Inspired by this thread, I was wondering how common 3D printers are. Are they used in a lot of workplaces? For what purposes?
Are there many/any people who own a 3D printer at home? And do you guys think that they’re something that a lot of people will personally own in the near future?
I work in manufactuing medical devices and order tens of thousands of dollars in tooling from a handful of local shops each year. None of them use them that I know. We don’t use one either.
We did have a hobby fair here at work last month and an employee had one to show that he built himself for about $1K. It was pretty neat but still a novelty.
His used some type of corn product as media to melt and draw the objects.
To me it seems easier and faster to machine an object or even cast it rather than use a 3d printer.
They’re ubiquitous in many areas of engineering and design, usually for rapid prototyping. Ten years ago, my high school had a second-hand printer that was given to us by an engineering firm that was dumping their outdated technology. If you’re designing a gizmo, and need something that you can hold and bolt on to some other gizmo for initial testing, you can use a 3d printer to get a prototype in minutes to hours. Previously, you’d have to spend a fair amount of time making a set of drawings for the machine shop and wait days to get your prototype gizmo.
At home, they’re not super common. It’s still a fairly niche hobby, perhaps comparable to personal computers in the 70s. But in ten or twenty years, I wouldn’t be surprised if they became more common, particularly among the sort of people that have a well-equipped shop in their basement. If I had money to blow, and I could find a remotely practical excuse to print something, I might buy one some day.
I don’t think they’ll follow the same pattern as the personal computer market. These machines are already relatively inexpensive for what they do. Personal computers were able to do more and cost less over time because of advances in technology. Each of the parts in a 3D printer could be made somewhat less expensive through greater production volume, but there won’t be anything that matches the difference in price and capacity that memory chips went through to turn personal computing from a niche hobby into a modern necessity.
However they may take a greater part in manufacturing as time goes on. The upper end machines will become faster and there will be new technologies to use in the 3D ‘ink’ that will make these more common. This could take hold fast where there are low to medium volume production runs. It’s not uncommon now in those circumstances to have some metal parts machined instead of cast. The same thing may become more common for plastic parts.
Where I live, there are a couple of arts/crafts co-ops that have them, and rent time on them, pretty doggone cheap.
(In fact, the only thing stopping me from playing with them is that I don’t know what “language” to encode the data in, that they can print from. I’m guessing they can take some standard CAD formats, but I don’t know. What I really want is a small replica of the mountains nearby here: how do I tweak Google Maps topo maps to produce a file that can be printed?)
We have one at work which we use for making one-of-a-kind fixtures and jigs that we use in our assembly room. It’s saved us thousands of dollars in machining costs (we don’t have our own machine shop) and days that would have been wasted having designs sent out for machining.
I also have one at home that I built myself, mostly for fun. I use it to print small items for use around the house, custom bits for computer case-modding, and toys and sculpture gifts for friends. Nobody I know has a 3D printer at home, so I can’t say they’re common - still pretty much a niche toy.
The software used to run the printers typically starts with a STL file, which is a standard file for describing 3D objects. Many common CAD programs have options to export STL format tiles. You then use one of several different slicer programs to turn the STL file into a Gcode file, which contains the actual instructions telling the printer how to build the object. That process is specific to the printer, since different ones will have different physical configurations and a gcode file for one won’t work for another.
I’m not sure what you mean. I’ve had many printers, and they’ve all been three-dimensional.
Are the current 3D printers only for objects with non moving parts? I can see a 3D printer making an object like a fork or a frog paperweight.
But how could it make anything with moving parts? Like a stapler or can opener? Unless it made the parts and you assembled them yourself. Like those toys that came with the parts in a plastic square. you broke out the parts and pressed them together.
Sure, they’ve made fully assembled wrenches. I think one of the printer companies uses wrenches as their test product. They printed a 2 meter long one or something to show how big their printers could print.
I think they have some improvements to be made - surface finish, porosity, but hopefully they’ll end up like laser printers today. Technically, laser printers aren’t the cheapest form of printing, but they’re cheap enough that everyone uses them.
Oops, forgot to say: machining still has closer tolerances, so that’s what people stick to for now.
On my machine, I have printed interlocking chains in one print, that flex smoothly when removed from the printer. I have also printed multi-part assemblies that snap together to make geared toys, including a working 6 speed transmission model. It’s quite possible to make objects with moving parts, and there are some nifty demonstration prints that have been done of interlocking parts that would be impossible to assemble normally.
Admittedly, printed plastic gears and bearings don’t work as well as actual machined metal parts, but it is quite possible to print working mechanical parts on a printer. My home printer has a planetary gearbox on the extruder mechanism which was largely printed on an earlier version of that same printer, although I am using conventional roller bearings pressed into the printed plastic gears.
This should probably be another thread, but I"m lazy:
Is it yet (commonly known, at least) if printers can create items (sinter-able) metal powders?
If so, gun control just got a whole lot more difficult.
Sinter: fusing of powder(s) to form solid material using heat below melting point. Used to create complex metal parts - I have experience with the commutators for hydraulic motors. Those were worm holes in a solid disk - the hole on top was not connected to the hole directly under it.
Extremely expensive 3D printers can print in metal powder. The cheap hobby printers can only print in plastic. It is possible however to use a printed plastic form to make a ceramic mold to cast metal into.
This debate has already begun. A few months back someone printed a plastic lower receiver for a gun. Legally, the lower receiver is the gun - everything else can be bought mail-order without going through any of the legal hoops of buying a gun. The printed lower receiver only lasted for half a dozen shots before falling apart, but that’s enough to prove the concept.
A friend of mine has a CNC machine in his garage. I will not tell him how cheap Makerbots have gotten, or his wife will kill me.
I have read a couple of articles on using them for creating complex custom parts for scale models.
My current printer came with 11 dimensions. But, there was a crash and I can only access four.
Back To The Op
I expect 3 D printers to become a lot more common in the coming decades. Right now, we’re barely at the Model T stage of things. I see 3 D printers becoming better, faster, and cheaper. They may be The Next Big Thing.
Spam reported.
This isn’t spam: I saw them listed online at Staples.com. A bit pricey for an average home, and I’m sure they’re limited feature items compared to what big businesses get, but they are listed. Go to Staples.com and search for them. Cube is the brand, $1300 is the price I saw.
The only reason I post this is because it shows (imho, ymmv) that 3D printers are now available for a whole lot of people. How common is it to buy one? Beats me.
What I forsee is the use of 3d printers to make items ordered off the internet. Entire businesses will sell nothing but downloads to make whatever items ones home printer can handle. Cheap-ass resin and plastic items at first, like novelties and toys. But imagine a garage with a 3d sintering machine being able to order parts for a car as a download and printing it out for a customer in minutes. Or if other materials are able to be printed out like flexible rubber-type material. You could print out a pair of cheap wellingtons or a custom case for your iPod. What if a faux-fabric is created? A whole new world of items would be available. And imagine a high-end 3d fabricator with multiple “bays” that do different materials simultaneously. The outer parts of the aforementioned wellies could be created on one bay while a soft gel insole was created on another.
Think of all the uses to which the internet is already put that were simply unimaginable previously. I expect a similar boom from Home Fabrication devices.
Is there a 3D printer that can make a 3D printer? :eek:;)
It’s made by Von Neumann industries.