actress of pakistan

You need air cooling to print PLA but do you need fan for it? Chopmeister doesn't think so. He started a project of a fanelass cool air supply to the printhead. He uses a 3d printed radial air blower powered by small DC motor to pressurize the air which then goes trough silicone tubing to the printhead and cools the printed object.

Fanless 3d printhead cooling - air blower and silicone tubing guide cool air to the printhead

His next steps are to improve control electronics for the fanless cooler to make it more Plug'n'play.

Follow his progress and get detailed information at his blog:

http://chopmeister.blogspot.com/2013/11/road-to-fanless-printhead-diy-radial.html


Nice project Čop!

Chinese are coming! Here is the photo gallery by Reddit user Timaz  from 3D China Expo 2013. Some interesting printers there :-)

Source Reddit post:

http://www.reddit.com/r/3Dprinting/comments/1req8e/even_more_new_chinese_printers_from_the_3d_china/




http://www.3dchinaexpo.com/

Great video showing the process of creating DIY 3d printed headphones with all the steps.



Source:

https://www.youtube.com/user/guardthemind?feature=watch

Since open source hardware is the core of DIY 3d printing technology development, here is compilation of videos to give introduction of the OSHW movement.








Thiel Fellow Yoonseo Kang gives a Hitchhiker's Guide to Open Source Hardware at SDF2013

The main competitive feature of 3dagogo marketplace they list is that the models are tested to give reliable 3d prints.

"An informal survey we conducted revealed that up to 70 percent of free 3D designs on the internet are severely flawed and would result in a failed print and wasted filament," said Drew Taylor, CEO and Co-Founder of 3Dagogo.

https://www.3dagogo.com/




































Update (5.2.2014):

they released a new feature: Communities:

http://diy3dprinting.blogspot.com/2014/02/3dagogo-releases-communites-feature.html

Marius Kintel, the creator of OpenSCAD, discusses the merits of Multi-color multi-material 3D Printing on the ORD Solutions 5 extruder system.

Things ain't gonna tie themselves together without some outside help. :-) Here is a great project by Rich Olson done in soft PLA.









Thingiverse page (you can use Thingiverse custimizer to change sizes)

http://www.thingiverse.com/thing:178234

Olson's blog and more details:

http://nothinglabs.blogspot.com/2013/11/3d-printed-hook-loop-fasteners.html

He has great tips post on how to print with various filament types including elastic PLA:

http://nothinglabs.blogspot.com/2013/09/filament-roundup-3d-printing-in-all.html

• Fully functional parts are produced rapidly with standard granulates, from 3D CAD files without a mould
• Clocked nozzle closure with piezo technology ensures high part quality
• 3 or 5-axis component carrier with linear motors for complex 3D geometries without support structure
• Intuitive operation using hand gestures on the high-quality multi-touch screen
• Quiet, dust-free production environment

About AFK process from the company page:

Unlike conventional additive manufacturing techniques, with ARBURG Plastic Freeforming (AKF) standard granulates are melted as in the injection moulding process. The freeformer produces the component without support structures, layer by layer from minuscule droplets. The discharge unit with nozzle remains stationary, while the component carrier moves.
The globally unique AKF process makes use of 3D CAD files, which are read in directly by the freeformer. After start-up, everything else takes place automatically. A nozzle closure with piezo technology builds up the desired component layer by layer from minuscule plastic droplets. During this process, the item under construction is moved by a component carrier with three or five axes.

• Unique: fully functional parts are created with minuscule plastic droplets, without a mould
• Versatile: low-cost standard granulates are used instead of expensive special materials
• No support structures: stationary discharge unit and moving component carrier for complex 3D geometries
• Combinable: AKF is also suitable for processing two components, e.g. in moving hard/soft combinations
• Effortless: parts are automatically built up layer by layer on the basis of 3D CAD files

Video and more information:

http://www.arburg.com/en/solutions/freeformer/#!prettyPhoto

Freeformer brochure (PDF):

http://www.arburg.com/fileadmin/redaktion/Mediathek/Prospekte/ARBURG_freeformer_680836_en_GB.pdf

This is amazing DIY project where you can download files and instructions for devices with incredible design to create them at your home. They provide all information free under Creative Commons licence. There are some 3d printed parts in them.

