Digital Desktop Fabrication

If Bill Gates gets his way, there won't be anymore software license issues. Nor anymore PCs, just terminals paying per instance charges to use his programs on his servers. Maybe his can fix it so you pay $90 a month to use his printers.

wws

This was actually featured a cupla years ago. Hard to comprehend.

But this inkjet thing does seem outta control. Haven't calc'd it out, but it seems these things are WAY more expensive than the laser carts I used to get for $70 that cranked out 3,000 pages.

Hospitals get million-dollar blood analysis machines for FREE! Well, almost--you gotta sign on the dotted line for the co's *reagents* for the next millenium. Seems that's what's happening w/ goddamm printers. Cars, CNC service?? Spider's web, of sorts.

Another content-filler story for the ever-hungry news networks. MIT has lots of smart people, but they are usually involved with stuff so far removed from commercially viable products, it's laughable.

Real-world parts are made from strong materials and that normally involves the application of lots of energy in the form of heat and pressure somewhere along the way. The notion that a nano-sized pastry bag can puff out equivalent components makes me question the sanity of these people and the overall intelligence of the "Science Friday" editors at PBS.

"If I tol you once Orville, Iz tol you a million times...it will never fly"

Gunner

"Pax Americana is a philosophy. Hardly an empire. Making sure other people play nice and dont kill each other (and us) off in job lots is hardly empire building, particularly when you give them self determination under "play nice" rules.

Think of it as having your older brother knock the shit out of you for torturing the cat." Gunner

I work with a lot of Rapid Prototype plastic parts as well as ones made up by hand with epoxy and Bondo. It's a good system for making development samples of complex non-structural plastic shapes before committing to a very expensived mold but the necessary ability to mentally visualize and assemble the 3D shapes before entering them into the CAD tool seems rare. The designer needs to understand the complex rules and language of geometry, mechanical and sometimes electronic design to produce something more useful than a personalized cell phone cover.

I would rather fold, hammer and weld a 3D shape out of sheet metal because it will be much stronger and I can rethink and modify it afterwards. I sort of think with my hands when forming curved surfaces and I can't do that on a computer.

jw

The "plastic" prototype could then be used as a pattern to make an investment casting of a more suitable metal. Still pretty quick.

Another process will build a metal parts by computer controlled weld build-up.

However, for visualizing and fit-up purposes the plastic part would suffice.

Wolfgang

Glenn Ashmore wrote:

One of the main reasons the Wright brothers succeeded was their use of an internal combustion engine. Heavier than air vehicles were pretty much impossible until then.

And yes, I know about rapid prototyping and SL -- both are wonderful processes. But I'm not holding my breath for a lathe chuck built-up using nanotech or any additive process.

That's standard practice in rapid prototyping. It sounds like Glenn saw something about MIT's Fab Labs. They're a different thing. It's kind of a "gee whiz" project at present.

It sounds like the story may be a bit mixed up with another thing altogether, though: MIT's MEMS technology labs.

-- Ed Huntress