Inside the World's Biggest Consumer 3D Printing Factory 105
Sparrowvsrevolution writes "Much has been made of consumer 3D printers like Makerbot's Replicator and the open-source RepRap. But for those not yet willing to shell out thousands of dollars for their own machine, Shapeways offers 3D printing as a mail-order service. And its new Queens, NY factory is now the biggest production facility for consumer 3D printing in the world. Just one of Shapeways' industrial 3D printers, which use lasers to fuse nylon dust, can print a thousand objects in a day, with far higher resolution than a consumer machine as well as intricate features like interlocking and nested parts. The company hopes to have more than fifty of those printers up and running within a year. And it also offers printing in materials that aren't attainable at home, like gold, silver, ceramic, sandstone and steel."
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Rich old people don't have poor eyesight, poor old people do. Rich old people can have their cataracts, nearsightedness, age-related farsightedness, and astigmatism completely cured for $15,000, the price of two CrystaLens implant surgeries.
I'm 60 and have one in my left eye, my vision is better than 20/20 at all distances. My eyesight (which used to be incredibly nearsighted as well as age-related farsighted; I had contacts AND reading glasses) is better than most 20 year olds. I now need no corrective len
Re:Is it just me or... (Score:4, Informative)
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NPR blogs has been doing this lately too with 20 point sans-serif. It's annoying as hell.
I seriously do believe that they are compensating for people who can't be arsed to adjust minimum font size (or dpi) on their own, or to even tell Windows to "use big fonts."
Look at this. Just look at it.
http://www.npr.org/blogs/alltechconsidered/ [npr.org]
I'm 47. I'm not blind.
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BMO
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NPR blogs has been doing this lately too with 20 point sans-serif. It's annoying as hell.
I seriously do believe that they are compensating for people who can't be arsed to adjust minimum font size (or dpi) on their own, or to even tell Windows to "use big fonts."
Look at this. Just look at it.
http://www.npr.org/blogs/alltechconsidered/ [npr.org]
I'm 47. I'm not blind.
Oh, God.
That site specifies font sizes in pixels. That's going to look oh-so-readable on 'retina' displays...
CSS was very carefully designed to adapt to the specified needs of the USER. The user knows what size font (s)he finds comfortable to use, and can be presumed to have configured the browser to render normal sized font at that size. Specifying font sizes in absolute sizes - point sizes, millimetres, whatever - breaks that, but at least eight point font should be one tenth of an inch tall on any correc
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so what's the barrier to entry on this? (Score:3)
If I front some capital, can I become the next Shapeways? Do I just buy machines people can't afford, and then print things on those machines, selling them at a markup sufficient to recoup my costs? Or is there something else going on?
Re:so what's the barrier to entry on this? (Score:4, Informative)
To answer your questions, in order:
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You left out the bit about getting your advertising for free...
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No, no, you missed the point of the whole story, which is: hey these machines are soooo cooooool!!!!
And it's true. They are.
Wait, were we supposed to be posting news?
Re:so what's the barrier to entry on this? (Score:5, Insightful)
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Yeah, basically.
Re:so what's the barrier to entry on this? (Score:5, Insightful)
It would require a lot of capital. These machines and their materials are absurdly expensive. You require knowledge on how these machines function. You need to be able to translate what the customer wants to the given machine (high 3d modelling and CAD skills). You need the know-how to put objects together into single prints so you're not waiting for one single small object (optimization). And most importantly you need to be able to add the support structures so the objects do not break in the process (physics, 3d modelling, CAD). Etc etc.
So essentially, like any other highly specialized tech field, it requires lots of expertise. You don't just load up a docx and hit print.
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Support structures? You don't seem to understand how their printers work.
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I know quite well how their printers work. But in case you don't believe me here's Shapeways' take on the topic: support structures [google.com]
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Selective Laser Sintering does not need support structures, unlike Fused Deposition Modeling.
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Support structures? You don't seem to understand how their printers work.
some of their techniques need support structures. what makes it hard to start competing with shapeways is that they have pretty much all 3d printing techniques covered.
Re:so what's the barrier to entry on this? (Score:5, Interesting)
The most important part is getting people to know you exist (and getting them to trust you). Now that Shapeways has an article on Forbes, everyone else, including you, is miles behind.