You can build:

• Open Mirror - DIY gesture controlled mirror with smartphone connection and speakers
• P.A.C.O. - DIY gesture controlled Bluetooth speaker made in concrete with strong bass sounds
• OSOUND - DIY Bluetooth streaming speaker with gesture interface

You can download all the files needed and building instructions at:

http://www.digitalhabits.it/

First post:

http://diy3dprinting.blogspot.com/2012/02/freed-handheld-3d-manufacturing-device.html

The leFabShop crew from France decided to showcase 3d printer installed in an alectric car to demonstrate how some future repairman could 3d print replacement parts in his vehicle.
I don't know how would such setup be stabilized to compensate for car vibration road bumps, acceleration, breaking etc. but if there is a demand there will be a solution.



by leFabShop team.

We believe that in a near future, cars will be electric, self-driven & equipped for advanced field operations. Your plumber will be able to produce spare-parts in his vehicle, some goods will be produced on demand in the delivery truck.
crédits :
original idea : Bertier Luyt
scenario & post-prod : Tatiana Reinhard
architect & 3D model : Samuel Bernier
image & light : Georges de Genevraye
with the help of : Renault Creative People Lab
3D printer : MakerBot Replicator 2 Personnal 3D Printer
car : Renault ZOE
music : interlude - pulp funktion 3
thanks : Omar & team le FabShop
© le FabShop 2013
www.lefabshop.fr / info@lefabshop.fr

3d printer in your trunk - it's like a replicator on Enterprise - you don't need to carry anything with you EVER!

The electric car featured in this video is Renault Zoe and Renault has some crazy scheme where they rent you the battery for it ... I'm loosing faith in electric cars ... bu that is a different topic ...
You can see the review of Zoe in the video bellow jut to get idea what it is. For you USA natives, YES cars in Europe are generally much smaller.

From video description:

In this video we demonstrate a custom eye tracker for Glass that can be built for $25 and using a Makey Makey with Glass.
Glass supports touch gestures (e.g., swipe, tap, scroll), head gestures (e.g, tilt up turns display on, gesture down turns display off), and voice controls (e.g., "ok glass", voice input). By using the IMU sensors directly (as we show here) it's simple to extend the range of head gestures. There is a proximity sensor that is used by Glass to determine if the device is being worn. It is capable of recognizing wink/blink gestures but it cannot actually track the gaze of the user.
We hope that these new input methods can be used to expand when Glass is relevant for use (e.g., with your hands full) or who can use it (e.g., users with disabilities). They are intended for developers and researchers, we don't intend for people to use our eye tracker while walking around. It's essentially a very cheap and easy way for all of us to have this feature before it is integrated into the device directly (eventually some manufacturer will do it) and if we find interesting use cases it may even advance the timeline for their inclusion. All of the code and 3D models are available in http://www.WearScript.com.

http://blog.brandynwhite.com/new-glass-input-methods_eye-tracking_touch-sensitive-clothing

Wearable technology is growing trend. Codeninja made his version of Google Glass technology with help of 3d printing and modified Raspberry Pi. It has retractable and motorized eye piece display, invisible camera inside display box and various sensors, like 3-axis IMU and some environmental sensors.
Not many technical details are available, I REALLY hope that the plans and files will be made available. Please Codeninja! He notes that he is working on making it even smaller.

BTW: it has a cool BORG-ish look doesn't it? I like it. I would even wear it to town.

First prototype

Modified Raspberry Pi: removed most connectors, removed chip for lan/2nd usb, added usb hub + wifi + bluetooth

Version with pico LCD display / Eye piece

Resistance is futile

Source:

http://codeninja.de/glasses/

I think that we will see explosion of wearable technology DIY projects in near future including several versions of  DIY Google Glass devices.


