What's Holding Back 3-D Printing

An anonymous reader writes "An article at MIT's Technology Review makes the case that the complexity of the design tools behind 3-D printing are what's holding it back from widespread adoption. Many of the devices are indeed prohibitively expensive, but the inability for your average person — or even your average tech hobbyist — to pick it up and start experimenting is an even bigger obstacle. 'That means software innovation could be more important to 3-D printing than gradual improvements in the underlying technology for shaping objects. That technology is already 30 years old and is widely used in industry to create prototypes, molds, and, in some cases, parts for airplanes. ... Although additive manufacturing allows for designs that can't be made easily in any other way — such as complex shapes with internal cavities — so far, companies have mostly used 3-D printing to create prototypes or models of familiar products.'"

Acquisition of Skills Takes Time - lots of it

[BoRegardless]

Been using 3D solids for rapid prototyping new medical equipment for over 15 years.

Job shops can make your parts quickly and relatively inexpensively compared to other machining and hand working methods, so that part is OK for prototyping and functional parts that can stand being done in the limited rapid prototyping materials & processes available.

Skills need are the understanding of the design of physical parts with all the subtleties and the desire to learn to use a competant 3D solids modeling environment. You don't walk in to this expecting a familiarity with PowerPoint as enough skill to do the job.

Competent 3D solids software from the likes of SolidWorks, AutoCAD or other similar programs start at about $5,000 per seat and they don't become highly usable until you get near $10k. It easily takes 1000-2000 hours to become good at doing 3D modeling, assuming you are already familiar with design and 2D CAD.

There are 3D solids RP machines in half a dozen types and you can't afford to buy them for hobby uses. Stratysis laser sintering for Nylon, SS & Titanium type things cost more than a Ferrari, so forget it, unless you are Jay Leno.

Re:Not enough publicity

[daid303]

Stop looking at the bad reprap prints, and look at this:
http://davedurant.wordpress.com/2011/10/12/ultimaker-faq-but-what-about-the-quality-of-prints/ [wordpress.com]

All done on stock 1200 euro Ultimakers.

Extremely expensive.

[csumpi]

It's just very expensive to get into 3d printing. A makerbot is over $2k, a lulzbot is almost $2k. (It probably also doesn't help the cause that lulzbot sells 3d printed parts like this [lulzbot.com] or this [lulzbot.com] printed on the very same almost $2k machines that look like crap.) Even build-it-yourself machines cost close to $1k, not even factoring in time spent.

Then there's filament at $40/kg, the occasional hotend replacement, material wasted on prints that don't come out or stop halfway, etc.

The print quality and material strength is also questionable. PLA is water soluble so it doesn't work outdoors, cracks easily, on the other hand ABS releases toxic fumes when melted.

It's hard to justify all that cost even for someone with money to burn to print a $20 stove knob, or odd $5 broken plastic pieces for a car's door to open. It's a great tool for rapid prototyping and for nerds, but not for mainstream.