[extropy-chat] TECH: Soon, 3D Printing for the home office...

[Dan Clemmensen]

Emlyn O'regan wrote:

>Machine Could Bring 3D Printing to the Home Office
>http://www.betterhumans.com/News/news.aspx?articleID=2003-11-25-5
>A machine that cheaply and efficiently produces objects made of plastic and
>metal could soon bring 3D printing to home offices. 
>
>  
>
In the frenzy of digital photography, we purchased a high-quality
color printer. It turns out, after a year of using it sporadically, that
it's a lot cheaper to e-mail the images to a professional outfit and get
the prints back in the mail.

Why is this relevant? Because you can do the same thing with plastic
and metal parts. There is a company at
  http://www.emachineshop.com
That has a completely web-based business model. You start by
downloading their software, which is fairly nice CAD program, at no
cost. It's proprietary Windows software, and the license requires that you
refrain from using it to create designs that you then fabricate 
elsewhere, but
it's free.

In addition to being a fairly good CAD program, the software has some 
neat features::
   1) you can select materials from an extensive list including dozens 
of plastics,
       steels, and aluminiums, and lots of other metals.
   2)You select a machine (e.g, punch, 3-axis mill, tap) for each line 
or set of lines.
   3)You select "finishes" for each surface.
   3) After you design your part, or at any time during the design, the 
program can
        evaluate whether or not the design can actually be machined.
   4) The program computes a set of prices for the part, based on 
delivery time and quantity.

After you are happy with your design, you select the quantity and the 
delivery time,
and click on the "purchase" button. The program sends the design to the 
company, and
the company sends the parts back by mail.

Unfortunately, I did not discover this place until after I fabricated 
the mechanical parts
of my STM at home. I spent more for tools and material than the 
emachineshop design
would have cost, and since I am a klutz, my result is a lot less 
professional looking.
(I bought a drill press for $60, delivered, but a 9/16" drill bit costs 
$15.00!)

If I succeed with my prototype. I will probably reward myself by having 
a few more
built at emachineshop.com

Prices? A very simple small metal part will cost $50.00, quantity 1, and 
$75, quantity 10.
The STM part,  as I designed it, would cost $100, quantity 1, and $185, 
quantity 10,
in stainless steel. My prototype is aluminium, and the tools and 
materials cost about $200.00

As a separate issue, the really complex part of a modern product is the 
printed circuit board.
There are now many companies on the web that will build PCBs for you 
using the same
business model that emachineshop uses for machined parts. I intend to 
use one of these
shops for the electronics for the STM.  Again, the quantity 10 cost is 
generally not much
more than the quantity 1 cost, and the smallest order is about $150.00

If you can afford to wait for delivery, hardware really is software, at 
least for small parts.

To all American extropians: Happy Thanksgiving!