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The impact



The Mini Metal Maker is a game-changer in the world of do-it-yourself 3-D printing. It gives engineers and designers a new tool for fabricating precision parts without expensive machinery or difficult manual processes. It puts a powerful new tool in the hands of artists and craftsmen for creating customized repeatable items in metal. It is also a valuable and accessible educational tool because it is low cost and small enough to be portable.

I've always dreamed of being able to print miniature parts and detailed sculptures directly in metal. To me, the Mini Metal Maker moves 3D printing from the land of plastic toys into the real world of arts, science, and engineering. I have had so much fun creating and using the Mini Metal Maker, and believe that you will too. 

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FAQ
What is the Mini Metal Maker for?
The Mini Metal Maker is for printing custom jewelry such as rings and gem settings, sculptures, specialized machine parts, ornamental hardware, metal chains, or even special hardware such as miniature turbines or pistons.

Who will use the Mini Metal Maker?
The Mini Metal Maker is for anyone interested in creating small detailed metal objects. This includes the 3D Maker community and as jewelry artisans. The Mini Metal Maker is also a valuable tool for design engineers and machinists, who require small runs of specialized hardware for creating prototypes. The Mini Metal Maker adds new capability for the DIY inventor or artist by making fabrication in metal easy and direct.

What's the print bed size?
The print bed currently allows for prints up to 2.3 inches x 2.3 inches x 2.3 inches (6 cm x 6 cm x 6 cm) in size. The movement resolution is up to 1600 steps/mm.

How does the clay become metal?
The device prints with a commercially available jewelry product known as "metal clay." This material is a pre-mixed emulsion of metal particles in a water soluble organic binder. When heated in a kiln (600˚C-900˚C) the binder burns away as the metal particles fuse together.

Where can I buy materials for the printer?

I have been purchasing various metal clay materials online from Amazon and also through e-bay. The Mini Metal Maker requires the clay to be precisely mixed to a special consistency. I will provide pre-mixed syringes of clay along with the parts and software for the MiniMetalMaker.

Can I use it with other clays, or just metal clay?
The mini metal maker will work for most water soluble clay or ceramic type materials if the consistency of the material is properly mixed. Refining this mixing process for each of the available types of clay is an important part of the research and development we are currently completing. Since the device extrudes from commercially available syringes, it is entirely possible for users to develop their own clay blends. We will make pre-mixed clays of different varieties available for sale along with the Mini Metal Maker.

How big is the printer?

Our current printer measures 16 inches (41 cm) tall, 7 inches (18 cm) wide, and 12 inches (30 cm) deep. The new prototype will be slightly deeper in order to accommodate bed motion for two heads in place of just one.

Will it work with Windows 8? How about Macintosh?
Yes, and Yes. The core computer for the Mini Metal Maker is an Arduino Duo running modified Sprinter-based open source firmware. We are developing a cross-platform work environment for loading your objects into the printer.

Do you always need a computer to print?
No. It will be able to print directly from SD cards. Our current prototype requires a connection to a computer, but we are designing the production model to print directly from a compact flash chip that is inserted into the machine.

Does it work with a USB port?

Yes it does. It just has a standard printer-type USB cord that you could pull out of the back of your normal printer and connect to this printer.

Does it cause indoor air pollution or health problems for users?
No. The Mini Metal Maker does not cause any fumes or air pollution. The clay is water based and non-toxic, as its original purpose was for sculpting by hand. Also, the entire machine operates at room temperature because it does not have to melt plastic. You will need to purchase a small *kiln, however, in order to fire the objects.

*Kilns of any sort should be located in a well ventilated area away, often in a garage or a covered outdoor work area.

Robjects simply mean 'Robotics objects'. You can 3D print various connectors and blocks that interlock with each other to make bigger and more complex designs than what hot glue and foam board is capable of.

Prototyping robot designs can often be frustrating. Whilst I do love hot glue and double sided foam tape, they can leave a nasty residue on your parts.
To solve this I wanted to come up with a system that allowed me to turn my robotics components (Servos, Arduino etc.) into a modular system that would allow me to quickly prototype designs, but also make those designs permanent.

