garage

Junior Veloso Is Really Hi-Res

We’ve written about Junior Veloso’s fascinating experiment in constructing a homemade resin-based 3D printer, but he’s recently made significant progress in developing the quality of his 3D prints. Just take a look at the image above and we’re sure you’ll agree he’s on the right track. The left side is printed at an incredible “50… Continue reading Junior Veloso Is Really Hi-Res

Junior Veleso’s Homemade High Resolution 3D Printer

Junior’s making his own hi-res 3D printer, and he has the experience to do it, having previously converted an inkjet printer into a 3D powder-based version. He’s been blogging this journey since July 2010 and is providing all the information and discoveries to the public, “you agree to not make use of it for commercial… Continue reading Junior Veleso’s Homemade High Resolution 3D Printer

Another Inexpensive 3D Printer Kit Emerges

Competition for Makerbot? Cubely jumped into the 3D printing scene this week at an Arizona Hackerspace meetup. Cubely, a RepRap derivative, hopes to produce a superior hobbyist 3D printer at low cost.    Cubely consists of four major components: Electronics, which they recommend purchasing from MakerBot, as they are “unfortunately” the sole supplier; Stepper motors… Continue reading Another Inexpensive 3D Printer Kit Emerges

CubeSpawn

Another very cool KickStarter project has appeared: CubeSpawn, by James Jones. The project’s concept is to establish a standard approach to linking personal manufacturing machines together based on the common cube shape. In this vision, 30cm square cubes are placed adjacent to one another, and each contains some type of manufacturing machine. Results from one… Continue reading CubeSpawn

Printing Steel. At Home!

There’s an interesting discussion underway at the RepRap forums, where the idea of Direct Metal Laser Sintering is being pondered. DMLS involves laser-heating metal (or other material) powder, layer by layer, slowly building up a solid object. This is pretty similar to how many 3D printers work, but the interesting bit is that these guys… Continue reading Printing Steel. At Home!

Homemade 3D Printer: The Details

Alvaro Fogassa of Homemade 3D Printer has posted some details about his inexpensive design. We’ve written on Alvaro’s expedition before, and now he tells us how it works, and points us to the software he used. The Lexmark Z12 inkjet-printer based design involves using common dental plaster as it’s material, mixed with a water-based glue… Continue reading Homemade 3D Printer: The Details

The Homemade 3D Printer

  Yes, there’s RepRap and Fab@Home, but it’s also possible to just get down and do the whole thing yourself too. Not everyone would be able or interested to do such a thing, but certainly everyone enjoys a good story. Alvaro Fogassa is publishing an episodic story of how he’s trying to build a 3D… Continue reading The Homemade 3D Printer

Lego Polar 3D Printer

  Yes, it is apparently possible to build a working 3D printer out of Lego blocks! Don’t believe us? Check out the link below to Instructables, where Gene Hacker provides a step-by-step process for creating the device.   Interestingly, he used a Polar coordinate system rather than the traditional XYZ scheme, because “I didn’t have… Continue reading Lego Polar 3D Printer

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Maker Faire 2008

Every year makers of wonderful things congregate at the Maker Faire. This year it was held on May 3 and 4 in San Mateo, California, and as expected, many interesting items were exhibited. Wired has the best coverage of the event, and includes stories on such items as:   A hand-built steam-powered time machine A… Continue reading Maker Faire 2008

OoeyGui Continues

We’ve written about Lou Amadio’s garage-based “Fabr” project before, in which he’s building his own 3D printer – including self-designed portions of the machine itself. He’s now released code and Sketchups for the 3D printer, the controller board and the decomposer plugin – which apparently has run across some difficulties with Sketchup. An upcoming post… Continue reading OoeyGui Continues

3D Toys with Fabr

Many people are considering unique uses for and implications of 3D printing. Lou Amadio wants to be able to print toys for his four-year-old son, or at least create replacement components for those toys inevitably broken or lost by the youngster. Lou’s approach is a bit more extreme than many might consider: he’s not only… Continue reading 3D Toys with Fabr

The Fabaroni

Ok, we’ve heard of expensive media for 3D printers, paper, sugar and other wacky stuff going in “raw” and coming out as usable 3D objects. Today it’s pasta dough! The Fabaroni home-made 3D printer is capable of printing 3D objects with a moving head, much like other inexpensive 3D printers. In fact, it “loosely follows… Continue reading The Fabaroni

Evil CandyFab 4000

The CandyFab 4000 is definitely not a commercial product and is most appropriate for those of you already handy with tools. The CandyFab can be constructed for around $500 in readily available parts, and can use output from common 3D modeling software. The device is designed primarily for fun – it doesn’t have a very… Continue reading Evil CandyFab 4000

Garage Fabbing?

As fabbing equipment continues to fall, the ability to create becomes available to more and more people. While I envision a future where people have 3D printing equipment in their homes right beside their 2D (paper) printers, this forum discussion suggests a future in which fabbing equipment is dispersed to the public – but only… Continue reading Garage Fabbing?