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They also demoed at SIGGRAPH. Very cool samples.
Since it's a new industry, marketing. Don't buy... (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:so what's the barrier to entry on this? (Score:4, Interesting)
One barrier to entry could conceivably be (of course!) patents. The first company to do large-scale 3D printing I'm aware of was Align Technology, Inc., maker of Invisalign plastic braces (I'm a former employee). They've been printing positive molds for the aligners using stereolithography for over a dozen years, and have a lot of patents in the "mass customization" industry. When you start printing tens of thousands of unique objects a day like they've been doing for years there are certain methods that give you economies of scale despite each piece being different. It's not applicable to low-volume home printing, but when you get to a warehouse of 3D printers things could get interesting. There are probably other companies out there with additional work in this space that will crop up if it gets lucrative enough. (And hey, many aren't even software patents.)
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They don't mention it, but I would imagine there is a lot of automatic optimization for maximizing yield per print across multiple orders. I bet there's some Tetris Master level packing that's augmented by some automatic order system.
You also need a front end as well as a hopefully automated back-end to detect model errors (holes etc). As well as some software to weed out models that can't print well.
These are still high-tech devices and I'm sure you would also need people who are trained in the numerous
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As usual, the devil is in the details. And in surviving the eventual competition with everyone else who gets the kinks worked out of the system as well.
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If I front some capital, can I become the next Shapeways?
It may already be too late. Staples is getting into the game: http://seekingalpha.com/article/1042071-staples-fires-warning-flare-to-3d-printing-market [seekingalpha.com]
I would not be surprised to see a home improvement or other big hardware chain get into it too. Think NAPA 3D parts for autos
Good service (Score:5, Informative)
I ordered the sintered steel thorn dice set from them for roleplaying games, and I have to say I'm delighted. I'd imagine in about fifty years home manufactories will be about as common as power tool sets are today, although if you want the best quality you'll have to go to larger producers. Mostly they will be used for short term, specialised, low stress, or artistic requirements though, I can't see anyone printing off high end tech like the latest laptop cheaper than it could be bought through regular channels.
Cost (Score:2)
Neither the story, the summary, or even your comment, has what most people want to know: how much does their service cost?
How much did your dice cost? Do they charge by the time it takes to print, or the amount of material used?
Re:Cost (Score:4, Informative)
Eh its all on their site. The steel dice that let me roll like Sauron cost about $12-$15 each, with the expected postage. Those were the most expensive ones though except the gold plated versions, so material used would be the main thing associated with the cost. http://www.shapeways.com/model/126266/thorn-dice-set-with-decader.html [shapeways.com]
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Typical loaded dice are made with two types of material, one denser than the other, and Shapeways only prints with a single material. So printing dice that are asymmetrical is the only option.
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Yes, but they'd have to be hollow and you can't print hollow objects without holes in them. So, in other words, people would be able to look inside your dice and see that they weren't symmetrical.
Typical loaded dice are made with two types of material, one denser than the other, and Shapeways only prints with a single material. So printing dice that are asymmetrical is the only option.
sintered doesn't allow for holes and cavities? all other techniques do, even home fdm(provided there's not impossibly long bridges or overhangs).
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I also wondered, is there any way to know if a design will print out correctly? For example if I designed a pencil balancing on its tip with no supports, does the software, or somebody at shapeways, alert me that I'm being stupid?
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I also wondered, is there any way to know if a design will print out correctly? For example if I designed a pencil balancing on its tip with no supports, does the software, or somebody at shapeways, alert me that I'm being stupid?
Yep... they check your models before they print it and will notify you of problems like that. From their FAQ [shapeways.com]:
When a product is ordered for the first time a manual check will be done to make sure the object is printable. Now, factors like wall thickness and detail thickness are tested, which sometimes leads to the rejection of the design. Sometimes products for sale (whether it is your own or not) can be uploaded but turn out not to be printable.
Unfortunately, we do not have an automated way of checking every single design rule, which is why we optimize and only do a thorough (manual) check for designs that are ordered, not just designs that are uploaded.
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For example if I designed a pencil balancing on its tip with no supports, does the software, or somebody at shapeways, alert me that I'm being stupid?