For another Raspberry Pi powered wearable glasses project with full build instructions see:

http://diy3dprinting.blogspot.com/2013/08/3d-printed-wearable-glasses-computer.html

Great design, lot of marketing hype and some interesting features.








Key features from Kickstarter page:

Frame and Case Design - The quality of printing is predominantly dependent on the resolution and accuracy of the motion axes. The printer must be capable of composing accurate layers of plastic material layer after layer to produce a usable part. We have designed Robox® from scratch, ensuring the frame and motion systems are extremely rigid and accurately positioned. All motors and axes are attached to a single stainless steel frame which is a reference surface for all motion; this is rigidly attached to injection moulded parts which form the body of the printer to create a super-stable platform.

We wanted all our cutting-edge innovation to have a suitably high quality sleek exterior finish. We’ve used high quality materials including anodised aluminium and clear polycarbonate to give the printer a clean stylish look that would be at home on any desk. Our industrial design aim was to hide all the technology required for movement and printing but still exhibit the magical process of 3D printing to the user. We think Robox® is beautiful, with clear views of what’s being manufactured from over half the surfaces. The filament reel and power supply have been integrated into the product, so we have no messy external parts to clutter your desk and take up more space.

A fully self contained unit with a small desktop footprint.
Speed - Dual Nozzle System - Robox® includes a proprietary dual-nozzle system which can improve print speeds by up to 300% when set against our competitors. A single material feed can be directed out of one of two nozzles – with a 0.3mm or 0.8mm extrusion diameter. This means Robox® can produce highly detailed exterior surfaces for the surfaces you can see, and then quickly fill the object using the larger nozzle multiple layers at a time without affecting part strength or detail. This combined with a needle-valve system stops ‘ooze’ and ‘stringing’ from the nozzles - a problem commonly found in other printers. So now you can finally have the best of both worlds – a perfect high quality exterior finish with much faster print times!

300% increase in print speed thanks to the Robox® Dual Nozzle Print Head
Automatic Material Recognition - Robox® requires no programming for different materials – just load the reel and go! Each reel contains a chip which stores all the necessary parameters for the material which have been thoroughly tested, so as soon as you install the reel, the printer is automatically programmed and ready to print.

SmartReel™ - Each reel of filament has an EEPROM which contains material data to allow Robox® to automatically set print parameters.
Quick-Change Print-head - Our HeadLock™ System allows you to change the function of Robox® quickly and easily. From the outset of this project we've made the product easily upgradeable, so the head contains a universal interface that will work with all future upgrades to the Robox® platform, including a 2 material head, stylus cutter, milling head and 3D scanner, the possibilities are endless!

Swap the head and turn this micro manufacturing platform into a different machine altogether
Replaceable, 'Tape-less' and Removable PEI Bed - Once your print has finished you are free to remove your model from the printer. The print surface itself is also easily removable - allowing for easy replacement or dismounting of models away from the printer, or for switching to alternative beds e.g. a stylus cutting mat, milling fixture system or turntable for the 3D scanning head. To ensure that your bed is always perfectly flat for 3D printing when Robox® is configured as an FFF system, the print surface is constructed from PEI laminate material, which requires no tape, glues or special preparation. Prints stick fast while printing, and then release themselves once complete.

Heated Bed with Removable Print Surface - Certain models and materials benefit from different print surfaces. The small cutout section on the front right of the bed allows easy removal.
Enclosed Build Chamber - Robox® has the option of a fully-enclosed build envelope for stabilising the printing environment, improving results and making it safer. When a printed part cools (particularly when made from ABS) unevenly or too rapidly, it shrinks unevenly, causing warp cracks and de-lamination. Our enclosure serves several purposes; prevents outside thermal influences affecting your print by blocking draughts and keeping the internal temperature stable, and shields users from surfaces that are too hot to touch.

