3D Printing

[El Unicornio, mang]

This is actually quite alarming, and I'm not usually alarmed by such things

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-22464360

The blueprint used to produce a 3D-printed plastic gun has been downloaded about 100,000 times since going online earlier this week

Of course, you still need ammunition and it's only single shot, but I imagine getting hold of ammo is probably easier than getting hold of a gun. (especially if you're in somewhere like America where you can go into a supermarket and buy a box of ammo without any ID)

[mobias]

Personally I can't wait to get myself a 3D printer. I'll never have to shop for butt plugs ever again.

They do seem to have come down in price a lot. You can get one of eBay for less than a grand (a 3D printer that is, not a butt plug)  I presume its not a very good one at that price though.

[El Unicornio, mang]

I'm gonna make myself a life-size Scarlett Johanssen plastic model.

Some Warhammer 40k figures I wanted as a kid might be more feasible though.

[syntaxerror]

how long before someone seriously injures or kills themselves because the crappy plastic disintegrates?  guns are dangerous, you know.

[mobias]

Don't know if this is true or not but I heard recently that the first commercially available item made with a 3D printer was in fact a dildo. As with porn and the early days of the internet - sex leads the way with any world changing technology it seems.   

[BlodwynPig]

Surely cheaper just to buy a dildo.

[chocky909]

Hardly the point. I racked up a £150 dial up internet bill downloading an ISO of My Wrongs ages back.

As a burgeoning member of the pinball community there is a bit of excitement about being able to reproduce some very hard to find specialist pinball parts which, although already possible needed to be produced in bulk to be commercially viable but soon, will be able to be made on awhim and will also be forever available.

[Thomas]

Don't know if this is true or not but I heard recently that the first commercially available item made with a 3D printer was in fact a dildo. As with porn and the early days of the internet - sex leads the way with any world changing technology it seems.

Interestingly, one of the first patented electrical devices (the fifth, to be precise) was a vibrator, in 1902.

[Replies From View]

I'm not interested in this technology until blueprints for all the different Boglin types go online.

[MojoJojo]

Not that surprising; the steam powered ones had all sorts of problems.

[mobias]

Could you get a 3D printer to build a 3D printer? Would the bottom not fall out of the market if that happened? I guess presumably you could get it to print a new bottom too

[chocky909]

Could we print Ziggy a wife?

[Blumf]

Could you get a 3D printer to build a 3D printer?

Of course

http://reprap.org/

[mobias]

Of course

http://reprap.org/

Excellent! I love the sound of that.

[Bleeding Kansas]

NO! This is how they take over...

[Replies From View]

Just unplug them when they start doing that.

[Noodle Lizard]

A lot of talk about how in the not-too-distant future we might be able to print out new organs tailored for each individual patient.  Don't know how that would work, but the science man said so and it's pretty fucking cool if it would, come on.  I never thought this kind of shit would come about in my lifetime.

Unfortunately, most people seem to use it for printing gun barrels and making dreadful "handmade teapot holders" or somesuch shite.

[vrailaine]

I never thought this kind of shit would come about in my lifetime.

yeah, the last 5 years or so my expectations of what the future could be like have gone considerably up in expectation.

[BlodwynPig]

yeah, the last 5 years or so my expectations of what the future could be like have gone considerably up in expectation.

Surely, will be ruined by commercialisation/idiots.

[El Unicornio, mang]

3D printed dolls

http://www.messynessychic.com/2013/05/17/human-doll-cloning-is-so-hot-right-now-in-japan/


Creepy

[El Unicornio, mang]

First 3D printed metal gun, able to fire multiple rounds

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u7ZYKMBDm4M

[imitationleather]

So this is how the world ends.

[El Unicornio, mang]

Indeed. If they can make a gun, what's to stop them making an army of T-800s?

[Replies From View]

It's an army of T-1000s I'm worried about.

Imagine them, constantly morphing their limbs into knives and stabbing weapons to be scanned and 3D printed.

[Petey Pate]

I wouldn't get too excited about 3D printing yet.

