Re: "Printing" our own parts!

AMPSOne@xxxxxxx wrote:
Print-a-Part was at the 2007 AMPS show in April and had their first
product for sale -- a set of individual link tracks for the Italeri
LVT series of kits. Price was NOT cheap -- $90 a set to fit on a $35
kit -- but the detail was amazing. They are fragile but they can do
tricks nobody else can do.

Even the US Army uses CAD-CAM computer casting for some items where a
CO2 ("cold light") laser is played into a tank of special resin to
create 3D items. Best I saw was an HO caboose that came out with
separate grab rails cast in place.

That was 15 years ago and cost $250,000 for the equipment, so things
have definitely gotten more affordable.

Cookie Sewell


Yup - stereo lithography. We do some of that, too. We also do a thing out here using laser cut butcher paper - the paper sheets are layed up and pressure glued, and then precision cut with a computer driven laser. You can cut anything from flat shapes to spheres to engraving out of the process. I've seen small examples of spheres cut inside of cubic cages...really neat - you pull away the excess to reveal the sphere inside the cube.

The resulting parts are sort of somewhere between wood and resin as far as the material goes. The equipment is expensive, the material is dirt cheap. And you can lacquer coat them to make them really smooth.

OTOH, the best I've seen is a plastic printer that prints working assemblies - like an adjustable wrench, or gearbox, or a bottle with a screw-off cap - that come right off the printer fully assembled and operable. These will do that - went to an afternoon demo of one once:

http://www.dimensionprinting.com/

--
- Rufus
.