Test print: ABS 78x10x5mm - Draft quality -This test print using ABS in our closed build chamber shows no shrinkage or warping even when the bed and part have cooled.
Expandable for 2 Extruders - Robox® is ready for a second extruder; so coupled with a dual material head (currently in development), you will be able to print two different materials at the same time – whether this is just two colours of the same material, or a build material and separate support material.

AutoMaker™ Proprietary Software - Rather than bundle Robox® with the usual selection of Open Source software, we’ve decided to develop our own so we can take advantage of the many innovative hardware features already designed into our Robox® platform. This further enhances the simplicity and usability of the printer for both experts and novices alike. This has been designed from scratch so the consumer can become the manufacturer from day one, we want everyone to be able to create their world.

Automaker™ Beta 2.0 - A clear and simple status page
Simplicity with Depth - Ease-of-use is at the heart of the design of Robox®, but for those of you more experimentally inclined – don’t fear! We have divided the software into simple and advanced modes, so for those of you who don’t want to ‘tweak’, just place your parts and print. Advanced mode will allow more experienced users to alter all parameters of the printer manually. Once you are happy with a print profile you can save it for future use - repeatable high quality printing, another goal of the Robox® project.

http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/robox/robox-desktop-3d-printer-and-micro-manufacturing-p

http://www.cel-robox.com/

Christopher Hawkins posted a video with 3d printable stepper motor. It's a step closer to self-replicating machines. It is printed by Shapeways in WSF material (White Strong and Flexible). It seems that design is not released to public. Hopefully it will get open sourced in the future. Lot of people could finde many uses for a stepper like this and could contribute to development. Remember people: sharing is caring!

New Slic3r is out with many new features! Huraaaaaayyy!

From the news post:

Major new features:

• built-in automatic STL repair
• OpenGL 3D preview of the repaired file (thanks to iXce for the initial work); also supports multi-material files
• ability to override individual config options for each object in the same print job
• new support material rewritten from scratch
• new Ooze Prevention feature for multiple extruders (park extruders outside skirt and drop temperature by a specified delta)
• options to avoid starting loops on convex vertices and/or overhangs
• volume calculation
• ability to customize how materials are mapped to extruders
• new First Layer Acceleration option
• new option to use firmware-controlled retraction (G10/G11)
• new option to use a distinct extruder for support material interface

Improvements:

• Slic3r is now much faster because many mature parts of code were rewritten in C++ for faster processing and less memory usage (Slic3r is now 40% C++)
• most of memory is now truly shared between threads, reducing the total footprint
• improved infill patterns and bridge detection
• the automated test suite was largely enriched
• don't combine retract and travel anymore when using G0 (Mach3 compatibility)
• better Makerbot (Makerware/Sailfish) compatibility
• Windows binaries are now built with Expat for faster AMF parsing
• Minor improvements:
• new [layer_num] placeholder in layer-change G-code
• custom G-code can be supplied via command line too
• some options were renamed or rearranged for clarity
• new --info command line option to get information about the file
• add .ngc to supported G-code suffixes
• the wizard now saves initial profiles automatically
• automatically copy Simple Mode settings into a 'Simple Mode' preset in Expert Mode

Changes:

• layer height ranges are scaled automatically when object is scaled in plater
• avoid G92 E0 for sailfish output
• the "Infill every n layers" option was renamed to "Combine infill every n layers" to clarify its purpose

Bugfixes:

• several threading issues were fixed
• some situations causing incomplete infill were fixed
• fixed regression causing wrong direction for inwards move in holes, thus little blobs
• fix crash on Windows when username had non-ASCII characters
• some spiral vase prints had little gaps in the loops
• Z-offset was not applied to spiral vase prints
• lift was not working correctly with multiple extruders and multiple skirt layers
• fix speed math for wipe, which was causing too fast retraction
• other minor fixes

http://slic3r.org/releases/1.0.0RC1


Update:

Here are some possible bugs screen-captured by Radusava

Xeed doesn't need external control, it is standalone controlled via touch interface. Price is hefty. It looks high-quality on the photos ...


















