I have come across a website www.Click2detail.com where they will convert scale drawings into a Cad-Cam program and produce a model to scale by a 3-D resin printer(they have you-tube videos of the process.). The models are built up layer by layer on the printer. One of the items they printed was an actual musicians flute! Anyway i’d like to know what effect this will have on model building and the hobby now that this Technology has arrived ?
It has a while to go yet. It is good for samples and such, but it isn’t as precise as it could be, yet. The cost would also have to drop a lot in cost to make it competitive with traditional injection molding technology.
At the present time, the printer costs tens of thousands of dollars which would make each model extremely expensive to produce, so prices will have to go down drastically before it can be used commercially at an affordable price per item.
Aside from the still horrendous cost involved, which prohibit private use, the process leaves a lot to desire. Surfaces are quite coarse, in fact to coarse for the fine detail we want.
3D printing will find its way into the hobby - being employed in rapid prototyping processes.
A couple of years ago I attended a talk by MR editor Neil Besougloff on the future of the hobby where he mentioned the potential of this technology – which he learned about from his son if I recall correctly.
It is potentially fascinating to think that you could in essence email a a detail part to a friend. As regards cost, that is bound to go down – just witness the projectors for digital images which were four figure items just a couple of years ago. I now know a few modelers who have their own laser wood cutters.
If the quality would improve for model purposes, I could imagine that an outfit such as Kinkos or other commercial copy centers might have them. When color copiers were brand new nobody had them in their homes, you went to a copy center. Then the prices came down and many people have color copiers in their homes.
Dave Nelson
It means you won’t be at the mercy of what the manufacturers decide to produce. Every freight car and engine shell will be available.
A few other places…
http://www.moddler.com/index.php
Steve S
Tens of thousands of dollars is a bit of an exaggeration (oh I’m sure we can find an example in that price) but the home unit is now under $1200 - less than some brass locomotives.
Check out Maker bot - their model prints in ABS - not resin, and it wont’ be too long before they’re well under a few hundred dollars (this year’s CES had three other manufacturer’s of 3d printers, once the market and competition grows, we should see prices come down) - I’d wager within 24 months.
The molds for injection molding can cost tens of thousands of dollars and a mold is only good for one type of model. The benefit to 3D printing is that a single machine can produce an unlimited variety of models with the click of a mouse.
Steve S
Those home units have nowhere near the resolution to produce models. You could use them for making brackets to hold switch machines and stuff like that. But for models on display you still need a high-end machine that costs about 20k.
Here’s an example from Moddler.com.
Steve S
I totally disagree, steve. The quality of the new units was amazing, one manufacturer at the CES even had a chain mail glove made from their product - and despite that the links were solid, the glove was loose flexible. They still leave a bit of a edge on curved surfaces, but nothing that can’t be smoothed out.
The sample you show is great, no doubt, but that doesn’t mean that railroaders need that complicated of a print in one go - you can achieve complex shapes though the combination of many smaller ones.
So, lets happily disagree!
PS - I had to pull my show paperwork, but check out Cubify. I think I could easily work with the products this puts out (they were the ones with the chain mail glove), and for more than just under-layout brackets.
I’ve held an object made on a Makerbot. I could easily feel the ridges. They just aren’t capable of the fine detail needed for body shells. Let’s see a Makerbot replicate rivet details and panel lines.
Steve S
I remember when color laser printers were over $10,000. Now they’re some under $500. So I am sure the price will come down. But I think it will be slowly because the demand for the machine won’t be as great. For manufacturing it needs to be fast and materials need to be cheap. For the home user the machine needs to be cheap. For models, both need fine detail. Also, getting the intricacies of the prototype converted to computer files to produce the models will probably require some advances as well - especially when starting with photographs. I suspect that a lot of person hours will be required in the beginning.
But I think it will come, just not in the next couple of years.
Enjoy
Paul
I need somethign not commercially available - “lids” if you will for open hoppers to make them into covered hoppers. After reading up on the Maker Bot it really appears this would be suitable. A little snading takes care of the texture, and then roof walks, grabs, and hopper hatches could eb added from seperate detail parts. Still way ahead of fabricating a dozen of these by hand from styrene. I don’t think we’re going to have to wait much longer for even finer detail capability at a consumer price. Keep in mind Maker Bot relies strictly on Open SOurce software and hardware designs, and many people have already gone beyond what the stock kit offers.
–Randy
Randy, a lot of the online printers will send you a price quote if you send them your model file.
Steve S
The tools to make a freight car can cost 100s of thousands of dollars. You get what you pay for. Compare the cost per hour of injection molding to 3D printing, and injection molding still wins. It can produce hundreds of parts in the time it takes to print one part. If that machine costs hundreds of dollars per hour to operate, your product gets expensive quick.
True, but that assumes the manufacturer is willing to put in the money and effort to make the car/loco in the first place. 3D printing is going to fill in the gaps that the manufacturers are refusing to fill.
BTW, here’s a guy who printed some parts for a HOn3 shay.
http://www.shapeways.com/forum/index.php?t=msg&th=5331&start=0&
ETA: Here’s another printing company. Check out the microfine green material. I bet it’s beaucoup bucks.
http://www.finelineprototyping.com/services/materials.php
Steve S
It will be a long time before 3D printing will be used for real mass production. We’re not talking 10’s or 100’s or thousand pieces here, we’re talking 10’s, at most. Maybe 100’s.
Even neater are the parts duplicators, Jay Leno has one, because ther ARE no parts available for some of those antique cars he has. Now those are expensive pieces of machinery. When they come down in price, it’s something you might see in a musuem to restore old locmotives when parts are no longer available.
–Randy
.
Nice work, Odie. What’s the material?
Steve S
Steve, the material I use is some kind of nylon-like material…but more brittle. It starts as a liquid.