3D printing, it's neat.

[bill2or3]

http://protovision.com/2010/05/13/3d-printed-objects/

[kiyoshigawa]

That looks pretty neat. I didn't realize how small everything was at first. I'm curious about how durable this stuff is. It looks like it'd be fairly easy to break along the 'seams,' but I could be wrong.

[bill2or3]

(05-17-2010 01:19 PM)kiyoshigawa Wrote:  That looks pretty neat. I didn't realize how small everything was at first. I'm curious about how durable this stuff is. It looks like it'd be fairly easy to break along the 'seams,' but I could be wrong.

The material is ABS, aka: "Lego plastic", it's certainly weaker along the layers than across, but I'd be hard pressed to break one of the properly printed(ie: with the temperature adjusted correctly) parts like the whistles without using a pair of pliers.
A part of any real size will have layers printed in alternating directions.

There's a software setting for how dense the interior of the solid parts is filled, less dense will print faster & use less plastic, more dense will result in a stronger part, but take longer. For reference, those whistles took 12-15 minutes each.

There are really a *lot* of software settings, so it can take a bit to get a particular machine dialed in.

There's some pictures of my machine in this post: http://protovision.com/2010/04/21/3d-printer/

There's still a fair amount of tuning to be done in the software, which should improve print quality a great deal. Moving homes interrupted work on that, but I expect to be back at it in a few days.

These two guys have some of the better print qualities, just to give you some idea what's achievable:

http://hydraraptor.blogspot.com/
and
http://technocraticanarchist.blogspot.com/

[Deven]

Always amazing Bill!

[Sea Shadow]

In the for what its worth department: Bill and I have been working on printing a set of parts for a Prusa Mendel for the transistor.

As of this post I count a total of 24 parts printed between the two of us.

[Deven]

woah! That is sweet! Thanks guys, we will put them to good use!

[Sea Shadow]

2 parts left! See you Saturday

[Deven]

AWESOME!

[bill2or3]

Sea Shadow picked up my contributions to the parts-set last night. When you guys get the thing assembled I'll have to brave a visit to UT county and come down to see it run.
Bill

(02-10-2011 10:42 AM)Deven Wrote:  AWESOME!

[Deven]

Thanks again to the both of you for the parts. We will be sure to put them to good use!

See ya soon.

[kiyoshigawa]

So Bill, Deven says he's ready to order a full set of new Prusa parts. If you know which specific parts we can get from you instead of ordering them new online, let us know so we can save some trouble.

Also I'll likely be ordering the Mantis parts this coming week as well, but you can give your spares to James for his build instead.

[cymon]

(02-18-2011 08:23 AM)kiyoshigawa Wrote:  So Bill, Deven says he's ready to order a full set of new Prusa parts. If you know which specific parts we can get from you instead of ordering them new online, let us know so we can save some trouble.

Also I'll likely be ordering the Mantis parts this coming week as well, but you can give your spares to James for his build instead.

What happened with this?

[Deven]

Tim is almost done with the Prusa build (he took over as I was preoccupied with other projects). He is also still working on the Mantis, but that is on his back-burner atm.

[cymon]

Today's XKCD brought up something I've been silently wondering for a while now. Why is there nothing marked "adult" on Thingiverse? Not that I want that, but surely I can't be the only one that has thought that printing a... uh... marital aid would not only be possible, but the printing process would make them naturally ribbed. I also expected to see someone put Steven Colbert's head on one.

Hopefully this is just a result of Thingiverse having some decently implimented filters. In which case I'm okay with it.