Last week I ordered a 3D printer (MakerBot's Replicator 2) for my home, to allow my daughters (6 and 8) to grow up being able to model and print out their own toys. Playing the game Minecraft has provided them the eye to see and create shapes in 3D. I'm eager to see what they will create when I provide them with the transition from virtual to physical. I want them to be pioneers of their generation.
To be honest I think that 20 years from now people won't look back and say "3D printing, ahah! that was the revolutionary invention" but it will be a part of a larger set of inventions and innovations which will revolutionize manufacturing.<p>For example, I think 3D printing as a method to rapidly make metal casting and injection molds (either directly printing the molds or via lost-material casting) is potentially more impactful to manufacturing than direct 3D printing. The truly big innovation of 3D printing and, say, "table top manufacturing / fabrication" systems won't come because such devices will be immanently practical for home use. Instead what I think is more likely is that the ability of hobbyists and tinkerers to experiment with them will lead to an explosion of innovation. Meaning: better tools and techniques for automating and simplifying the process of transitioning from design to manufacturing.
Several people have commented on how this will change appliances and toys.<p>Let's look at this popular hundred dollar coffee maker: <a href="http://amzn.com/B004SOZVQ2" rel="nofollow">http://amzn.com/B004SOZVQ2</a> which one could order within seconds and have it delivered within two days.<p>Just from the picture, one can see it has at least two dozen parts made from seven different materials ranging from injected molded plastic, stainless steel, glass, as well as electronic components.<p>It would be incredibly time consuming and wasteful to print each of these pieces with a 3D printer.<p>As others suggested, you could print a custom injection mold for each component, but then you would need the injection molding machine, several different kinds of raw plastics, and some means to get rid of the unused, potentially toxic, materials.<p>Okay, to complex. How about a simple toy, like this ten dollar Nerf gun. <a href="http://amzn.com/B0002UP0IA" rel="nofollow">http://amzn.com/B0002UP0IA</a><p>Again from the picture one can see seventeen different pieces all different colors and at least three types of plastic and a least one metal spring.<p>This gun could be made with 3D printing technology, but it would waste an incredible amount of material and would take a fair amount of time. You would still have to order the darts and spring separately.<p>I could see someone wanting to make this themselves; those who like legos, model trains etc.<p>3D printing can be world changing for hobbyists. The rest of us have already had our world changed by modern manufacturing, global supply chains, and online retail.
There's a few ways to look at this:<p>In the long term (30-50 years), "replicator" technologies could appear, and then game over there's some major disruption coming.<p>However, for the type of machines today, better democratization means easier prototyping, which combines with hackerspaces / TechShop, open hardware, etc. are already allowing hardware startups to emerge - a movement that's gaining steam rapidly.<p>For the mid-term, cheaper prints comparable cost/materials-wise with injection molding, this could still do some pretty amazing stuff with flexible production, but we'll still need assembly lines with chips, etc.<p>Maybe if we can get conductive inks to be responsive enough for digital electronics, we could print circuit board inside and just pick-n-place the ICs. Also, by this time we may have a more modular approach to hardware where only a few thousand components are needed to make 99% of devices - then Kinkos-scale production would be possible. Timeframe: 10-20 years?<p>What do you guys think?
I got a 'creepy crawly maker' for Christmas when I was a kid. It was cool. But after I'd made all the bugs and run out of juice, it went in the closet.<p>3D printing is a toy so far. I don't see how it will ever be more than that.<p>Sure, folks promise better materials soon. But its actually hard to make metal things well. That's why its done in large factories with expensive presses and stamps and things. You're not going to recapitulate that in your living room.<p>I'd love to be wrong. But so far, lumpy plastic toys is what we see. Why? Because that's possible at low temps/pressures and with cheap tooling.
Design and manufacturing engineers have been using 3D printing for some time now and while it hasn't revolutionized anything 3D printing has certainly made the discipline more efficient and lowered the bar for prototyping. We now have a fully established rapid prototyping flow that allows an ME to"print" a part without even fiddling with the actual printer or stereolith machine.<p>The only flipside is that customers can see the real thing much earlier and do not understand that at least two or three more engineering disciplines are involved in turning a prototype into a product.<p>I think the potential for the home user and tinkerer is enormous and that can only be good. Companies that can afford in-house 3D printing are also the ones least likely to address niche markets or crazy ideas.
Star Trek's replicator is the obvious long term outcome if we can can get nanotechnology cheap enough, so anyone can buy such a machine in their own homes. Then we'd go to supermarkets (or maybe get them sent home) to buy only raw materials like protein and such.
To start I think 3D printing is just making it easier for hobbyists and small professionals to manufacture products, lowering cost for the consumer and increasing competition. In time they'll start to come into the home if we can find further compelling reasons for them.
More plastic shit to print more plastic shit into the world. I can only see this "changing" things in a negative way, at least environmentally. I hope this doesn't take off, unless it is able to actually counteract the way things are going with plastic right now