoms, Adrian Bowyer, inventor of the RepRap, Fab Lab users, a RepRap owner, University of Missouri Professor Dr. Gabor Forgacs, and several educational institutions who use the technology. All of this and videos from TED, Fab Lab, the uPrint, RepRap and Organ printing in one place. Enjoy!

Via The Tyee

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The Homemade 3D Printer

Friday, January 29, 2010 |

Those new to the concept of 3D printing are often even more amazed to find out that it's entirely possible to actually build a 3D printer yourself! It's not particularly easy and you must have very reasonable hardware talent, but definitely possible.

You'll need to select a method of depositing print media from many potential concepts, prepare a design for your build chamber, engineer a precision movable print head mechanism, a housing, electronic interfaces and a power source. Oh, and you must develop sophisticated control software to ensure it all works perfectly.

Doesn't sound quite so possible now? Perhaps.

Don't fear! There are several approaches that just might make your project a whole lot easier. Consider the paths taken by others to simplify the work:

Re-engineer an existing 2D printer mechanism. There's quite a bit of truth when someone explains that a 3D printer is similar to an inkjet. The print head moves across X and Y dimensions already - you merely have to add the third Z dimension. This greatly simplifies the work.
Use an existing design already perfected by others. There are a couple of excellent projects that can provide the necessary designs and even the required software. The leaders in this category would of course be the RepRap project and Fab@Home.
Buy a kit. It's not only a proven design, but it's also all the parts and instructions you'll need. Two leading kit makers include MakerBot and The Rap-Man. You can also purchase assembly kits for RepRap and Fab@Home, too.

It is entirely possible to build a homemade 3D printer. You simply have to decide how much effort you wish to put into the project. If you are up for a difficult technical challenge, design and build it yourself. If you want the assurance that your build will actually work, consider RepRap or Fab@Home. Finally, if you just want to get it done quickly go for a kit.

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Thursday

14May2009

3D Printing Market Still Growing

Thursday, May 14, 2009 |

You might have noticed a slight financial crisis around you in recent months, but in spite of that, the 3D printing universe is still expanding, at least according to research done by nextgen. In their recent report, "3D Printing" on "Rapid Prototyping/Additive Fabrication/Solid Imaging via Stereolithography, Fused Deposition Modeling, Selective Laser Sintering and Inkjet Technologies" they say the market is still growing and is expected to reach a comfortable USD$782.6 million per year in 2013.

We're not surprised, as interest in this technology continues to grow, proportional to advancing device capabilities and inversely proportional to decreasing cost of equipment and services.

The one thing that bothers us a bit about the report is the lack of focus on the hobbyist space. Rep-rap and several other do-it-yourself products exist and are undergoing continuous improvement. So what, you say? Those are just for hobbyists!

Perhaps, but the trend recently is for small startups to take the designs and inspiration of Rep-Rap and build very inexpensive printing devices for hobbyists and small companies. One can imagine these designs being gradually improved over the course of years, eventually reaching capabilities applicable for general use. Could this be a case of the Innovator's Dilemma?

Via EarthTimes and NextGen Research

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Monday

11May2009

Purple Crayon

Monday, May 11, 2009 |

Today's discovery is Purple Crayon, a startup company intending on producing an inexpensive consumer-oriented 3D printer. And that's not all:

An old school garage style startup, Purple Crayon is a new company dedicated to developing and selling consumer personal fabrication technologies. At its core the idea of personal fabrication is to provide anyone the ability to “make stuff” regardless of skills or knowledge. The idea is similar to modern desktop printers, which make it possible for anyone to produce high quality printed material with absolutely no idea how the printer works. Personal fabrication technologies will have an impact on the same scale of the industrial revolution – enabling anyone with a vision to build it, or share with others to build or modify a version of their own.

Purple Crayon intends on producing an entire line of related products that would enable consumers to create a variety of object types. They envision scanners, milling machines and printers that are inexpensive and easy to use. And they'll be quiet, too.

They're not shipping a 3D printer yet; in fact, at this time they are only beta-testing a 3-axis positioning system, code-named "Cassius". This platform could be used to become a CNC mill or even a 3D printer in the future. They expect to be shipping a Cassius kit in June 2009. Watch for it!

Via Purple Crayon

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Wednesday

06May2009

The RapMan

Wednesday, May 6, 2009 |

We've seen several RepRap kits before, and here's another low priced option. This one is specifically designed for educators. This fills a need for educators unable to afford the still-quite-expensive commercial 3D printers - because The RepMan is priced at only GB£750!

The price breakthrough will permit a great many more schools to consider teaching 3D printing techniques to their students.

Not only does The RepMan cost less than commercial equivalents, they've also been able to reduce the cost of consumables. Consider these prices for a 1 kilogram bucket of each:

£60 ABS
£75 Polycapralactone (PCL)
£20 High density polyethylene (HDPE)
£20 Low density polyethylene (LDPE)
£20 Polypropylene (PP)
£20 Unplasticised polyvinylchloride (UPVC)
£30 Polylactic acid (PLA)

We understand that although The RepMan was packaged specifically for the education market, they are receiving interest from industry as well.

Via The RapMan

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Monday

20Apr2009

Two Routes to Low Cost

Monday, April 20, 2009 |

Fluid Forms poses an interesting question: how to obtain an inexpensive 3D printer. They correctly point out the two possible courses of action for obtaining inexpensive 3D printing solutions:

Commercial units, such as the Desktop Factory and MCOR printers.
Open Source hardware solutions such as RepRap, Fab@Home and the recently announced MakerBot

The problem, of course, is that the commercial options are not really options yet. In fact, Desktop Factory is currently undergoing financial difficulties and it is unclear that their offering will ever appear, as much as all of us would like it to.

There's a third option not mentioned by Fluid Forms, being use of a 3D print service such as Shapeways, Ponoko and others. While they have large communities and are easily usable, they may not be exactly inexpensive. The popular 3D print services all seem to use the expensive commercial 3D printers (Z Corp, Dimension, Objet, etc) and the costs of those devices (and their associated consumables) is inevitably passed on to the print user.

Fluid Forms' solution was to opt for an Open Source offering, either MakerBot or RepRap. While this might seem depressing if you've been hoping for an inexpensive commercial offering, we're not so certain. If MakerBot and RepRap gain vast legions of users, it's likely that improved products could emerge from their space. These could be commercial offerings based on the inexpensive Open Source hardware.

Software companies do this all the time, so why not hardware companies?

Via Fluid Forms

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