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Makerbot
councilface:
I work in Motorsport. As it stands Rapid prototyping is completely unsuitable for our hobby. However, within 30 years we will all have these babies in our homes printing our TVs etc 8)
lcmgadgets:
Argh! No! It's not spam! I swear!
Yeah, I wondered about the finishing. I'd seen something done in ceramic, and the roughness of it really showed up there. Rats. Just dreaming, I guess. Thanks for being gentle with me.
bkenobi:
This stuff has a lot of potential, but I don't think things are at a point where you can make final parts. When I was working on my MS, one of the other students was working with RP to see if it could be used to build replacement bones (like hips or knees as I recall). I don't know what ever happened with that work (it was VERY early stage...concept at best).
These things are great for certain things and if enough of them are sold, we all may actually have an opportunity to consider one. Think about CNC machines. Those were pretty new and VERY expensive ~10-15 years ago. Today it's possible to build one for ~$1000. In fact, you can actually buy a small one for carving wood for ~$1500.
Maybe in another few years you'll be able to get a small RP machine for a similar price. :dunno
mphuie:
--- Quote from: lcmgadgets on April 29, 2010, 05:41:49 pm ---Hi all,I
'Newbie here, to both this forum & to posting. I hope that if I make a mistake that you'll b patient with me. I discovered a device a few days ago called 'Makerbot'. Here's the link: http://www.makerbot.com/. Makerbot is a 3d printer that can make just about any shape out of abs plastic, up to 10cm x 10cm x 13cm. Needless to say, such a tool would b great for making arcade stuff. But the price--$950 (relatively cheap, but I'm having a hard time justifying it)! I was wondering; would anyone b interested in buying custom made joystick tops, buttons (the plastic parts of them, at least), etc.? If I could sell some of what I made, maybe I could justify buying one...
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The hard part of building an arcade isn't the buttons or joysticks, there are a huge variety of options and colors available. You might have better luck trying to recoup costs by buying a wood cutting CNC and cutting/selling CPs
mountain:
The resolution on the Makerbot is too low anyway from what I have seen. "Rapid prototyping" is just as it says, for prototypes, one off concepts.
I would like to have one to make one-off parts for custom projects though. How cool would that be! 8)