3D-Bots

Man has 75% of skull replaced with 3-D printed implant - latimes.com

Mon, 11 Mar 2013 08:34:18 -0700

Man has 75% of skull replaced with 3-D printed implant - latimes.com

Dutch Architect Plans To Build A 12,000-Square-Foot 3D Printed...

Wed, 23 Jan 2013 20:20:30 -0800

Dutch Architect Plans To Build A 12,000-Square-Foot 3D Printed House (via Janjaap Ruijssenaars ‘Landscape House’ - Business Insider)

(via Dilbert comic strip for 11/05/2012 from the official...

Mon, 05 Nov 2012 13:48:35 -0800

(via Dilbert comic strip for 11/05/2012 from the official Dilbert comic strips archive.)

Desktop 3D Printer Creates Ceramic Bricks for Buildings

Mon, 05 Nov 2012 11:29:38 -0800

Desktop 3D Printer Creates Ceramic Bricks for Buildings

We finally solved the issue of the jumping print head that was impacting several of our 3d printers....

Tue, 30 Oct 2012 12:12:24 -0700

We finally solved the issue of the jumping print head that was impacting several of our 3d printers. We would consistently get solid prints in the morning or late afternoon, but midday would often see prints start to shift horizontally or vertically as the bot moved to higher levels on the z-axis. After experimenting with dozens of fixes — from cleaned power sources to shorter USB cables to removing humidity — we learned that the issue was actually caused by overheating RAMPs electronics.

We added a 40mm fan in a bracket mounted over the RAMPs on each printer and the problem instantly went away. If you notice any issues with the print head mysteriously jumping around, even in ways that appear to be hardware related, give a fan a try. It is a quick and cheap fix that I wish we had tried first.

3D Printers + Raspberry Pi + Botqueue (by Todd Sampson)

Tue, 30 Oct 2012 10:36:47 -0700

3D Printers + Raspberry Pi + Botqueue (by Todd Sampson)

Ron’s Compact Extruder is far and away the best upgrade we...

Mon, 29 Oct 2012 16:22:35 -0700

Ron’s Compact Extruder is far and away the best upgrade we have made to our 3d printers in a long time. Amazing improvement in print quality over the Wade’s extruders we were using before.

Note: Be sure to use the Mark III if you get your motors from mpja.com; since the shafts are too short to use the older versions.

(via Ron’s Compact Extruder, Mark III by raldrich - Thingiverse)

We just donated to EFF’s efforts to keep 3D printing open. This is important. Check it out

Thu, 25 Oct 2012 09:16:56 -0700

We just donated to EFF’s efforts to keep 3D printing open. This is important. Check it out

The future of higher education: reshaping universities through 3D printing

Tue, 23 Oct 2012 09:22:20 -0700

The future of higher education: reshaping universities through 3D printing

3D Printing Comes To The Disney Universe: Your Face “Frozen In Carbonite”

Mon, 22 Oct 2012 12:09:19 -0700

3D Printing Comes To The Disney Universe: Your Face “Frozen In Carbonite”

3D printer to help foot pain sufferers

Mon, 22 Oct 2012 10:21:58 -0700

3D printer to help foot pain sufferers

A 3D printed aircraft test flies successfully

Mon, 22 Oct 2012 09:20:25 -0700

A 3D printed aircraft test flies successfully

3D Printed Resin Clock Radio Features Retro Nixie Tube Display

Fri, 19 Oct 2012 10:28:34 -0700

3D Printed Resin Clock Radio Features Retro Nixie Tube Display:

I love the way this clock looks. Gimme.

Shapeways Announces Manufacturing Facility In New York City That Can 3D Print Up To 5 Million Products A Year

Fri, 19 Oct 2012 10:01:47 -0700

Shapeways Announces Manufacturing Facility In New York City That Can 3D Print Up To 5 Million Products A Year

3D printing was used in Wii U controller design

Thu, 18 Oct 2012 14:59:51 -0700

3D printing was used in Wii U controller design

3D Printer Market Rising To $5 Billion By 2017, Says CEA Report

Tue, 16 Oct 2012 10:29:29 -0700

3D Printer Market Rising To $5 Billion By 2017, Says CEA Report

Very cool 3D photo resin printer made by students

Tue, 16 Oct 2012 08:47:22 -0700

Very cool 3D photo resin printer made by students

Odd Rostock Printer Behavior

Mon, 15 Oct 2012 13:22:33 -0700

After building a number of Prusa and MendelMax 3d printers, we recently decided to make a Rostock delta robot printer. While the Rostock design is quite cool, we were experiencing what appeared to be a weird firmware bug with the machine.

The Rostock would home correctly, with top+bottom or top only endstops, but as soon as it finished homing the print head would shoot for the right-rear corner of the print platform. This behavior occurred no matter what object we were trying to print. After letting the print continue despite the initial jump, we finally noticed the machine was actually trying to print the file in the wrong location.

The Fix

It turns out that the Marlin firmware for the Rostock was setup to use 0, 0 as the center point of the build platform. While this makes perfect sense, it produces the above behavior when Gcode is created using the 100, 100 build platform center used by standard RepRap machines. Simply change the center point to 0, 0 in Slic3r, or your slicing programing of choice, and it should work correctly.

One More Thing…

While updating the center point will allow the Rostock machine to print correctly, the print preview in Pronterface now shows the file being printed in the lower left corner with most of the design off the screen. To fix this, we need to open Settings -> Options in Pronterface. Then update the build_dimensions from “220x220x100+0+0+0” to “220x220x180-110-110+0” (without the quotes) and restart Pronterface.

It is now printing like a charm.

Patent helps to prevent 3D printing piracy (this company owns 40,000 patents)

Fri, 12 Oct 2012 08:48:10 -0700

Patent helps to prevent 3D printing piracy (this company owns 40,000 patents):

California-based Intellectual Ventures was established by former Microsoft technology boss Nathan Mhyrvold. It now owns and controls about 40,000 technology patents.

I believe that the US patent system is broken and this company is only making it worse.

Could 3D printing really shift the trade balance?

Wed, 10 Oct 2012 13:33:45 -0700

Could 3D printing really shift the trade balance?:

In my opinion it might make a small shift to the trade balance, but we won’t see that change happen anytime soon. Plus, the printers will probably be made overseas eventually!