Build Your Robot Online

An anonymous reader writes "Ever needed a custom part for a robot, case mod or hardware hack but lacked the tools or a machineshop to make one for you? Ever needed a custom circuit board? Well, PC Magazine's Bill Machrone writes about a few websites, Emachineshop and Pad2Pad, where you use their free software to design, price, and order anything you can design with the software. This is more useful to slashdotters than 3D 'printing' technologies like rapid prototyping since you get real working parts. It looks like they support a number of machines and fabrication techniques beyond traditional machining, like plastic injection molding and waterjet. As Machrone says, this is empowering stuff. This is something that should ignite a creative spark to all you hardware tinkerers out there in Slashdot land."

Comments

Open-source Hardware

[cgreuter]

Y'know, this sort of thing is perfect for open-source hardware projects.

Typically, if a group wants to develop a Cool New Machine, they can do the actual R&D online with CAD software and possibly build a few prototypes. However, once the design is actually done, there's nowhere else to go with it unless they can convince some hardware manufacture that it'll sell enough to justify a production run.

But now, they just need to convert the design to whatever format Pad2Pad uses and put it up for download. Anyone who wants one just needs to send in a copy and a credit card number and they're done.

This could lead to some interesting new hardware.