Technical specifications:

• Build size: 350x270x220 mm
• Max. print volume: 20.8 liter
• Positioning accuracy: 0.012 mm
• Layer thickness: 0.05 - 0.35 mm
• Weight: 75kg
• Extruder size: 0.35 mm
• Speed X and Y axis: up to 1 m/sec
• Extrusion speed: up to 170 mm/sec
• Production speed: 6 cm3/min
• Printer dimensions: 800x600x500 mm
• The Xeed is priced at €7,000 (€8,470 incl. VAT)

Another day, another 3d printer. Bigger print area and high price in this one.

It looks like PC case aimed at gamers / PC modders that has a 3d printer in it. Beside great design it has no other innovative features and there are no tests or videos of it working. It also uses some custom software and some sort of custom filament cartridges. I'm all for diversity, competition and options and like it's design so hopefully we will see more of it in the future.

This could be useful for you Delta owners. MAD fellows upgraded a Deltabot into cnc mill. They are milling only foam and frozen jello for testing . They wont to use this mill to create molds for metal casting.





http://madfellowstech.com/upcycled-deltabot-project-a-success/

http://madfellowstech.com/direct-to-grilled-cheese-and-jello-cnc-delta-bot-mill/

It gives you very simple library and very simple resizing commands. It is extension of the 3d printing support released recently for Windows 8.1. There will be many opinions about this, but it is step forward. Step by step 3d printing is getting everywhere.




I had trouble installing 3d Builder app on my PC for some time, probably because of my region. It works now.


http://apps.microsoft.com/windows/en-us/app/3d-builder/75f3f766-13b3-45e9-a62f-29590d5781f2


Video by: http://www.youtube.com/user/GeekWire

You can now build this great looking delta yourself. Boots industries released the files since their new printer BI v2.0 is coming out.












From Thingiverse description:

Ask questions in our forums.
Learn how to strings the towers here.
Learn how to calibrate the towers here.
Learn how to properly calibrate the Ramps 1.4 pots here.
The Rostock BI V1.0 was sold at Boots Industries in fully assembled and kit form.
Our popular version of the Rostock printer by Johann features a cable drive and several other key modifications/improvements.
All parts shown were printed using our Super Premium PLA Filament.
Comes with everything you need to build your own or improve upon the design:
All Sketchup models, ready to print stl trays and additional exploded view models and pictures.
Don't hesitate to contact us if you want help with your build!

Quick specs:

• Printer Dimensions (LxWxH): 380 mm X 330 mm X 580 mm
• Build Volume (cylindrical): 170 mm Diameter X 155 mm Height
• Maximum Operating / Printing Speed: 200 mm/s
• Minimum Layer-height: 100 Microns (0.10 mm)

http://www.thingiverse.com/thing:164965

MadMaxx made this great video describing his experiences with Prusa Mendel. Because he described several problems and raised some questions he received a lot of negative comments on this video.
He did told me on twitter that he was intentionally controversial to start the debate which is important for open source community. Without discussion there is no progress and that is the point that some of his commentators do not understand. They just went into attack mode "HOW DARE YOU TALK ABOUT PROBLEMS!!!!!.




Problems he describes:

1. Hanging Z-axis
2. Two Z-axis motors
3. Lots of wire strain
4. Hard to maintain - easy to mess up 
5. X axis wobble

I don't't have lot of experience with Prusa Mendel, but I read or heard about most of those problems, but never tough of them as design issues. I just never connected the dots.
Many of those problems can be solved with upgrades and later Prusa Mendel designs made improvements to address those issues. And there is the Prusa I3 :-)

Update (11.1.2014.):

Josef Prusa responded to this video:

Hi man,
first, my name is pronounced "proosha".
As you said, its old model, no reason to bitch about it in 2013 you are three years too late ;-)
It is still built as there are thousands of ppl who can help you with it.