That shouldn't be a problem. If you watch the video in TFA, the item is built up layer by layer, supported by un-fused stock. Your pencil balancing on it's tip will be supported by surrounding material, until it's finished and removed. At which point it won't be balanced on it's tip anymore. This is how they build hollow pieces, and pieces with overhangs.
As the sibling poster mentioned, they do check for other things. Like they make sure that hollow items aren't too thin, connecting struts actually con
Re: home manufactories (Score:2)
... home manufactories....
After all the Warhammer gaming, I think I'll be calling mine a Manufactorum.
Questionable goods (Score:2)
Okay, what if I submit a design to print a 3D gun (or replacement parts for one)? What about the packaging for, say, a credit card skimmer? How about a timing circuit made entirely out of electrically-conductive plastic (so it doesn't show up on an x-ray scanner)? I can only hope they look at the things being submitted; But I'm reminded of the scene in Batman begins where Alfred says, "Well, we'll have to order a lot of them in order to avoid suspicion." "Oh? How many?" "About ten thousand sir." "Well, at l
Re:Questionable goods (Score:5, Insightful)
Okay, what if I submit a design to print a 3D gun (or replacement parts for one)? What about the packaging for, say, a credit card skimmer? How about a timing circuit made entirely out of electrically-conductive plastic (so it doesn't show up on an x-ray scanner)?
Um, then you should receive a 3D gun, the packaging for a credit card skimmer, or a timing circuit. Haven't we gotten past this "make the tools illegal" crap yet? It's what you do with them, not the item itself that's problematic, and there are valid uses for all the above.
Re:Questionable goods (Score:4, Insightful)
Um, then you should receive a 3D gun, the packaging for a credit card skimmer, or a timing circuit. Haven't we gotten past this "make the tools illegal" crap yet? It's what you do with them, not the item itself that's problematic, and there are valid uses for all the above.
I've tried telling my government that... but they keep arresting, torturing, threatening, and imprisoning me whenever I do. I'm also on a whole bunch of watch lists, kill lists, security lists, lists of lists, databases of lists, lists of databases... I don't even know anymore whether I'm coded green, yellow, orange, additional screening, deportation... it seems like they come up with new ways to criminalize things every day. I don't know a single person who isn't a felon anymore... the only difference is, not all of them have been caught or pissed in the cheerios of someone "important".
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sounds like you have bigger problems than ordering crap you could easily make out of any material
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sounds like you have bigger problems than ordering crap you could easily make out of any material
This is not news regarding OP.
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To clarify (or not) only the part that ATF refers to as the gun must be home built. The object referenced lately as a 'home printed gun' is the lower receiver for an AR style rifle. It is a piece that holds various control bits. When buying a complete AR-15, it is the part carrying the serial no. A part performing essentially the same function is not always the 'gun' according to the ATF for other platforms.
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No. Manufacturing a gun is manufacturing a gun -- which without a license/permit is highly illegal.
I'm sure someone actually hand checks every submission though--otherwise they would have a poor reputation for things failing.
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It depends on WHO manufactures it, and in what context. If I wanted to, I could use a sharpie and draw on my nice oak desk here, then cut it out with a razorblade, and put AR15 parts on it, and I have legally manufactured a gun.
I just can't do that with intent to SELL the gun.
It doesn't sound like IF the ATF ruled these guys couldn't legally make a lower, that it would qualify as SELLING a gun. After all, I sent them the gun pattern to print. They are selling me labor and materials, but the project i
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Okay, what if I submit a design to print a 3D gun (or replacement parts for one)? What about the packaging for, say, a credit card skimmer? How about a timing circuit made entirely out of electrically-conductive plastic (so it doesn't show up on an x-ray scanner)?
Um, then you should receive a 3D gun, the packaging for a credit card skimmer, or a timing circuit. Haven't we gotten past this "make the tools illegal" crap yet? It's what you do with them, not the item itself that's problematic, and there are valid uses for all the above.
I think you'll find that if you are found to have an unlicensed firearm, your pathetic cries of "but I have a valid use for it!!!" will not do you much good.
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And I think your assumption that any given gun is necessarily unlicensed is going to get you laughed out of the logicians club.
