New Breakthrough in 3-D Printing

Really amazing stuff. We are looking at a glimpse of the future.

I'd be lying if I said I understood at all how these worked.

The first thing I saw on TV about 3D printers made no sense to me and I was certain at the time that I was seeing someone's April Fool's gag at the time.

Clearly, they exist, but my brain can't grasp that we're that far forward at this point.

I feel bad for the folks at Grandt Line and places like that because their days are clearly numbered.

This was just released Monday.

That's true, however it was Monday March 16, 2015.  Here's the original article.

 

http://www.washingtonpost.com/...literally/?tid=sm_fb

 

 

Company's like Grandt line and others must adapt or fade into history. 

Bob, thanks, didn't see that. Don

It is a REALLY cool techno advance over the standard 3D printing of today! 

It truly is amazing. Not train related, but my next door neighbor just got a knee replacement based on a prior scan and making a 3D replacement knee.

That's pretty amazing. Going to be interesting to see how far prices fall on all of this down the road.

It was premiered about a year ago at a conference of ground breaking tech......it's been improved since then...but same process. 

 

Creating and designing parts is STILL the big blockage to 99% of the public using 3D printing...no matter the format. 

Ford may have broken that open today. They are offering downloads of 3D printable files of many of their cars for $4!! THIS is the first step of making 3D printing a household item.  The model car guys are really excited. 

These 3D printers are pretty cool.

 

However, you've gotta design and create the part you want using CAD (Computer Aided Design) software.

 

Software like AutoCAD ain't cheap, and the learning curve takes a college course.

 

Not something the average model railroader is gonna tackle.

If there's something you want done, you'll have to hire a CAD software pro to design it, then you'll have to choose the most durable and strongest plastic to use in the most accurate reproduction 3D printer machine.  

Lots of luck.   The best and most accurate (in millimeters of specs) 3D printers cost hundreds of thousands of dollars.

There are companies out there with those type of 3D printers that will do it for you if you provide them with the CAD file, but they don't wanna just make one or two items, they want to make a run of several hundred.  And it ain't gonna be cheap.

 

Maybe someday 3D printing (like computers) will be inexpensive and easy to use, but that day won't come for a long time.

No question the technology is advancing almost as fast as prices are beginning to drop.  

 

However these are not for the faint of heart.  It's  easy to make something from an existing plan.  And if you buy a 3-D scanner then reproducing some things would be fairly easy.

 

The biggest hurdle to 3-D printing in the home is that I think the vast majorities do not have the design skills to create a plan.  You need  much more than a passing fancy of design programs.  If they can solve that issue with technology then I think people will line up to buy them.  Although the way kids are so technology adept these days they could probably handle creating something after a few trys.

 

Ed

Ed,

 

I'd like to agree with you, but 3D printing and learning CAD software to create what you want is far and beyond most teenagers and adults.

Yeah, some schools and colleges are just now offering courses of how to do it.

But it is learning the CAD software to create the exact design and specifications of something as well as the highly accurate machine to make it that is currently unaffordable to the average person.

I mean, if this technology was available, Lionel, MTH, Atlas and Bachmann would be punching out all kinds of detailed locos and boxcars at much cheaper prices.

 

But, they aren't.  That's because the present 3D printing technology for their use is still too expensive and years away from precise perfection.

 

 

It will never be economical for lionel to 3d print because of the volume. You can kick out pladtic parts from an injection mold 100 or 1000 times faster than 3d printing. And I learned autocad in high school, late 80's so not really new tech. It is expensive but not hard to learn, just takes practice, but consider the previous alternatives for making complex parts... buy a lathe and milling machine, spend potential thousands tooling, and accessories, and learn the trade of being a machinist. This is by far easier technology for the home modeler.

Is there any such thing as a free and open source 3D CAD package?

 

I was goofing around with BRL-CAD, but just making simple typos when going thru the tutorial made me question why am I doing this. I also couldn't come up with any drawing that had dimension lines on it.

 

Or put it another way, among those that use 3D printing, what software package are they using?

 

I have used AutoCAD back in the days of DOS and 80286, AutoCAD Lite, and now DraftSight. I bought TurboCAD a while ago, should have wasted it on some Lionel trains instead, it I could have enjoyed it then.

 

---------------------------------------------

 

Jeez, my manners.

 

Thanks for posting the video. That was neat!

...I remember when cell phones were $1200, not that long ago.

 

A different Ed!

Yeah, that was 20 years ago. 

 

Maybe, just maybe 20 years from now 3D printers, the plastic/resin and CAD software will be as easy to use as Microsoft Word and Microsoft Excel..... but don't count on it.

Eddie,

 

I agree that most kids, or anyone else for that matter, could not do this without extensive CAD training.  My comment about kids being able to do it was just an attempt to say that kids today are alot more tech savy than some adults, mainly me !!

 

I just can't wait for price and technology to arrive at a point where it would be something I could enjoy fooling with.  They better hurry up getting there though because at my age and health the faster they move the better. I'm to the point where I only put a few drops of smoke fluid in my steamer rather than fill it for fear it will get wasted ��

 

Sometimes you just have to laugh.

Ed

HMMMM, printing up new body parts on your own.  Now, someone needs to post a video on UTUBE showing how to install them, sort of DIY.  Would cut healthcare cost dramatically.