Hanging Z axis was made because it transfers less wobble to the print, now with tube couplings, its not needed. Your coupling slid out of the shafts either because they were oversized or you didnt tighten them. Sanding the motor shafts helps a lot too. Your cables broke as you didn't bolt them to the Y carriage or used poor cables. Two motor Z axis is much easier to maintain then the original mendel one, if you would built original mendel, you would know. That thing sucked to calibrate. The x axis wobble is true, but during prints it wasn't affecting the quality too much. ...
Anyway, keep up the good work.

Source:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IQuUqd9ldUU

Let's talk abut problems. Criticism is free consulting.

Here are videos by Allen Jetter that describe how he improved his Prusa Mendel and changes / upgrades he made. He invested lot of work and time. It doesn't solve all problems mentioned above and raises some new issues, but it is good illustration on hove to move ahead.

Wood is very cheap. Wood is easy to obtain. Wood is easy to work with and many shaping technologies are available. It comes in many forms with different properties from flexibility to strength. It is renewable resource. It can be easily recycled.
There were entire generations of printers like Ultimaker based on laser cut plywood, but full wood was never in fashion. probably because it is not high-tech and not self-replicating.
I would like to see more projects with wooden parts. I like the texture and natural aesthetics of wood contrasted to technology.

Here are some designs that use wooden parts, some are fully functional, some are under development:

Wood frame Mendel90

Mendel90 is great design and it is often built with wooden frame. One of the great success stories with wooden parts. Design is custimizable based on your input and generates paper printable cutting and drilling guides for the frame.

Adapto 3d printer

It can have aluminum beams and low cost wood frame.
























http://diy3dprinting.blogspot.com/2013/11/adapto-diy-3d-printer.html

Ikea RepRap

While surfing around I found this reprap with wooden / particleboard frame (maybe made from Ikea furniture). Further information is unavailable. Let me know if you have any additional information about this printer.












http://aeons.phrenzy.org/~berserk/reprap/printer/

Gunstrap

The Gunstrap is a plywood repstrap that is based on the Mantis CNC design. It has a build area of 200x200x100mm (comparable to the Mendel) and is employs a heated build platform and a heated build chamber. Unlike other wood based repstrap's, no ball bearings are required for its construction, excluding the extruder and all parts can be obtained from scrapped printers and scanners. In addition, its build chamber can be heated up to 100 degrees Celsius as most stepper motors are contained out side of the build chamber and no thermoplastic is used in its construction. The only stepper motor within the build chamber is the extruder stepper motor which is actively cooled using a peltier.

R-360 features:

• Cheap when compared to any other existing printers with a large printing area and speed. This must make more people easier to have it.
• Our 3D printer consists of far fewer parts. Compared to RepRap, it contains only one third of the parts. So it's really easy to build it even if you are a beginner. We assemble the main parts of the printer, saving you from all the hard work, so you can be up and running in one hour. No soldering necessary, just plug the main parts together with a few bolts and you’re ready to print! We will upload all instruction on our website.
• The bed is a disc and turns 360 degrees. This is unique and fun! Also this keeps the bed perfectly level using a unique leveling system. We invented this bed shape to get rid of extra bearings, belts, rods and plastic parts.
• The rotating bed makes it ideal for 3D scanning applications. Scanning turntable mode is included (3rd party scanner is required)
• We are planning colourful printers, such as orange, sky blue, pink and light green. We also have white and black. This very cute 3D printer would compliment your rooms’ decoration.
• Light but robust! You can travel with it easily! You can take it apart and build it again easily, folding it up into a small, flat traveling size in minutes.
• Fully Modular, we designed it so very easy to change and upgrade any of its parts.

Future plans for R-360:

• Cloud Printing upgrade. Using your Raspberry Pi, you will be able to send prints directly from the internet to your 3D printer, turning it into a networked (wifi if your Raspberry Pi supports it) 3D printer! (Separate Raspberry Pi is required)
• We are planning to add separate 3D scanner upgrade. The disc shaped bed allows us to create for you the next step in 3D printing: the 3D copying machine! A 3D scanner will be able to scan an object and then the 3D printer reproduce it.
• Multi colour printing. Multi colour or multi material upgrade.
• Modular Upgrades: a larger printing area; 30cm printing bed and 30cm printing height, plotter & paste extruder heads, and 3D scanning apparatus.

http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/2132002936/r-360-the-most-simple-and-modular-3d-printer

http://replicatorwarehouse.com/






























R-360 printer specifications:

User Bam from Lulzbot forums experiments with 3d printing metal solder. He had some success but there are obstacles in the road. This could be interesting for electric circuits 3d printing.


