MakerBot’s New 3D Printer: The Thing-O-Matic | Hacker News Reader

MakerBot’s New 3D Printer: The Thing-O-Matic

blog.makerbot.com

85 pointsph0rque36 comments

I'm so excited to see these 3D printers becoming more and more advanced. The disruption caused by the Internet so far will be mild compared to what these things will do in the long run.

Seemingly this is a long way off, but when consumers can create many or most of the objects they need using some raw materials and data from an open source hardware design, the whole economy will have to adjust dramatically.

Great work guys!

but when consumers can create many or most of the objects they need

I'm not seeing that soon. Many or most of the objects that I need are either: 1) Full of advanced electronics - phone, ebook reader, laptop, netbook etc.

2) Made of metal for strength - e.g. car or bike parts

3) Made from fabric - clothes and bedding

4) Edible

So when do these machines go past being fabs that can churn out plastic trinkets? How many white plastic rabbits does one need anyway?

When I get my hand on one of those 3D printer, I plan to make a self replicating lego train network en-masses, completed with construction legobots and the like.

The lego clone bricks will be the foundation for an entire robotic enterprise to build a train network around my neighborhood, and then the next and so on.

That mean, lego assembly lines for building trains and various kind of construction bots, and various scouting legobots that fly, crawl, and move on the ground. Then it's time for the human to source electronics and plastic supplies, as well find a business model for the train network I am going to build.

It's an interesting project that seem to be multifacet, at least to me. Alas, I am still on hacking my RC cars to become robot stage. Tommorow is desoldering day and finally controlling the motor of my RC car.

Just wait - one of them will go back in time and try to kill Lego Sarah Conner. You'll see.

I'm posting this from my phone, so no links right now, but you can print in many more materials than just plastic, and they're working on circuitry... see the link I posted below, don't want to spam.

Unfortunately, that is not really the case yet. Some 3D printers say you can print in metal but what they are really using is the same plastic with metal dust sprinkled in. So while it looks like metal it does not really have the properties you really want in metal, such as strength.

Most of the different materials that 3D printers offer are pretty much the same plastic modified in some way.

You're probably thinking of SLS, which is nylon based, but can have stuff sprinkled in. The metal printers that ProMetal makes bind steel powder together, and then infuse it with bronze. It's quite strong, and I've heard that the grain structure is actually better than casting.

Don't even get me started on EBM. ;)

The reprap guys have demoed a solder extruder so that they could print a circuit board with it.

3d printers are just one tool in the box. Traditional cnc machines are also dropping in price and the software is getting easier to use. The MIT Fab Lab demonstrated building a house in a few weeks with a set of tools that fits inside a shipping container. They aim to bring the cost of this container of tools down to $10k. At that price point we could see a whole new range of businesses performing advanced local manufacturing.

http://www.fablabhouse.com/en/

1) There's no reason that it can't print circuit boards with some conducting/semi-conducting materials.

2) Again, it's a material choice

3) This is already solved. There's a designer who makes clothing with these 3D printers, google it.

But this printer doesn't do circuit boards or metals (let alone aloys)

I've seen the pages bout the fabrics that you mentions. They might go down well in the right sort of nightclub, but it's not a "solved problem" - you wouldn't want a blanket, pillow or comfortable but tough jeans made out of that. Though women may want those chunky high-heeled shoes made to custom order, once it can do colours.

There are 3d printers which can print metal.

Still a long way from an affordable 3D printer for the masses. Also, the masses will want variable color objects printed on demand.

No video of it in action yet? That's always the part I look for in 3d printer articles.

I wonder how one of the major problems with these things will be solved. We have a Stratasys ($30k+ unit) 3D printer at work and while it does a great job of making a prototype overnight, the feature size still isn't small enough to not notice ridges. I'd guess that the features are well below 0.01" but you can still see a "pattern" on the end product that wouldn't be there if it were, e.g., molded or machined.

RepRap is doing some interesting research with using multiple types of materials like embedding wiring in the product, but the technology has a long way to go before it's consumer-ready.

You should check out non - FDM processes; for instance, Objet machines have a 14micrometer layer thickness, so they're absolutely smooth coming out of the machine. There's so much more out there.

Shameless plug: http://cloudfab.com/fab_facts

That is a nice summary of what is out there.

Thank you. We tried. It's really unfortunate that even among people who know about printing, they know about the top two or three processes, generally. There's so much cool stuff happening in this space, the industry really has an image problem.

Yeah, the ridges were really noticeable on pieces I've seen before. It'll do for very utilitarian purposes, but aesthetically it's a deal breaker.

A bit of sandpaper or a quick dip in acetone will help with that.

Or you could buy a 'smoothing station' for $20k.

For $45,000, you can get rid of the steps:

http://www.solid-scape.com/t66_roi.html

I'm having a hard time finding examples of things it prints. You'd think they'd have a few impressive pictures of stuff they've printed with it...

To see examples of things makerbot, thing-o-matic's younger sibling, built you can check out thingiverse.com

I can't think of anyone who embodies the hacker mentality better than the MakerBot guys. The polish on this version really shows. Keep it up!

That really sucks that the price increased. I've been waiting patiently for years for the price to come down.

Btw I don't think it actually made that platic rabbit in the picture. I've seen things the reprap has made and that rabbit is way too advanced looking. Anyone know?

The price for the cupcake CNC (previous model) HAS come down while supplies last -- you can get it really cheap. The Thing-O-Matic is a new, much improved model.

I believe it made the rabbit; I've seen similar things made by cupcake, and thing-o-matic is supposed to be even more preceise.

And last but not least -- it's all open source. Build one yourself if you think the price is too high. I think their profit margin is very reasonable, and if you try to build one from scratch it is probably going to cost you at least as much in bill-of-materials-and-lasercutting alone.

Video of the thing-o-matic printing here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xVKzRJJh7t8

I was implying they were marking it up too much. I just wish someone would figure out a cheaper way to make 3D printers. Alas, I have no ideas.

The plans are all open source, if you think the markup isn't worth it, you can put it together yourself. http://wiki.makerbot.com/cupcake

That was a typo sorry. I meant to write "I wasn't implying"

It's cheaper than anything else.

Oh, my. Just as I was about to shell out for a Makerbot as well. Damn.

You can get a cupcake cnc (old makerbot) for half price while their supplies still last.

Yes, but that wouldn't tweak my NewShinyometer quite so hard.

doesn't say that on the makerbot site anywhere I've seen.

I've got it worse, I'm half-way through the build of my Cupcake.

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