Hm, no, I’m not talking about parts contained in other parts, if I understand what you mean by that. Imagine printing something shaped like an upside-down letter J, a vertical column with an arch shape at the top. You start printing the vertical column from the bottom up, and then get to a point where the other tip of the arch appears, but is at that point unconnected to the column. If you just print the tip of the arch, it will fall down as nothing is supporting it. Instead you need to print TWO columns, the real main column and some kind of thin support column for the arch, which will need to be cut away after printing. A complex shape can require numerous supports, some of which may be hard to reach after printing is done.
Here’s an example of a print with support structures.
Ok, so this is a problem with the layered printing technique you use. I had assumed that was not an issue with common 3 axis printers. Is it?
I had a thread about another technique, definitely not mature at that time. Have to find it, interesting different concept but the materials were limited.
Sorry, not a common 3 axis printer. As I think about it I realized that no printer may be able to rotate the head and print upside down for that purpose, though I suppose the table could be rotated instead.
So, yes, that looks like a problem for all the conventional techniques unless someone is making the super-duper version that can do that.
Here’s something I saw previously, Computed Axial Lithography. That would be able to print those kinds of shapes, and should only need support structures for shapes contained in other shapes, assuming the shapes could support themselves when completed.
I haven’t used that type of printer, only the filament type and the resin type, but I would guess that the powder type might not require supports, if the unsintered powder is able to support the sintered bits.
The “pile of powder” printers, such as selective laser sintering, indeed don’t require supports. I’ve had a lot of things printed that way that would have been impossible with an FDM printer.
Not really, since the technology is already here for that, and in fact has been for longer than 3D printers themselves. CNC mills were the original computer-aided manufacture, and they have no problems at all making guns, and are available for private ownership at a price comparable to high-end 3D printers.
3D printing is great and all but still seems to be limited by the medias available. Nice to make a complex chess piece out of a polymer but as far as I know you aren’t going to be able to 3D print anything out of ceramic, most metals, glass, paper, wood, cloth, etc.
Most manufacturing techniques can only work with some limited materials. You can’t judge the maturity of the technology that way, not much technology could be considered mature on that basis.
Would this be a finished product that you would sell with the supports still attached? I have bought several pieces and all come without any supports and are polished smooth. It never occurred to me that pieces had supports that would have to be removed and sanded. Is that all done by hand?
About the houses, how does that work? They cant just print a solid wall, right? So do they do hollow rectangles and bolt them together until they get the wall width they want? They have to be hollow to run water and electrical somehow.
When I was in high school, I was shown a milling machine that “could make anything,” even a complete duplicate of the machine itself. That was in the mid 1960s.
Today, my nephew works at the Purdue Polytechnic Institute here in Anderson, Indiana. Students there learn to work with 3D printers. The kids kept breaking the machines, though, so now they teach them how to make their own 3D printers out of old ink-jet computer printers.
Just saw this. Yes, any supports needed to hold up parts of the object during printing must be removed manually after the print is done, with knives, sandpaper, etc. Depending on the shape, it can be a real pain in the ass.
Unless the pieces you saw were printed with one of the technologies that doesn’t need supports.
As for other materials, that depends on where you draw the line on what counts as “3D printing”. For instance, you can 3D print a wax model, use that to make a plaster mold, melt out the wax, and then cast any metal at all (or even some ceramics) in the mold. Does that count as “3D printing in metal or ceramic”? There are places online where you can order “3D printing” that offer those as options. And while you can’t 3D print wood, you can CNC machine it, with much the same effect. Or maybe you can even 3D print wood: What do you call it when you put a mold around a growing plant, and let it grow to fill it? That’s been an art form for a long time-- Now what if the mold is 3D printed?
To be more clear, I was in high school long before CNC milling machines. Class of 1967, not quite back as far as horse-drawn typewriters, but typing class had manual typewriters.
