Is the technology out there to weld 3D models in
steel?
David,
had dinner last week with an American based mathematician
Vaughan Jones, who was holding a conferance down in N.Z.
Regards Alan
----- Original Message -----
Sent: Tuesday, February 14, 2012 9:47
AM
Subject: Re: [PSUBS-MAILIST] Ready to
print
Thats the whole idea behind the reprap movement. Open source free
software. The hardware is scalable and extremely hack able. Makerbot for
example posts
It's cut files
For a laser cutter to make the panels and case. You can download the
eagle files for all of the control boards. Build an arduino clone and solder
the boards yourself. You could print other parts. You could build a Makerbot
or a reprap for very cheap- providing you have some access to some tools and
have a few skills. I plan on building a much bigger machine once I get much
more skilled. Heating the build platform becomes much harder, but certainly
not impossible.
Also, each month the resolution of the printers gets much better. Go
big.
Sent from my iPhone
--
David Brelsford
Math Teacher
NAF Prep
410.446.7037
"Life is good for two things, discovering mathematics and teaching
mathematics"
Simeon Poisson
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You
know what I’d be really interested in? Scaling it up! I have lying in the
garage a set of rods and linear bearings, with a lead screw, that look like
a four foot long big brother of the printer’s X axis. I can see putting
exactly the same little extruder head on mega hardware and printing a bike
frame or a kayak. Or for the sub, maybe a ballast tank or a deck. It would
take an awful long time, for sure, but since the process is entirely
automatic I really wouldn’t mind. The control electronics should be
transferrable, except they would need to drive much beefier
servos.
You are right, and I thought about that as soon as I hit
send. Knob and all of the other non-mission critical stuff can be made.
There are programs out there- plugins and such for 3d programs that allow
you to make all sorts of cool knobs. The neat thing is that you can
customize that they say.
I have not ton tons of research on PLA, but what i found
through MSDS etc is that it all varies. There are so many manufacturing,
extrusion and printing variances that it would be difficult to give an
actaul lenght of time till it degrades. Trial and error is the only way.
With water in the bay for example, there is, on a daily basis I am sure,
differences in salinity, temperature, contaminants etc.
I'm going to look up Slic3r when I get home. For those
out there that are still kind of curious about this 3d thing, look up some
videos on you-tube. Try searcing for Prusa, Makerbot, makergear, mendel.
That will give you a great idea. But I warn you. You will be hooked. I was.
Now I have a Makerbot, and I have ordered another for the school. I would
like to build a Rep-rap variant soon. Also there is a really neat one about
to hit the market called printerbot, which looks like it is going to be in
the 500~ range. all of the printed parts and designs are posted on
thingiverse. The idea behind most of these "robots" is that they can print
themselves.
On Mon, Feb 13, 2012 at 12:03 PM, Smyth, Alec <Alec.Smyth@compuware.com>
wrote:
EXCELLENT!!!
The only thing I disagree with is the “don’t make anything for a sub”
notion, as I would suggest it’s a part-by-part decision. There are
innumerable knobs, brackets, instrument dashes, etc. that can be of
ABS without their failure being life-threatening, and which in many cases
are plastic already. How about printing a Kort nozzle, which is really hard
to machine?
One
thing I would like to pass on is that I started using Skeinforge, but the
number of quite incomprehensible parameters made it really hard. I’ve
replaced it with “slicer” which has a tiny fraction of the parameters and is
actually easy to use. I couldn’t recommend it highly enough, that one change
was what got me from tearing my hair out to actually printing. It’s
downloadable for free at http://slic3r.org.
Just
last night I started experimenting with “123D”, which is a free 3D drawing
application from Autodesk. I’m very impressed so far, it seems a lot more
powerful than I would have expected from a free app.
I’m
very interested in exploring PLA for addressing the issue of ghost traps in
the Chesapeake, and have been poking around for data on how fast it degrades
in water. Fishermen lose 20% of their traps each year, and these “ghost”
traps continue fishing for many years unattended, until they eventually
corrode. They catch some poor creature that becomes the bait for the next
one, and the chain just continues. It should be possible to cut a little
square window in traps, and cover it with a PLA grid that’s tie-wrapped to
the edges of the hole. Print the PLA mesh to match the mesh of the trap so
there’s no functional difference. Calibrate the thickness of the PLA wires
so it will dissolve after X months in the bay. Do you happen to have
any data on how quickly the PLA degrades? All I have found is for composting
conditions, and a statement that it eventually dissolves if freely floating
in water, but no data on the rate at which that would
happen.
Thanks,
Alec
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specified.
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Alec, I'm
gladto see that I am not the only person embarking on this 3D printer thing.
I just built a MakerBot Thing-O-Matic (makerbot.com), and am having a ball. Still tweaking some
of the setting in skienforge, but will have it in tip-top shape in no time.
I am actually planning on using it in my classroom here in Baltimore City
(7th grade math) I am a newb as well, but being on the bleeding edge of
technology is not always easy.
A few things,
after reading the other posts and questions here.
I think, for
the PSubs folks, and really anyone who will be making parts that your lives
my depend on, I do not think that I would trust ABS. Nothing on the sub is-
or should be made out of lego, Besides, there are plenty of
opportunities out there for mistakes in the printing to be made and parts to
delaminate.
Definately
dont make stuff for the water out of PLA. It breaks
down,
The real
advantage is in proof of concept. The ABS/PLA is cheap. you can design
anything you want, print it, and bolt it to your sub, or your car or bike or
head, or whatever. if it works, you can then invest your time into welding a
part, or sending it to someone like shapeways- who cna then make the part
out of metal. It really allows you to look at your actual design, not just
what you think you drew. If it works get it made, or edit the drawing.
A few things
to think of: you have to draw something in 3D. To many that is pretty
daunting. Solidworks and Autocad have a steep learnign curve. A progam that
I have been using with my kids is called Tinkercad (tinkercad.com i believe). It
is a web/browser based, easy to use 3d program. It does not have all
the bells and whistles, but it is free, and a much easier learnign curve.
Remember, I have a group of 7th graders using it now. they can design
someting, and when its working right, hit print and actually make it.
There is
another website that I like called Thingiverse, where people post the things
that they design as .stl files, and they share theme with the world.
Granted, there is a lot of sillness going on too, but a lot of the stuff is
really helpful. there is also a great community of people out there trying
to learn how to use these things, so there is a lot of help.
dmb--
"Life is good for two
things, discovering mathematics and teaching
mathematics"
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"Life is good for two
things, discovering mathematics and teaching
mathematics"
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