Robjects is what I came up with.
Through a series of male and female dovetails your parts will simply slide together. This way you can layout your whole robot design, be it a 6WD beast, or a 2WD obstacle avoider. Once you are happy with your design M3 nuts can be places in the male dovetail nut traps. M3X20 socket head screws can then go through the female dovetail into the male dovetails nut trap.
Robjects are still very much a work in progress.

There are a lot more blocks that need to be modelled and I am still considering different connector options. I am putting them up on Thingiverse now because I need your help. I've only just made a 3D printer of my own and I don't know how the system will work on others, my tolerances may be wrong, the numbers could be way out of line. So far all my pieces fit perfectly and the set screws hold them together like a rock.

You can print these brackets on your Robo3D with heated bed off to prevent a crash and have your printer fix itself! You don't really need a 2nd 3D printer :P
Get Fan Bracket @ http://www.thingiverse.com/thing:166045 

Today while printing on my Robo 3D I ran into a problem where after 30 minutes it would just shut down and stop printing, after this happened 3 - 4 times in a row I flipped the printer over and felt the ramp board and it was on fire! I checked the forums and talked to some friends and they said that the ramps heat up really bad and can shut down if you run the heated bed at high temps while printing for prolonged time (known issue). The solution is to add some active cooling in the form of a fan to the Arduino board that drives the Robo 3D.

I used my Ultimaker 3D printer to print out a few brackets from Thingiverse.com to mount an 80mm fan to the bottom since I had clearance with the new feet I printed that raised the printer up for the Smart LCD Controller I recently installed (check that video out). The results were epic and in this video I will show you the entire process end to end to fix this problem once and for all.
The brackets were printed w/ following CURA settings on Ultimaker v1
White PLA material
0.2mm layer height
0.4mm nozzle
70c Bed
210c Hot End
100mm/sec
Cooling fan 100%
Total printing time approx 50 minutes...

• 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

Inspired by the Baxter robot, this arm can be trained to move with your own hands. Once the train button is pressed, youd. move the arm and gripper as needed while the Arduino stores the positions in EEPROM. After that the arm will replay the motion as needed.

Universal Laser Attachment for 3D Printers Stand Alone System

Laser-Bot Personal Manufacturing System by J Tech Photonics

Laser Bot hardware setup

Laser Bot workflow

Laser diode head

This kit is a combination of the popular 1.7W 445nm Laser Diode Component and the 2.0 Amp matching laser driver kit with a 12V adapter. This includes everything you need to get your laser up and running in your product or project. We now even cable the laser with a Mini Fit Jr. connector at 2.5 feet to make it even easier to hook everything up! The kit includes:
1.7W 445nm Laser Diode Component (now with 2.5′ Mini Fit Jr. Connector Cable included)
2.0 Amp Adjustable Laser Diode Driver Kit, 8V Compliance
Power Adapter 12V 2A, US Style Plug
Laser Specifications:
This multi transverse mode laser diode component is pressed fit mounted in an aluminum housing and has an aluminum mountable heat-sink. The front of the component contains a glass collimating lens for the laser output.
Absolute Maximum Ratings:
Item Absolute Maximum Ratings Unit
Forward Current (Tc = 25°C) 1.7 A
Allowable Reverse Current (Tc = 25°C) 85 mA
Operating Case Temperature 50 °C

Electrical / Optical Characteristics
Item Min Typ. Max Unit
Optical Output Power 1.6 W
Dominant Wavelength 435 455 nm
Threshold Current 80 220 mA
Operating Voltage 3.7 5.5 V
Beam Divergence Full Anlge (1/e^2) // 5 14 25 deg.
Beam Divergence Full Anlge (1/e^2) – Perp 30 44 50 deg.
Driver Overview:
2 Amp Version, 12V adapter Kit
This version of the popular High Current Laser Driver offers up a lot of current in a small package for an excellent price. The design team perfected several versions of this driver to give a quality current source with a large compliance voltages with both adapter choices to be able to work with most every laser diode. They packed it with multiple features and made it capable of interfacing with even the oldest of your equipment in your lab or the newest wiz bang in your product or system. This version includes a 12V power adapter that will provide 8 volts at maximum load of 2 amps. This can be used to power higher voltage laser diodes in the 4-7 volt range like the 445nm laser diode component. It can also power IR laser diodes in the 2-4 volt range, but it might need additional cooling fan if left on for extended amounts of time.
This driver will provide 1 amp of constant regulated and protected current to the diode. Configurable current limits with jumpers for 0.5 and 1.0 amp settings and adjustable output with an analog trim pot. It also can be remotely controlled with an opto isolated input with a super huge range of acceptable voltages for turning your driver on and off. Does your equipment in your project or system that you want to interface with have backwards logic? No problem! There is a jumper for choosing inverted or non inverted logic as well! Perfect for integrating into any final product or project.

