Tag Archives: #3Dprinting

popular term for all methods of additive fabrication techniques

From A Wooden Apple To…

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a useless old computer that started a billion dollar company

Since this is a new blog, I’ve been watching the traffic – mostly in the laughably vain concern that I might begin to approach my throughput limitation (hey, it’s my fantasy, alright) – and this morning discovered a rather interesting visitor had stopped in.

Now before I continue, I should preface this by saying I first read a slew of emails, all RepRap related. Included in one such group email was the confirmation that ABS cylindrical stocks are available and have melt points (~110 C) that make it possible to use this material in that experimental, 4-day-in-the-making, Vik Olliver Meccano effort about which I posted earlier. Having been in the manufacturing side of plastics for years, I can assure you ABS is highly regarded (too often I’ve had to make due with lesser plastics like SAN).

Hence my amusement at a mention by none other than Bruce Sterling on his Wired blog. And while I have nothing to do with the item in question, I do now perhaps have a better understanding of Mr. Sterling – even though I understand the post is intended to poke some fun. Well. Kinda. See, it took four years studying ID before I began to shed my aerospace engineering “blinders” (hey, I got through orbital mechanics mathematics and their painful derivations, but it didn’t make me inventive), and he’s only been at ACCD a few months, I believe. Furthermore, if I recall correctly, he won’t be there much longer. A shame. Hanging around a bunch of students who aren’t polarized into a way of thinking can be liberating… in ways that hanging around experts isn’t. I recall one student in 1992 (now a design firm principal, I believe) having the audacity to suggest handheld cellphone-like devices in ten years! That idiot! If only he’d listened to the impossibility of that development from all the senior instructors and engineers.

Why respond? Maybe because it was all the comments made by people in the late 70’s. “Whut da hell ya need a ‘puter fer? Ah got me a 350 Chevy.” I recall those kinds of comments. I just didn’t expect Bruce Sterling to be the one to pull them from my memory. What a great reminder of how things are. And how I expect them to continue to be, especially in regards to virtual worlds. I was just having this conversation last night with Jerry… in world….

(note: the above image from 8-Bit Nirvana)

RepRap v.2

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{Note: 17 Feb, 2010 – for Boing Boing visitors who apparently read an entry today on 3D printing of ceramic material, it’s actually not a new development. In fact, Ceramics Monthly did a whole issue on the topic of 3D printing ceramics a year ago (Link).

Bowling Green researchers Sebastien Dion and John Balistreri were, to my knowledge, the first people to 3D print ceramic materials back in 2006 (Link); using a modified ZCorp printer, if I’m not mistaken. I think I posted something here about it – or maybe I just saved the link to my Del.icio.us account – but yesterday’s headline on Boing Boing, “3D printing comes to ceramics”, is very misleading. Bruce Sterling more accurately reports “A RepRap printing in clay” (Link), which is probably a first for that particular effort. Some one should tell Doctorow to post better headlines.}

{Note: 1 Sep, 2008 – for the Sterling readers surfing through from Instructables, you’re almost certainly going to find these of interest: latest news on house “printing” and a ZBrush forum thread showing/explaining someone’s custom jewelry operation (both by way of my Twitter account, where I now post quick news bits; this blog is now for deeper discussion on such topics.)}

{Note: Oct 24, 2006 – for all the Make: visitors, you might want to do a search here on “reprap“. There’s more going on that just this thing. Cheers.}

In memory of the original “RepRap” entry lost in the Spam War earlier, I present a small update. Vik Olliver has submitted images of his device pictured here.

gluegunfabber

From his Listserv entries:

I’ve constructed a prototype turntable from Meccano that automatically lowers itself up to 60mm, currently at 0.75mm per revolution though this can be changed. This is intended for use in experiments in continuously
extruding recycled HDPE…

Recent fabrications include a 18mm high 19mm diameter cylinder with 0.85mm walls, and a 13mm high 43mm diameter cylinder with 1.75mm walls. Each layer is 0.25mm thick. It’s fascinating to watch in the same way as a potter is, at work on their wheel.

Maybe we can get him to post a short video clip. Industrial designers as well as all glue gun user’s the world over would probably love it. Nice.

And Even More FabLab Stuff….

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The Economist has posted an article from their print edition reminding everyone that Dr. Gershenfeld has been using RP technology to assist those in need for years. I’ll admit having temporarily forgotten. It’s truly a shame that $20k is too much for some developing countries to afford; probably preventing the more widespread use of his collection of devices. I guess that depressing part of the story helped me forget. Isn’t that roughly the cost of a single Smart bomb?

When Did I Become A Hippy?

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Since leaving the cube farm of corporate America and going solo, I’ve found myself ever more increasingly concerned with social issues. Not that I wasn’t previously concerned, I just find myself soaking up more information via the net, mixing the worthwhile bits in with my past experiences, and attempting to integrate the results into my life. Maybe this is a mid-life crises thing. I’m unsure.

This is all to say that I’ve been trading emails with Dr. Bowyer regarding the RepRap project – but (and you guessed it) not in regards to technical issues. As stated previously my real concern was the potential to treat this open source effort as something appropriate only for academia or for those with research experience; to set technical goals but effectively ignore (or at the very least downplay) usability issues. Let’s make something that works, make it freely available to everyone via the internet, but not really concern ourselves with mundane issues like whether people injure themselves attempting to use/misuse the “product”.

I won’t go into details of our discussion but I’m at least impressed that Dr. Bowyer is engaging me in this conversation – there are many I’m sure who would not. This is definitely more encouraging than some product development efforts in which I’ve participated (none of which, I should add, approach either Graco’s shameful behavior or some of the recent automotive recalls).

Maybe I just need a haircut.