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Cubify 3D Printers Aren't Just for Squares (Video)
There are other 3D printers out there, but Cubify claims theirs is easier to use, has easier cartridge changes, and is all-around nicer and cooler than their competition. And Timothy Lord found them at Google I/O 2012, which means Google thinks they're cool, too. Wow. At only $1300 for their basic model (plus $50 each for the plastic "print" cartridges), every home should have one of these. Or maybe two or three. Or maybe Hackerspaces will buy all of them, and that's where we'll go to satisfy our lust for 3D printing.
article needs a blue screen w/ 1800 number and steak knives.
btw, who cares if google thinks it's "cool."
where am i supposed to go to satisfy my lust for sanding? photocopying? or any of the other basic tools?!
finally, a thermally-controlled 3d-printer without an enclosure to control ambient temperature is begging for trouble.
Something closed-source, with proprietary consumables, and based on how it looks likely difficult to repair.
No thanks, I'll stick with a Makerbot or RepRap 3D printer.
(plus $50 each for the plastic "print" cartridges)
Filament extruder plastic costs about $35 per kilo (talk about mixed measurements... but that's how its sold. Figure "fifteen bucks per pound")
So a loaded $50 cartridge should weigh at least 4 pounds total. I can't figure out on the website how much a cartridge weighs, but just looking at it it seems like you're paying a pretty high premium for your plastic.
Not quite as bad as "precious metal cost" printer ink, but I bet by the time HP sells a 3-d printer they'll find a way to make the plastic cost more than, say, silver, on a weight basis.
"Science flies us to the moon. Religion flies us into buildings." - Victor Stenger
What happened to sharing?
I thought the most important part about the 3D printer revolution was that users were in fact able to get designs through a communal repository of designs, FOR FREE.
What I see here is a bunch of super-fancy iPhone covers that sell at USD30.
That is not going to help fuel the revolution that the other 3D printers started. The implications for the world are enormous when everyone can replicate items in their house for free. It is not impressive when you get an iPrinter- that increases the cost of using it significantly.
Screw simplicity. I want to be free.
The thing that makes me nervous about this 'Cubify' business, though the hardware certainly has a more polished look than some of the DIY models, is that it appears to derive its attitude toward software and consumables from the same cesspool that consumer inkjets use...
By the pictures, the 'cartridge' is a smallish reel of polymer filament('proprietary ABS' per the FAQ). ABS filament should set you back less than $20/lb, not $50/cartridge-of-unspecified-capacity-and-properties...
And software? Ha, ha, ha. Even if you already have an STL object ready to roll, it's their fisher-price-meets-flash-game mutant bastard child of kiddo's first 3d modelling application/device-driver for you. But at least you get 25 free 'creations' if you buy one! Have they been poaching software guys from HP's consumer printers division or something?
It's honestly somewhat baffling. Given economies of scale, mass production, experience, potentially useful patents, etc. it shouldn't be terribly difficult for commercial 3d-printer vendors to compete on hardware specs(along with fit-and-finish and easy availability of finished products rather than kits) with the various DIY contraptions, but these 'Cubify' fellows seem determined to undermine what might be promising hardware with usurious consumables pricing and cringe-worthy software...
I know this will sound like shilling, but all I can give is my personal assurances that I have no connection to the site.
Shapeways.com is cool. I realized long ago that I won't personally 3d print very many items, and there are still economies of scale to 3d printing, even if a lot less than manufacturing. So shapeways has multiple varieties of 3d printer, and numerous materials of varying pricing, and open source models other users have printed you can use or modify and use. As a user, you only see the software(blender) and the finished product when it's shipped to you. Actually OWNING a 3d printer doesn't appeal to me much, but there are a couple things I'm working on to (eventually, some day) print.
SoI take it you have never heard of lost wax casting I take it?
You print the item you want, you pack that in a material with a higher melting point than the desired material for the object, melt the end material and pour it in.
What I want to know is when will these things have a hopper where I can chuck all my old laundry detergent bottles as feedstock?
Someone had to do it.
Clearly I need more caffeine.
