Tag Archives: desktop 3D printer
College Kids Design Desktop 3D Printer to Be Crowdfunded and Sold For Under $500
Deltaprintr Desktop 3D Printer Coming Soon to Kickstarter and Maker Faire
“We designed the Deltaprintr to be simple without sacrificing anything.” — Deltaprintr team
Deltaprintr is a new desktop 3D printer concept that is targeting a retail price of under $500. Created by a team of college students, the savings come from a desire to simplify, not limit, capabilities.
“The project’s inception occurred when I had built a RepRap for our University due to limited availability of funds at the time,” said Shai Schechter, the tech guru behind Deltaprintr, in an interview with On 3D Printing. “After noticing 3D printing’s potential in the classroom and rising demand from fellow college friends, we decided to make our own 3D printer that not only those who can afford to spend more than $1,000 on their printer can buy, but college students as well.”
The team began working on their desktop 3D printer in May and are in the process of finalizing production costs. Schechter said proudly, “we are currently on track to sell at retail under $500.”
The Deltaprintr Team
The founding Deltaprintr team is composed of electrical and mechanical engineers, finance, and a graphic designer. But there is also a great response from the community, Schechter explained, “with a lot of positive feedback and a lot of anxious people waiting for us to launch.”
Desktop 3D printer leader MakerBot, sellers of the $2,200 Replicator 2 desktop 3D printer, was recently acquired by Stratasys for $403 million. Perhaps this team can strike gold with their more affordable design.
The company has launched teaser videos on YouTube and high quality images of its 3D printer. Below is an image gallery and their teaser video.
See Deltaprintr at Maker Faire and on Kickstarter
Deltaprintr will be exhibiting at the World Maker Faire this September 21-22 in NY.
Schechter tells us they are also planning on launching a Kickstarter campaign sometime in October or November. Stay tuned here for more news on Deltaprintr.
Learn more at Deltaprintr.com.
Study Shows 3D Printing Emits Ultrafine Particles; What This Actually Means
Should You Use Your 3D Printer Indoors? Study Asks, We Explain
A recent study published in the journal Atmospheric Environment shows evidence that desktop 3D printers emit ultrafine particles (UFP) to a degree that should cause concern, if you operate your 3D printer in a telephone booth.
The report focuses on emissions by FDM (fused deposition modeling) printers that use ABS or PLA material, a configuration used by MakerBot and other popular desktop 3D printer companies.
Ultrafine particles are small particles, technically on the nanoscale, that can be inhaled and cause health effects ranging from innocuous to major, including lung disease.
The report claims that observed emissions of UFPs from desktop 3D printers were significant and therefore caution should be used when operating in a unventilated area.
Estimates of emission rates of total UFPs were large, ranging from ∼2.0 × 1010 # min−1 for a 3D printer utilizing a polylactic acid (PLA) feedstock to ∼1.9 × 1011 # min−1 for the same type of 3D printer utilizing a higher temperature acrylonitrile butadiene styrene (ABS) thermoplastic feedstock. Because most of these devices are currently sold as standalone devices without any exhaust ventilation or filtration accessories, results herein suggest caution should be used when operating in inadequately ventilated or unfiltered indoor environments.
At first glance, this sounds like a big problem for 3D printing, an industry in rapid growth and adoption. But the reality is that the level of emission observed is similar to that of laser printers, candles, and cooking on a stove at home – all activities consumers are not going to give up any time soon.
The same 3D printer utilizing a higher temperature ABS feedstock had an emission rate estimate (1.8–2.0 × 1011 # min−1) similar to that reported during grilling food on gas or electric stoves at low power (1.2–2.9 × 1011 # min−1), but approximately an order of magnitude lower than gas or electric stoves operating at high power (1.2–3.4 × 1012 # min−1). Regardless, the desktop 3D printers measured herein can all be classified as “high emitters” with UFP emission rates greater than 1010 particles per min, according to criteria set forth in He et al. (2007).
In summary, don’t use your 3D printer in a dark corner of your basement without opening the window.
Embedded is the full report.
CC image by pennstatenews
Student Creates LEGObot 3D Printer Made Entirely of LEGOs
LEGObot 3D Printer
Engineering student Matt Kreuger loves LEGOs and 3D printing, so why not combine those passions? Kreuger is the creator of the LEGObot, a 3D printer built almost entirely out of LEGO blocks.
Unlike other desktop 3D printers, the LEGObot is limited to hot glue which makes it more of a novelty than utility, but not bad for a first version!
Kreuger posted his design on Instructables along with this story and video.
Ever since I saw the first makerbot, I have been obsessed with 3D printing, but I am an engineering student so I don’t have an extra $800-$2500, and have been doing my best to create one out of what I have on hand. I tried arduino with easy drivers, and parallel port, but neither one gave results, I always needed a tool or part that I couldn’t get. So I pulled out my old box of legos and started building.
