Motorola Mobility, a Google company, is building a 3D printed modular phone, and has partnered with 3D Systems for commercial fulfillment. More »
The Captured Dimensions pop-up studio was located in the Smithsonian Castle and featured approximately 80 digital cameras all connected to 3D software. More »
Microsoft expanded their support for 3D printing by launching a Windows 8 app called 3D Builder. It includes a library of objects you can edit and 3D print. More »
3D Systems (NYSE:DDD) announced the availability of the Sense 3D scanner, the first 3D scanner designed for the consumer and optimized for 3D printing. More »
With rumors circling that 3D Systems will be purchased by IBM, the stock soars. We look at why IBM might be interested in the 3D printing giant. More »
Search Results for: household
Zeni Kinetic Launches 3D Printing Filament Grant Program for Schools
Zeni Kinetic Announces 3D Printing Education Initiative, Launches Pilot Grant Program
The greatest cost of 3D printing is in the filament itself, the plastic “ink” that enables 3D printers to do their magic and make real-world object. With regular use, an FDM style printer can easily go through 1 kg of filament in a day or two.
This creates a real challenge for introducing a 3D printer into every school, a mission espoused by MakerBot, the leader in desktop 3D printers.
Zeni Kinetic, a US-based filament manufacturer, is taking that challenge head on, with a new pilot grant program to provide free and low-cost American-made 3D printing filament for schools.
The company announced the program last month, stating that acceptance and participation in their program gives a 30% to 50% discount on all filament, and free material will be offered on a grant basis.
“As 3D printing expands for both corporate and household use, those who have a working knowledge of this technology will be ahead of the game in the job market, in addition to restructuring their way of thinking about the world and their place in consumer society,” said a spokesperson for Zeni Kinetic.
Zeni Kinetic is an industry leader in high-quality filament manufacture, and offers a 30-year bio-degradable PLA (polyactic acid), which is a corn-based plastic. Their filament is eco-friendly, flows and bonds well and will not jam printers. It comes in 1.7 and 3.0 millimeter sizes and will work smoothly on any standard FDM style 3D printer.
“It took us 18 months of dedicated R&D to refine the control systems, write the software and develop the automated technologies that we use to produce our products,” explains Zeni Kinetic. “A typical extrusion line used for making monofilament or “plastic welding rod” can easily produce a useable printer filament but it takes a combination of industry standards and in-house developed systems to reach our unmatched tolerance and quality.”
For more details please visit us at http://zenikinetic.com/non-profit/
The 3D Printer is Now Affordable – $100 Peachy 3D Printer on Kickstarter
$100 3D Printer Closing in on $500,000 on Kickstarter
How much does a desktop 3D printer cost? If you asked that question a year ago, the answer would be influenced by the price of a MakerBot Replicator, the leading home 3D printer that sells for $2,199.
Well, now the answer is $100, thanks to a Canadian entrepreneur named Rylan Grayston.
Mr. Grayston has literally reinvented the 3D printer and has launched a Kickstarter campaign for his product he calls “Peachy”, a $100 3D printer. With 23 days left in his campaign, he has raised nearly $500,000 CAD to fund the final development and distribution of his device.
It’s affordable, small, lightweight, and unique. It’s a 3D printer in a class all its own.
The promise of the Peachy is simple yet bold, “We want to lower the cost and difficulty of 3D Printing to a point where it’s accessible to the masses. We want the 3D Printer to become a household item. We want 3D printing to become a common part of life. We want you to have the choice: Should I buy it or should I make it?”
Reinventing the 3D Printer
While there are many low-cost desktop 3D printer alternatives, the cheapest available option to date has been priced at $500, such as the Robo 3D. The reason is that 3D printers have many mechanical components — galvanometers, shafts, motors, gears, microcontrollers, and so on — that create a cost floor.
Peachy’s design is different. It uses salt water to rise the resin. It connects to your laptop to harness the power of the sound card as a replacement for a traditional microcontroller. The smarts of the device are in software instead of hardware.
Mr. Grayston explained in his Kickstarter video that he replaced traditional expensive 3D printer parts with stuff lying around the house. “Literally the first version of the Peachy printer was created using household items,” said Grayston.
Kickstarter Campaign
Below is the video Rylan Grayston published on Kickstarter to promote his Peachy 3D printer.
Microsoft Confirms Plans to Take 3D Printing to the Masses at Inside 3D Printing Chicago
Software giant seeks to make 3D printing seamless for home use
In late June, during their annual Build Conference, Microsoft announced that Windows 8.1 would support 3D printing. This sparked many questions among people as to why Microsoft would get involved and how would they get involved. Jesse McGatha, a 14-year veteran at Microsoft, is one of the key people in charge of leading 3D printing innovation within the software giant.
