TechEcho

There have been a lot of crowd-funded and startup attempts to commercialize RepRap designs lately - here's a sample of a few:eMaker Huxley: <a href="http://www.indiegogo.com/eMAKER-Huxley-3D-printer-kits" rel="nofollow">http://www.indiegogo.com/eMAKER-Huxley-3D-printer-kits</a>SeeMeCNC - uses software to drive stepper drivers via a parallel port rather than onboard control hardware running GCode or the like, saving hardware cost: <a href="http://www.indiegogo.com/SeeMeCNC-H-1" rel="nofollow">http://www.indiegogo.com/SeeMeCNC-H-1</a>SUMPOD - <a href="http://sumpod.com/" rel="nofollow">http://sumpod.com/</a> - more appliance-y.

Does anyone happen to know where one gets the plastic for the printing? The price of $500 for this right now looks a lot more affordable than it used to be to me. Being able to source the printing material is the only thing stopping me at the moment.

A home-made 3D laser scanner would complement this nicely.

> 78 backers for $499 or moreWow! A true kick-start.

Is moving the print head in 3 axis the best approach? I'd imagine moving the print head in x and y and leaving z to the build surface easier.

Can the 3D printer, print other RepRap 3D printers?

Looks promising. Is it open hardware (i.e. anyone can make one without having to buy from the vendor) like the MakerBot?

What are some uses cases for something like this? For what reasons would schools care?