Tag Archives: video
Color Blending with Consumer 3D Printers Produces Amazing Results
Consumer 3D printers, like MakerBot and the Cube, cost over $1,300 and can only print in one or two colors. If you want multi-color printing, you need to use a commercial grade 3D printer that costs $20,000 or more.
Well, electrical engineer and hobbyist Richard Home, decided to branch out and design his own method of “color blending”, a technique that turns a basic 3D printer into something much more capable. He started with the open-source RepRap design and developed his own extruder design, which he coined “RichRap.”
As featured in Wired:
Here’s how it works: The RichRap has three extruder motors feeding into one nozzle, or hot end. Each motor spools plastic filament into the hot end where it is melted, then deposited on a build surface. An operator could load a RichRap with red, yellow, and blue plastics and generate green parts by mixing the yellow and blue, or purple by mixing red and blue.
Watch the videos below to see Richard discuss his design and show off some of his color prints.
Guto Requena 3D Printed Designs Based on Urban Sounds in Sao Paulo
Guto Requena is one of Brazil’s most innovative up and coming architects. His work is based on the ever-evolving world of communication and technology, reflecting how these new advancements affect us.
Requena was recently profiled in the i.materialise blog.
As a little child Guto Requena always dreamed about architecture. Then finally, when he started studying architecture he became more and more interested in digitalism and technology. At this moment he is one of the most innovatist architects of Brazil and with his studio Estudio Guto Requena he tries to push the projects he really wants to do.
For this collection he uses these former iconic designs as basics but reforms the digital models by using recorded cityvoices, urban sounds,…etc. through a computer program. He recorded these noises in different neighborhoods on the streets of São Paulo. The eventual designs were 3D printed at Materialise and are references to the beautiful hidden places in São Paulo’s neighborhoods.
Below is a video of an interview with Guto Requena.
University Professor Mark Ganter on Home Brew Printing Medium (Video)
Mark Ganter is a professor of mechanical engineering at UW. He loves 3D printing. He has machine #25 from ZCorp and has been doing this longer than these students have been alive. He is the co-director of the open3dp (Open 3D Printing) organization. And he thinks that 3D printing will cross academic boundaries, as we recently reported.
In the video below, Professor Ganter talks about a home brew printing medium for 3D printing.
Will It 3D Print? Objet Prints a Baseball Bat (Video)
In this edition of our Will It 3D Print?, we ask: could you 3D print a baseball bat?
In the video below, a baseball bat was 3D printed on an Objet Connex Multi-Material 3D Printer and tested against a variety of objects to see if it breaks. The bat is printed in Objet’s ABS-like Digital Material – a very strong and functionally versatile composite material that is unique to the Objet Connex range of 3D printers. The bat does not shatter or splinter upon hard contact with various objects.
Verdict: YES!
3D Printing Mobile Labs: A New Combat Strategy for the U.S. Military
The U.S. military is embracing 3D printing in a novel way: they have developed mobile labs that can prototype and manufacture replacement parts or innovative equipment in combat.
The service’s Rapid Equipping Force, known as the REF, took a standard 20-foot shipping container and packed it with high-tech, prototyping machines, lab gear and manufacturing tools to create the Expeditionary Lab — Mobile.
Soldiers no longer have to wait to bring ideas back to scientists and engineers back in the states. The REF has brought the experts to the soldiers in combat.
The first mobile 3D printing labs were deployed to Afghanistan this summer. Each lab costs $2.8 million.
Col. Pete Newell, commander of the Army’s REF, explained the motivation. “The soldiers out there, they know how to do stuff; they know how to fix stuff and they know what they need to be able to do, but what they don’t have is the technical expertise in many cases to do it themselves.”
The extreme heat in Afghanistan quickly eroded the eight-hour battery life of these devices down to 45 minutes, a problem that loaded down dismounted soldiers with the weight of extra batteries for multi-day missions.
Engineers created a special adaptor and power cable for a standard military-issue BA5590 battery, which now powers the Minehound for up to nine hours. The fix also allowed soldiers to take the battery off the device and wear it on their body for better weight distribution and reduced arm fatigue, Newell said.
Expect to see a growth in 3D printing mobile labs – not just for combat scenarios but also for handling natural disasters and other peace-time missions.
Watch the video below for more details.
Via Military.com.
