The BBC World Service had a story about these devices this morning. They use an additive process to manufacture an object, rather than the traditional subtractive process i.e. when machining a part on a lathe, material is removed until the desired shape is acheived. The user programs the 3-D printer with the specs of the desired object and the device makes it. They are not well suited for mass production since they make one thing at a time. It would be a neat thing for scratch builders, espeacially those who model lesser know railroads. The BBC story said that they are about the size of a microwave oven, so they would be practical for home use.
I’m wondering if any of you have tried this for model railroading and what results you had.
This has been discussed here a couple of times over the past year. The biggest drawback at the present time is cost. A printer capable of making a good model costs thousands of dollars.
Yes, it would, George. However, one might argue that 3D printing really falls into the “designing” and “manufacturing” category rather than “scratch-building” category because of it’s repeatability.
If you do a ‘search our community’ for “3-D printer” and the like, you will get many threads on the topic.
Maybe someday we will all have one, but It is too expensive now and I doubt we will “have one in the den” due to the fact that different items are made out of differing supplies {IE “INK”}, so to have one for metals, one for plastics, one for woods, etc adds up faster.
It also {at least right now} requires more work than just “printing off a copy”…
The pages are awkward to navigate, but you´ll find tons of train items there - also US prototype.
Usually, you have a choice of various materials. The cheaper the material, the coarser the surface will be. Sanding is no option, as the material is extremely hard.
I’ve worked with 3D printers before as it was part of my CAD training. They are very interesting machines to work with. I’ve been out of the field for about four years now some I’m sure a lot has improved since then. Biggest problem I had was the thickness of the material and the support material. Most things you designed had to have a support material added to the product until it was finished. You would cut away the support material afterwords and if your products thickness was under a 1/8" you could cause a lot of damage or break you finished product. I tried to design a Zippo lighter for my assignment but had to scale the lighter up to get a finished product that would not break. I could see the use for O scale or larger but HO and N would be a little too delicate.
Couple of new printers have been announced or hit the market since the last time we had this discussion. One of them even uses the hardening resin method instead of the filament extrusion, for a much greater resolution, .001 on this one. And still in the $3000 range. Bunch of the initial patents expire in the upcoming year, so I expect to see more printers at even lower cost. If not this year, then next year we will probbaly have adequate resolution for HO models for under $1000.
In addition to model railroading in also a scale RC ship builder. I just purchased several very nice cowl vents from Shapeways for a 1/48th scale excursion boat I’m building. A little sanding with fine grit and a coat of primer and your good to go. Ill try to post a picture.