He notes:

Early experiments with metal printing with a Budaschnozzle 1.1 are looking good. Repeat: early experiments (Tin 95.8%, Copper 4%, Silver 0.2%, McMaster 76805a61). If you can wait a few days before trying this out, I'll let you know if it destroys the nozzle. Fun fact: silver solder will stick to painters tape.
The flow cuts out after about 15mm of 3mm feed, we might be able to extrude continuously with a larger thermal mass around the nozzle (metalschnozzle?). Alternately we could print in short bursts through some sort of g-code trickery.

His plans for the future:

• Faster extrusion at higher nozzle temps (going to give an all metal noz a shot)
• Printing through a glass nozzle (I've got some lab grade glass eyedroppers on order that I'll try to hack into a hotend
• Smaller diameter filament (should cut down on the heat soaking up through the filament)

http://forum.lulzbot.com/viewtopic.php?f=29&t=380&p=1992&hilit=bam#p1992

Simplistic open source SmartRap RepRap designed to be very easy to assemble and as cheap as possible. Nice job!





















From RepRap wiki description:

This is a new design of a reprap 3d printer. It is in the spirit of the printrbot simple , designed by Brook Drumm , one of our best designer in my opinion. I tried to make it even simpler (let's start a chalenge with Brook? :) This one is made with printed parts only so it's easy reproducible. It's also full GPL , meaning open to any business.

The goal for the Smartrap is to have the feeling of a lego assembly feasible by a 12 years old kid without complication.The Education part is very important and by building himself, the user should learn how every part is working in the all system, so he would be able to find problems and repair himself easily. In other word, the Smartrap tries to reach makers who are not real gurus like we have actually in the reprap world ( not negative meaning here, but only to help to spread the world and attire more people to this wonderful world of replicative-dIY-makers).

Other features in any order of importance are:

• Real Reprap : most of the structure should be printed, so it can print itself for friends. Only the common base should be bought on special shops ( motors,hotend,controller,lm8uu,endstops).
• Simple to build : I mean it! . No need for special tooling or ultra precision cut or drill or even adjustment. The final goal would be: no screw and everything come together by snap (almost).
• Open source! : GPL, you can build it, sell it, make a business of it. all that is ok if you stay under the GPL licence .
• Cheap as possible : fishing line, printed bushing?( not well working for me now) , cheapest electronics ( no heat bed, 4 motors, no fan).
• Optionally open to experimentation : I tried so much configurations before that i should put them all online one day : Aluminium rails with 608zz, fixed axis with moving hotend, moving axis with fixed hotend..etc .

Features

• Print size : from 150x150x150 to around 250x250x200. The first prototype is 200x200x150.
• PLA only : It's a political decision: Even if ABS gives better results , i really don't like the fumes and the ecological impact. PLA , beeing compostable and asking for only 60 watts alime, is far more interesting to me. ( open to talk of course :)
• Layer height : not really tested for now, looks like 0.2 works well.
• Printed parts: 10.
• Screws : M6 x2 , M3 x 16.
• Non Printed parts : 6 smooth rods 8mm , 12 lm8uu, 1 M5 , 2 fishing lines 500mm , 4 nema17 motors, 1 hot-end j-head, 1 controler board , 3 mechanical endstops.
• Assembly operations count : not much but not totally clear for now. I wait to assemble 2 or 3 more printers to make a good doc and video of asssembly

It is also on Indiegogo:

http://www.indiegogo.com/projects/smartrap-open-source-3d-printer-the-viral-printer