Today, at the Inside 3D Printing Conference in Chicago, Mr. McGatha began his talk by addressing the question: Why would Microsoft be involved in 3D printing? He explained, “when you have over 70% of 3D printing already happening on a Windows operating system, it makes sense that Windows actually supports that.”
McGatha expressed that one of his main goals is to have an application that can talk to a server and can talk to a device in a clean and consistent way. Moreover, Microsoft will focus on the individual home consumer and on how to can make that user experience as simple and as seamless as possible. Microsoft wants to create a “consumer operating system that is available to everybody” that works fluidly with 3D printing.
Essentially, Microsoft is looking to make 3D printing a plug-and-play process. Now that the cost of 3D printers is becoming accessible for individuals to have at their home thanks to innovations from MakerBot, among others, it is important to have a PC operating system that makes it very simple for people to 3D print things.
Jesse McGatha showed the audience a sample user interface for how Windows 8.1 would interact with 3D printers (see gallery below). While the actual product might look different when it comes to market, the idea is to make the printing process very similar to how a user would go about printing a regular Word doc or PowerPoint presentation today. Some things as simple as having print queues and a print spooler are features Microsoft is tackling to make the user experience straightforward.
At the moment, 3D printing can be a tedious process that requires multiple different software packages and several programs to connect the computer to the 3D printers. The complex process can be a deterrent for the mass adoption of 3D printing technology in the household.
After listening to Mr. McGatha, it is obvious why Microsoft would jump into the industry to make it user friendly and help catalyze bringing 3D printers into people’s homes.
Authored by On 3D Printing contributor Rodrigo Garza Zorrilla, technology entrepreneur and advisor.
Dreambox Hopes to Make 3D Printing Universal with Custom Vending Machines
“3D printing will enable every human on this planet to design, customize, and create products to solve problems – from the slightest household annoyance to global issues – and we’re here to fuel the revolution from the bottom up.” – Dreambox Team
A Dreambox is a 3D printing vending machine. It is the simplest way to have your custom models created. Take away the dozens of hours to setup a 3D printer, take away the weeks of waiting to receive an item from a 3D printing service, take away the need for a full-time operator and you’re left only with 3D printing’s unique manufacturing capabilities. With a Dreambox users can freely experiment with and harness 3D printing’s advantages.
The team came up with their concept while at UC Berkeley where it was hard to get access to 3D printers for rapid prototyping. Their only alternative was to order from online 3D printing marketplaces which would take 10-12 days for delivery and was more expensive.
Having an item 3D printed with a Dreambox is as simple as uploading or choosing a design online, clicking the “Print” button and retrieving the item once it’s ready. The details of what happens in between choosing to print an item and receiving that item are not important to the end user. What is important is that multiple users can get physical versions of their digital creations faster and simpler than ever before.
Dreamboxes are built to order with a varying number of internal 3D printers and lockers based on customer needs. Instead of creating our own 3D printers, we leverage the best of existing 3D printing technology so we can stay on the forefront of quality. Increasing the internal number of 3D printers and lockers lets a single Dreambox service a larger number of individuals.
Dreambox currently uses fused deposition modeling to create products from bioplastics, but will in the future offer additional material options.
Learn more at the Dreambox website.
Below is a concept video of the Dreambox 3D printing vending machine.
And here’s an inside look at how the Dreambox works.
RoBo 3D Printer Raises $500K on Kickstarter to Battle MakerBot
There’s a new Kickstarter champion in town: The RoBo 3D Printer. After setting up a Kickstarter campaign to raise $49,000, it looks likes the RoBo team will raise over $500K to build a a low-cost, open source, easy to use 3D printer.
What is RoBo 3D?
RoBo 3D is the ultimate 3D printer everyone has been waiting for. We combined the best minds from the open source community, the best hardware we believe can give the best prints, and our own ideas based on our experience working with 3D printers. The open-source design is made so people like us can go online and find all the documents that show the ins and outs of how to make a RoBo 3D. In true rep-rap fashion, RoBo 3D has been made so that it can print out its own parts. Once in your hands, print out another for a friend! Come experience it and together, lets create something great.
Who is RoBo 3D for?
Architects- print out model homes and buildings for clients. Change and print out again without hassle.
Designers- Have an idea that you want to bring to life? Print out your designs and see if they were everything you imagined. If not, change it and print out the next idea.
Hobbyists/DIY- Easily create your projects in the comfort of your own home.
Small Business owners- Manufacture your own products at the office!
Students- Senior engineering project coming up? Use RoBo 3D to proint the parts you need to get the job done done.
Home owners- Replace broken household items for next to nothing!
In their campaign, RoBo 3D provides a comparison matrix to the MakerBot. What jumps out the most is the price: $520 vs $2,199 for the MakerBot Replicator 2.
Below is their Kickstarter video. Congrats to the team for raising $500K!
