3D Printing - General Thread

[Bill Gill]

Agree completely with Russ's comments! Ed is a wizard with SketchUp and has been very helpful & encouraging about how to use it. He is also knowledgable and willing to design and contact Shapeways about printing parts. Recently I contacted him about making a tiny HO detail part, a "schoolhouse" lighting globe. This full size fixture has been around for ages in many locations besides schools, a quick search will turn up many examples. Ed took a photo I sent him and turned it into a tangible object to experiment with. Below is a photo he took of them still on the printing sprue. And you can see how they turned out here:http://railroad-line.com/forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=44096&whichpage=1

[Chuck Doan]

I have thought the same thing. Ed is taking Sketch Up to a very high level. It's been neat to see.

[Lawton Maner]

Staples is now selling 3D printers in their stores. A clerk in the store in Williamsburg, Va. claims that they will soon have one for public use in the copy center.
Film later.

[Bexley]

Dremel also appears to make a 3D printer now. Available at Home Depot even.

[5thwheel]

Oh no! Another Dremel tool.  Not knowing much about  3 D printing am wondering if this is just a toy?  What is 100 microns for printing quality? The information does not mention the soft wear need to design your own models.

What is the expected life span of things modeled in 3D? In other words once something is printed in 3D how long would the item last?

[finescalerr]

My impression parallels Bill's. It looks like a lo-res, low quality tool or, as Bill suggests, perhaps of not much more use for modeling than a toy. On the other hand it shows how mainstream the technology will become. -- Russ

[Hauk]

I dread the mountains of plastic garbage that will be printed on the growing army of low-end printers lilke the Makerbot and the Dremel.

I agree that they probably can be great educational tools. But all 3D printer filament should be recyclable.

[eTraxx]

The Dremel was reviewed in the current Make magazine 3D printer issue.

excerpts ..

.. has a color touch-screen interface that makes leveling the bed, loading filament, and selecting files a joy.
.. this single-extruder machine feels solid, but lightweight
.. software interface is similar to MakerBot Desktop or Cura
.. noticeably absent were options to change print temperatures, infill percentages, add rafts (without support) or use custom G-code profiles
.. no heated platform, so this machine is PLA only

biggest 'PRO' seems to be a lot of hand holding

Print Scores (5 highest)
Accuracy 5
Backlash 4
Bridging 4
Fine Features 3
Surface Curved 2
Surface General 3
Tolerance 2
XY Resonance FAIL (Tests the printer's ability to resolve single-extrusion width features and exposes resonance in the XY gantry (like printing a box))
Z Resonance PASS (Exposes mechanical issues in the Z motion system (like printing a vertical rod))

[finescalerr]

Thanks, Ed. Sounds like a very average unit overall but Dremel's market is more the handyman than the fastidious modeler so maybe it would be a decent choice for those guys. -- Russ

[eTraxx]

Russ .. yep .. biggest thing is it is turnkey I think.

From the Maker magazine results .. the Dremel (Idea Builder) is about half-way . Best is the Ultimaker 2

[finescalerr]

I don't see Bexley's unit there. -- Russ

[eTraxx]

These are all filament printers. They didn't include the Formlabs Form 1+, Project 1200 or B9 Creator .. all either laser or projector resin printers. Umm . the dimensional accuracy test ..

Accuracy: Form 1 -0.14, ProJet 1200 0, B9 Creator -0.25
Precision/Resolution: Form 1 +/- 0.08mm, ProJet 1200 +/- 0.21mm, B9 Creator +/- 0.06mm

[mabloodhound]

Well, we will soon see how the FormLabs Form +1 handles our needs as a well known manufacturer has just bought one.

[eTraxx]

Well, we will soon see how the FormLabs Form +1 handles our needs as a well known manufacturer has just bought one.

He's printed a couple of tests already and they are looking good

[Bexley]

Resolution is sort of an iffy measure of print quality. For filament printers, it's the smallest increment the head can move in. But it doesn't really take into account nozzle size- it might have an X-Y resolution of 100 microns and a Z rsolution of 100 microns, but if the nozzle is 400 microns in diameter, you're not going to really get 100 micron resolution in your print. With projector types, Z resolution is usually the amount the build table can move up for each layer, and XY is generally by the size of he pixels of the projected image. With those, things like light bleed and undercure can lead to a loss of resolution in the print.

With the B9, the XY is adjusted by raising or lowering the projector, and goes from 30 microns to 70 microns. (The catch is as the projector moves slower, the build area shrinks.) The Z can be as little as 5 microns, but it takes a lot of tweaking of settings to cure such a thin layer evenly, and when you slice in layers smaller than XY resolution of the projector, you don't really gain much. The smallest useful Z increment is 25microns. The difference between a 30 XY/25 Z print and a 70XY/50 Z print is noticeable. On our pro machine at work (which controls a lot of things like light bleed and cure speed and other proprietary things they won't explain) you almost can't tell the difference between a 100 micron and a 50 micron print with the naked eye, and both are still crisper than a B9 30 XY/25 Z print, which in theory is a higher resolution print.