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Simplicity. There's nothing you can do on a modern computer that cannot be done with an abacus, yet we use them anyway.
Printing a piece, be it a lower receiver for an AR15 or a Warhammer miniature is easier with a home computer printer than it is with a mill or set of woodcarving tools. Outsourcing the printing to a 3rd party is even easier.
You poo poo the time savings of turning out a run of a single copy or short run. That makes sense. But the learning curve to get to that single piece is vastly different
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This company might be a huge help with prototyping for new products.
It takes part of the infrastructure needed and outsources it.
Right now, a lot of that is done in China, giving them a chance to steal the design and beat the person to market with a crappier, cheaper version.
That risk goes away with this (somewhat, the Chinese will still probably infiltrate the company)
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Okay, what if I submit a design to print a 3D gun (or replacement parts for one)?
If you submit a design to print a 3D gun, or replacement parts, you'll get them. Of course, the tolerances won't be as close as a specifically machined part, nor would it really be strong enough to use to fire bullets (As it would be made of plastic. Sintered Stainless Steel would be strong enough, but again would have to be machined for an accurate fit).
Or if you wanted to do the same thing easily at home you could make a simple "Zip Gun" with a little plumbing pipe. Or a flamethrower with PVC pipe, a flas
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If you submit a design to print a 3D gun, or replacement parts, you'll get them. Of course, the tolerances won't be as close as a specifically machined part, nor would it really be strong enough to use to fire bullets (As it would be made of plastic. Sintered Stainless Steel would be strong enough, but again would have to be machined for an accurate fit).
Except for the point where you are either wrong or grossly overstating things. There are plenty of polymer lowers [lw15.com] capable of shooting actual lead bullets (or steel, copper coverings may vary). So far, none of the printed ones seem to have held up long. Then again, the Wright brothers' first attempts weren't so hot either. Or Babbage's first contraptions. But plastic in and of itself is not a deal breaker when it comes to firearms.
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Damnit, forgot to address another point. I've stated elsewhere (and have others) that the lower receiver is actually a 'gun' according to the ATF in the US. In order to make a gun for sale, you have to go through all sorts of hoops. Making a gun for yourself, not so much. I figure that this 3rd party making a receiver would be 'making a gun' in the eyes of the law and therefore not going to happen. Or not happen much.
Making a grip, sights, barrels, and just about any other part should be ok. Making a lower
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If you say nuclear bomb it implies fission (as you hint to plutonium). The criticsl mass of plutonium is significantly higher than 2kg though.
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Okay, what if I submit a design to print a 3D gun (or replacement parts for one)? What about the packaging for, say, a credit card skimmer? How about a timing circuit made entirely out of electrically-conductive plastic (so it doesn't show up on an x-ray scanner)? I can only hope they look at the things being submitted; But I'm reminded of the scene in Batman begins where Alfred says, "Well, we'll have to order a lot of them in order to avoid suspicion." "Oh? How many?" "About ten thousand sir." "Well, at least we'll have spares."
3D printers open up a whole new world for both good and bad applications. If they aren't thinking about this now, they should start -- because someone else is reading this right now and tapping their fingers together saying "myes, myes my pretties..."
I don't think this is quite the problem you make it out to be, but it's a perfect angle for the IP protection guys to take... they will be terrified that it will rip the bottom out of their spare parts market (I can't replace the worn out piece of rubber/plastic on my car keys, I have to buy a whole new key assembly for around $300!) but they'll pressure the government to shut it down because it means that little Suzie can order a gun over the internet and the existing laws on gun ownership just won't cut i
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Little Suzie can go to any one of a number of free online forums to hook up with sellers who can legally sell to her face to face. As long as it doesn't go across state lines, ATF and any feds are not involved. In a lot of states, no paper trail at all is required.
You are scoring 0 for 2 so far on your gun knowledge. Perhaps you should shut your ignorant ass the fuck up.
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Okay, what if I submit a design to print a 3D gun
This problem is not specific to 3D printers. Just ask Sheffield Forgemasters, who famously made an "oil pipe" for Iraq back in 1990. Oddly, the pipe was enormously strong and specified to very fine tolerances. Turns out it wasn't for oil.