This is a project I have been working on for the past year, it prints in hot glue and made almost completely out of legos. Based roughly on the first version of the makerbot, while it does print, I would call this more of a prototype than a finished project. I am using 4 power supplies (3v extruder, 7.2v for nxt, 12v fan, and 115 for hot glue gun) and having to manually turn the extruder on and off, (although i am working on that one) . Unfortunately, due to my lack of computer programming skills, every move has to be manually programmed from the NXT programming software, I have yet to find a g-code interpreter for the NXT.
Hopefully in the next version I will be able to shorten the height of the platform, reduce wobble, and use g-code files.
but in the mean time, I have included a Lego Digital Designer file with the full printer in it, just about all the technic parts are exactly the same as in my printer, but for the structure I used different parts to speed the digital building process, the structure and dimensions are still the same. under each X and Y axis there are 2 suspended blocks that I placed coins in to balance the weight of the motor on each side, for the extruder motor I used a lens adjustment motor out of an old VHS camera because it was low speed/high torque. In the .ldd file, the green box on the right side of the extruder gears is the case I made for it, it works perfectly.While hot-glue works, its very rubbery and doesn’t have many practical uses, if only one or 2 layers are printed then it will stick to glass to make window stickers, but its not sturdy or rigid, I will be experimenting with printing using wax and heat-melting resins in the future. I am currently limited to what I can make with what I have at hand, some more printed parts could really improve accuracy on this. I initially did not have enough gear racks so I asked someone who had a 3D printer at work if he could help me out, I was able to get around 30 of them printed, and while they work, they do not connect perfectly to the legos, which is what causes most of the wobble in the platform.
Full Analysis of the Stratasys and MakerBot 3D Printing Acquisition
Full Analysis of Stratasys and MakerBot Deal
On June 19, desktop 3D printer company MakerBot was acquired by Stratasys for $403 million. The next day, executives from Stratasys and MakerBot hosted a conference call with analysts to discuss the transaction. Seeking Alpha published a full transcript of the call and we provide our analysis on the deal below.
Executives on the call included:
- Shane Glenn – VP Investor Relations
- S. Scott Crump – Chairman of the Board
- David Reis – Chief Executive Officer
- Bre Pettis – CEO and Co-Founder of MakerBot
- Erez Simha – Chief Operations Officer, Israel and Chief Financial Officer
Stratasys Definitive Move into Desktop 3D Printer Market
Stratasys has long been a leader in the additive manufacturing industry. In December they completed a merger with Israel-based Objet to create a $3 billion 3D printer company. Now, with the addition of MakerBot, Stratasys is definitively embracing the desktop 3D printer market.
The executives commented that desktop 3D printing is the next industrial revolution.
It has been widely reported that MakerBot has major customers in organization like GE, NASA and Lockheed Martin, and continue to sell its desktop 3D printers to other Major Fortune 500 companies as well as small entrepreneurial startups and individuals.
Desktop 3D printing usage among design and engineering professional is growing rapidly. Stratasys and MakerBot estimate that between 35,000 to 40,000 desktop 3D printers were sold in 2012. This number is estimated to double in 2013, as consumers increasingly adopt desktop 3D printers for broad range of applications.
In acquiring MakerBot, Stratasys has expanded its scope, selling 3D printers priced from $2,000 to more than $600,000 for all purposes. The MakerBot products allow for more accessibility and affordability of 3D printers that will enable more rapid growth.
MakerBot Company Profile
MakerBot, headquartered in Brooklyn, is the market leader in desktop 3D printing, selling more than 22,000 3D printers since 2009. The company has 274 employees.
MakerBot generated revenues of $15.7 million in 2012, and grew rapidly to $11.5 million in Q1 2013. The company sells two 3D printers: the MakerBot Replicator 2 Desktop 3D Printer, and the MakerBot Replicator 2X Experimental 3D Printer. Retail prices range from $2,200 to $2,800. The majority of sales are placed on the MakerBot website. 60% of customers are based in North America, and 40% international.
The 3D printers are assembled in Brooklyn at a 55,000 square foot production facility in the Sunset Park neighborhood.
MakerBot hosts a web community called Thingiverse, where users can upload 3D printable files. There are more than 90,000 3D product files online and the site has more than 500,000 unique visitors and 1 million downloads each month.
Bre Pettis’ View
MakerBot CEO shared his perspective on the deal:
Our company shares a vision about how to lead the market’s growth and development and it’s all about creating a great user experience. We are very proud of what we have built at MakerBot, but we’ve only just begun. That’s why we are so attracted by the opportunity to join with Stratasys.
Our mission remains the same. Merging with Stratasys offers us an opportunity to continue to build our business and pursue our vision under the MakerBot brand. The last couple of years have been incredibly inspiring and exciting for us. We have an aggressive model for growth. Partnering with Stratasys will allow us to supercharge that mission to empower individuals to make things using a MakerBot and allow us to bring 3D technology to more people.
Deal Structure
Stratasys will issue 4.76 million shares of its stock, worth $403 million, in exchange for 100% of the outstanding capital stock of MakerBot.
In addition, MakerBot stakeholders will also be eligible for performance-based earn-outs of up $201 million through the end of 2014.
Read the full transcript at Seeking Alpha.