I meant to say:
I take it you have never heard of lost wax casting?
You print the item you want, you pack that in a material with a higher melting point than the desired material for the object, melt the end material and pour it in.
This is how a lot of metal casting is/was done using wax as the model and sand as the form.
I don't see people going to a hackerspace to print something out. This tech will take off when it gets adopted by home improvement stores. Then you can get your printed plastic at the same place you get your cut glass and timber.
Oh, you can refill the cartridge; but does your filament have the correct cryptographically-signed-and-timestamped anti-tamper code printed along its entire length?
If the optical-verification scanner in the filament feed path encounters a missing section, or a section not signed with the private key corresponding to the public key QR-coded on the filament cartridge, it won't continue printing, now will it?
And don't even think about a replay atttack... Each cartridge's key is reported to the Consumable License Activation Server upon first installation, and each Enciphered Consumable Subsection String is reported as consumed when it first passes through the optical-verification path. If a printer attempts to validate a previously validated cartridge key, or reports the consumption of filament with the same Enciphered Consumable Subsection String more than once, your printer will fail Cubify Genuine Advantage...
(The above is sarcasm; but I suspect that it wouldn't exactly be rocket-surgery to implement such a system in the real world...)
Or you could have the local smithy cast it for a shilling.
It's most certaintly not the first. There are several 3D printer manufacturers (including MakerBot themselves) out there that have been doing this for quite a while now... but none of them are charging as much for their consumables. It seems that for $50, you get about a pound of material, which is roughly 3 times the normal cost.
Bill
It's my Sig and you can't have it. Mine! All Mine!
It's a popular idea, but the materials science guys tell us that re-melted plastic has different properties than "fresh" plstic, and the more times you melt it, the worse it gets (more brittle, different melting temp. etc)
If you want accurate prints, you're going to need fresh plstic. Sad but true.
Simon
Physicists get Hadrons!
Unfortunately all plastics are different.
No plastic is the same, plastics have different composition, additives, melting points, all sorts of different properties that really makes it impossible to melt them together and expect any sort of consistency.
OTOH it instead of melting the plastics, your old bottles could be shredded somehow into powder and then mixed with something sticky, some glue or epoxy, but even then different behaviours of different plastics would be problematic.
You can't handle the truth.
Seems to me that that is a function of the additives in the plastic. If you use all milk containers, the properties shouldn't change.
Also, I never heard of the properties of plastic changing just from melting and re-extruding them. Maybe it is just a scale issue, where small scale reprocessing creates an inferior filament.
Actually, I was wondering the opposite, which is how to recycle objects that you make. I would guess that typically there will be significant waste as prototypes are fine-tuned, as well as when whatever you make breaks or is no longer needed.
I hope the design software will make it easy to incorporate the plastic's recycle number in a triangle embossed somewhere on the object, and even encourage it. My town's recycle service requires that all plastic objects have this number on them. In the past they have refused to pick up non-container plastic objects that don't have this number (when they notice it), such as a toy that stands out from the rest.
We have a Cricut and a Silhouette - electronic paper cutters.
The home crafting market is one I think a 3D printer would do well in, and this one seems to be aiming in that direction. There are lots of moms & grandmas who sew, quilt, knit, make cards, scrapbook, etc. Many of those women are incorporating computer driven tools into their workflows. A 3D printer would let them print cutsie embellishments, cupcake holders, party favors, napkin rings, and "girlie" things that are completely off the radar of the "hacker space" boys club.
- Jasen.
Most people are used to paying out the ass for inkjet/toner cartridges. Anyways, the RepRap is much cheaper and flexible, but it isn't something the mainstream users that Cubify is targeting will be able to build/use. Your average Slashdotter that likes to tinker with 3D printing will take the time to become proficient with the small details of getting everything to work; but the run of the mill engineer, doctor or whatever trying to prototype something via CAD just wants it to work without much effort. Plus it appears to be more polished, which helps in regard to workplace safety. An exposed extruder isn't something you really want. While I love the RepRap project, 3D printing won't become mainstream if it remains a gearhead type of operation.