Tea Party hates TSA, likes guns (Score:3)
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You're a fucking MORON. Christ, people like you just play right into the TSA paranoia trip... I'll bet you're a Tea Bagger, too.
I don't think 'girlintraining' has teabags, but whatever.
Won't be long now... (Score:2)
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before the MAFIAA turn their attention to these 3D printing outfits.
Could one even print a 45 rpm record?
Speed... not. (Score:2)
> can print a thousand objects in a day,
>thousand
Wake me when a 3D printer can output something as simple as a pen clip at 600/minute (which is what you get out of a 30 year old press).
For rapid prototyping, yes, this kind of stuff is OK, because there is no demo tooling that winds up being production tooling (as is typical, bleh) and actually saves money. But to tout these kinds of numbers as if they're any meaningful amount of production is just crazy.
Expecting downmods.
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BMO
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Speed is nice but not the goal, lowing the cost of production would be ideal. Cheap machines reasonable cost of material so when you need something you don't need to send out for it. Print a replacement scissor for the broken G key on your laptop. A new button knob or battery cover for your gadget, a zipper foot for your sewing machine, a few more plastic knitting needles, an upholstery attachment for your vacuum cleaner. items that it might be cheap to mass produce but the demand at any given moment is ra
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>Speed is nice but not the goal, lowing the cost of production would be ideal.
Speed is always a goal. Time is money. Cost is amortized over the number of parts you make. Your fixed costs of equipment, power, people, infrastructure, etc, do not go away. The more pieces you can make in a certain amount of time decreases the cost per piece.
>Why get your cheap plastic crap form china when you'll be able to print it at home for the cost of the plastic, you don't NEED 600 a minute.
Because a "do everythin
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The cost per page for an inkjet printed document is orders of magnitude more expensive than a page from Joe's Offset Printing Shop.
You pay for the convenience. It's certainly not cheaper. It's especially cheaper to print with gold leaf than it is to print with inkjet ink from HP. It's cheaper to email your digital photos to a professional developer and get prints than it is to do photo prints at home. Consumer level equipment is expensive and inefficient per unit.
Everyone is so enamoured of the Star-Tr
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well, you brought up the metal parts when someone said it's nice for plastic parts.
it's fun for custom plastic things. I printed up some cd/dvd stands the other day. and a stand for a GUS I like to keep on display. for that type of thing it's fun. or ass-vases you simply can't buy. of course then there's certain objects that you can't structurally injection mold, plenty of fun pieces are just plastic or the metal parts can be acquired otherwise.
home printers are fun hobby machines right now - they're money
Wrong video (Score:2)
The Forbes article plays a video from some cooking show. With a player with no stop button.
There are other 3D printing service providers. Autodesk has a list. [autodesk.com] Autodesk itself also does some 3D printing as a sideline. They're more interested in selling the CAD tools for designing parts. Their printing service providers are more oriented towards working parts than decorative objects.
Commercial 3D printing (Score:2)
Commercial "3D printing" has existed forever, or at least the equivalent ("here's the money, here's the model, make me X number of them"). What technology is used to do it is really quite inconsequential - current 3D printing really doesn't add any value to the process beyond more conventional techniques.
The attractive feature of actual 3D printing is that people can do it themselves. Buy a bag of nylon, load it into the machine, press out all the little play-figures you want from designs pulled from the
Klein bottle (Score:2)
Heh, a Klein bottle. Cool.
I wonder if that was sent to try to trick the software. Inside?! Outside?!?!?! BOOOM!
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Reductio ad absurdum
Picking some arbitrary thing from old technology and saying some tool/shop/etc is not capable of making it, does not mean the tool is relegated to making trinkets. Heck, many modern machine shops and production shops would not be capable of making some components of vacuum tubes either. This is not to say that 3D printing won't be dominated by useless trinkets in the near future... just that the original point was really stupid.
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I challenge you to use a modern, fully equipped machine shop to machine a fully functional horse.
A horse is not low tech. It's taken 4 billion years of evolution and controlled breeding to make a modern horse.
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And yet, as high tech as a horse is, it cannot make a vacuum tube either.
Their evolutionary path specialized them for something very different than us.
Let me know when you can run a quarter-mile in 21 seconds, on dirt, from a standing start. Barefoot.