3D printing is slow. 3D printers can manufacture things in incredible detail... at completely laborious speed. A few weeks back, while at Type A Machines, I watched a 3D printer create a plastic necklace. It slowly deposited layer, upon layer of filament, skimming back and forth over the small printer bed. In the half hour I was there, a light outline of the necklace had emerged, which looked more like a drawing. It was going to take a while. While I was there, I saw a replica of a human heart on a shelf that I'm told took the better part of a day to make.

Both Boeing and GE began 3D printing airplane parts last year to great fanfare. But the speed of 3D printing held these plans back from amounting to anything significant. GE's began 3D printing fuel nozzles for jet engines and are on track to do 85,000 by 2015. Boeing uses 3D printing at a broader organizational level, but for only for very small scale print runs.

Consumer 3D printing is cool, in theory. Consumer 3D printers are extremely technical tools, requiring advanced computer-aided design (CAD) knowledge and engineering know how. They're not entirely reliable and can only print small items using cheap materials. Further still, they cost anywhere between a few hundred and a couple thousand dollars, but the output, in most cases little, amounts to little more than novelty trinkets.

There will never be a 3D printer in every home. Consumer 3D printing has been forecasted to be a $70 billion market in 2030. The theory being that 3D printing will allow everyday consumers to replace out of production broken parts, or make toys — or whatever our strange amusements are — from the comfort of our home. But as Autodesk CEO Carl Bass told PandoDaily recently, the expense, materials limitations, and difficulty required to do this means that when the technology is at a point where it could have mass application, issues like upkeep, cost, and production complexity means we'll most likely outsource our needs to neighborhood kiosks.

3D printing will never be a complete catch all replacement for manufacturing. 3D printing produces complex designs in one whole go. Single-piece manufacturing has some industrial use, but anything that has moving parts will need to be assembled and put together by hand. For the foreseeable future, the economics 3D printing  will not be able to compete with the efficiency and scale of current production lines, molds, and fabrication techniques, which have been honed over decades. Anything detailed, featuring a mixture of metals and plastics (so pretty much everything complicated you use) is out of the reach of current 3D printing technology. Until hybrid printing – machines with an interchangeable 3D printing head and CNC mill, able to cut away and add material – becomes less of a science fiction, 3D printing will only be capable make small parts used in the production process.

3D printing is part of a wider revolution in manufacturing, not the revolution itself. The rise of maker culture in the last decade was prompted by the rise of 3D-modeling software, vast increases in computing power and a huge decrease in the price of industrial manufacturing equipment, alongside the introduction of consumer level devices such as CNC mills and 3D printers. 3D printing is but one of many factors that has fed into a manufacturing culture that favors access to tools and sharing ideas.

[Replies From View]

It'll speed up.  Ten years ago it took roughly a day to download an hour's worth of porn using e-mule.  That was only a 150mb file, as well.

So think of that.

[El Unicornio, mang]

I agree with you. This is really alarming for all of us. I think governments should do something about it before it can become too mainstream and they can no longer control people from printing guns. To everyone here, instead of printing guns, we should use our 3D printers in a more worthwhile way. Take a look at these few examples that you can try: http://www.3d2print.net/shop/our-customers-cool-prints/cool-print-gallery/

Yeah, they're already making things from 3D printing to help people with medical problems. But of course there will always be people who want to use the latest technology to make violent destructive things.

[Jamesieab]

You can get them in blimmin pcworld now! For a grand!

http://www.pcworld.co.uk/gbuk/printers-ink/printers-scanners/3d-printers/709_7034_70034_xx_xx/xx-criteria.html

[JesusAndYourBush]

Assuming the chamber/barrel is made of plastic then it's not going to work is it? It's just going to explode in your hand.

First 3D printed metal gun, able to fire multiple rounds

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u7ZYKMBDm4M

Ah, they can print with metal now! Well that certainly changes things.

[MojoJojo]

I have seen the plastic guns compared to holding a bullet in some pliers and hitting it with a hammer.

Metal "printing" isn't really a 3D printing thing yet, it's well out of the reach of domestic use (I believe last time I checked).