Re:Print a Vacuum Cleaner
by ZeroGravitas on Thursday March 24, 2011 @01:00PM
(#2364928)
Not really great examples. As you state duct tape already does the job for the battery door, and those clips are mass produced in china and can be bought for a dollar.
There are areas where it's an obviously better/cheaper solution than the alternatives. The best example I've seen recently was the Pixar 3D zoetrope.
Each item is unique in the world, they only need 1 of each (per zoetrope), they already have 3D models in the computer. Another niche I heard about was classic car owners printing out moulds to cast replacement parts for their cars. Or the guys that prototyped the glif stand for iPad. These are the things that these will be used for first.
I wonder what laser printers were first used for when they were tens of thousands of dollars to purchase? And if anyone's graphed the decline in price and increase in availability/usage over time and compared it with 3D printing's progress to guess when we'll all have one to print out our kids latest 3D model and display it proudly on top of the fridge.
There are areas where it's an obviously better/cheaper solution than the alternatives. The best example I've seen recently was the Pixar 3D zoetrope.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nKPtmXK--bA
Each item is unique in the world, they only need 1 of each (per zoetrope), they already have 3D models in the computer. Another niche I heard about was classic car owners printing out moulds to cast replacement parts for their cars. Or the guys that prototyped the glif stand for iPad. These are the things that these will be used for first.
I wonder what laser printers were first used for when they were tens of thousands of dollars to purchase? And if anyone's graphed the decline in price and increase in availability/usage over time and compared it with 3D printing's progress to guess when we'll all have one to print out our kids latest 3D model and display it proudly on top of the fridge.