Features:

High power current source for driving Laser Diodes and Light Emitting Diodes.
Current Range of 2 Amps.
Current Ranges are adjustable in 500ma increments.
No need for extra cooling at maximum load. (depends on power adapter and compliance voltage.)
Soft start for diode protection.
Reverse diode and ESD protection.
Thermal Protection and Over Current Protection.
Compact Size.
CW Mode and Input Control Mode.
Digitally isolated control input.
Control from CW to 5KHz.
Configurable Input signal: Inverting /Non-Inverting.
Multiple connector options for both Laser/LED output and control input.
LED status lights for input laser enabled and laser on.
Optional fan for extra thermal stability.
Specifications:
Specification HCDBSA 2 AMP
Current Source Range: 0 – 2 Amps
Current Limit Jumper Settings: 0.5, 1.0, 1.5, 2.0 Amps
Compliance Voltage w/7.5V adapter: 3.5 Volts
Compliance Voltage w/12V adapter: 8 volts
Current Resolution: 0.1%
Current Adjustment: Analog Trim Pot
Current Range Accuracy Always greater than limit, no more than 15%
Laser Diode Protection: Soft Start, Reverse Voltage, Current Limit, Thermal Shutdown
AC Adapter Input Voltage: 100 – 240 VAC
Control Signal Digital Isolation Voltage: 4500 Vrms
Minimum Control Signal ”Turn On” Voltage: 2.8 Volts
Control Signal Maximum Voltage: 36 Volts
Control Signal Maximum Current: 50 ma
Control Signal Maximum Frequency: 5KHz
Connectors: Screw Terminal and Molex Mini-Fit Jr™ Connectors
Operating Temperature: 0 to 40 °C
Storage Temperature: -40 to 70 °C
Dimensions: 2.85″ x 2.1″

Shapeoko 2 is a simple, low cost, open source CNC milling machine kits that can be built over a weekend. Assembly is required before you can use it.
This is version 2 of the fastest selling CNC machine in the history of the world. The machine has been under development for the last five years. Edward Ford has been designing, redesigning, and building what he hoped would be a CNC machine that anyone can build. This machine is by far his best one yet.
Note: There is also further information about the machine, kits, kit contents and other things on this blog post.Updated features:
Larger work area
Dual motors on the Y axis, standard
Dual Maker Slide on the X gantry improves stiffness
Completely redesigned Z axis makes changing bits easier and improves stiffness
Open front and back for larger materials.
Easier to expand
Easier to assemble
Improved belt design keeps dust out of teeth
Mechanical Kit – $299
The Mechanical kit is designed for experts that are interested in adding their own electronics or making serious modifications to suit their needs. After assembly of the Mechanical Kit, the Shapeoko will not be functional.
Full Kit – $649 – $685
This kit includes the mechanical components, motors, controller, power supply, wiring, pulleys, belts, stepper cable, tools for assembly, and a spindle.

Smoothieboard 

• Stepper motor drivers are cooled by the PCB with wide copper areas which allows you to get more out of your board than with normal off-board drivers.
• All main connectors are on the borders of the board making it easier to plug in and leaving the board less clogged with cables.
• All pins are broken out to make it easy to add things to your board and to make it easy to support new uses
• Stepper motors current setting is controlled digitally. Forget about turning minuscule potentiometers with a screw driver; Just set your current in your config file.

On Kickstarter it starts from 100 USD for 3 axis version, to 160 USD for 5 axis version.

http://smoothieware.org/

http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/logxen/smoothieboard-the-future-of-cnc-motion-control

RAMBo 1.2 

From product page:

Improvements for version 1.2 of RAMBo motherboard include:

USB isolation - Ground loops are a known issue with USB. When two devices are connected to mains power it is possible that their grounds are at different voltages. When a USB cable is connected between two devices with a different ground reference the cable can be a path for current return. This can cause interference, and in worst cases burn traces/components on circuit boards, and melt USB cables. It can usually be avoided by ensuring USB connected devices are plugged into the same power outlet as their peers. We opted to add isolation between the atmega32u2 that handles serial comms and the atmega2560 that runs the printer. The Analog Devices iCoupler ADUM7441 used is transformer based so it is isolated in a way similar to ethernet. We chose this part over opto-couplers mainly due to its small footprint for the number of isolated channels.

Thermistor over voltage protection - Over voltage and ESD damage to microcontroller ADC pins has killed many 3D printer controllers. Like many recent 3D printer developments a solution was proposed on the RepRap Forums. Bobc, Nophead, Cefiar, and NoobMan proposed an overvoltage protection for the thermistors. I found the discussion and based my implementation on nophead's sketch here. We customized it for the impedance, leakage current, and VCC level of RAMBo. It protects the Atmega2560's ADC from continuous 24V input and short pulses of 35V.

All the power rails on the new RAMBo boards are compatible with input voltages up to 35V.

There is a more detailed change list on the RepRap wiki. The individual commits are in the RAMBo source files on github. We will be publishing more docs shortly (mostly at the RepRap wiki). Google

https://ultimachine.com/content/rambo-version-12-released

Intel Galileo

From Arduino page:

Galileo is a microcontroller board based on the Intel® Quark SoC X1000 Application Processor, a 32-bit Intel Pentium-class system on a chip (datasheet?). It’s the first board based on Intel® architecture designed to be hardware and software pin-compatible with Arduino shields designed for the Uno R3. Digital pins 0 to 13 (and the adjacent AREF and GND pins), Analog inputs 0 to 5, the power header, ICSP header, and the UART port pins (0 and 1), are all in the same locations as on the Arduino Uno R3. This is also known as the Arduino 1.0 pinout.

Galileo is designed to support shields that operate at either 3.3V or 5V. The core operating voltage of Galileo is 3.3V. However, a jumper on the board enables voltage translation to 5V at the I/O pins. This provides support for 5V Uno shields and is the default behavior. By switching the jumper position, the voltage translation can be disabled to provide 3.3V operation at the I/O pins.

Of course, the Galileo board is also software compatible with the Arduino Software Development Environment (IDE), which makes usability and introduction a snap. In addition to Arduino hardware and software compatibility, the Galileo board has several PC industry standard I/O ports and features to expand native usage and capabilities beyond the Arduino shield ecosystem. A full sized mini-PCI Express slot, 100Mb Ethernet port, Micro-SD slot, RS-232 serial port, USB Host port, USB Client port, and 8MByte NOR flash come standard on the board.

http://arduino.cc/en/ArduinoCertified/IntelGalileo

http://www.intel.com/content/www/us/en/do-it-yourself/galileo-maker-quark-board.html

This is a 3D printed digital camera that you can build yourself. By making your own digital camera, it takes away some of the mystery around how such devices work, and are fabricated. Also, it allows you to fully customize the camera to your liking. You can expand the circuit to have new functionality, or design your own custom case by modifying the 123D Design build files.
While this may not be a high-resolution digital camera, it is nonetheless very rewarding. This camera allows you to not only build a tool, but be creative with it. Being that this iteration of the camera does not have a screen to preview the pictures, it operates a little bit like a traditional film camera in that you don't immediately know what the pictures look like. This adds a bit of surprise and excitement when the pictures are finally transferred to the computer from your SD card and you see what has transpired. In the age of immediate gratification, slowing down the creative process adds a bit of magic and mystery to the whole endeavor. In fact, all of the camera's imperfections and digital glitches give the pictures taken their own unique character. For all of these reasons and more, this camera is a ton of fun to shoot pictures with.