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A Bid To Take 3D Printing Mainstream
Nerval's Lobster (2598977) writes "Can 3D printing go truly mainstream? Startup M3D is betting on it, having launched a Kickstarter campaign to create what it terms the first truly consumer 3D printer, built around proprietary auto-leveling and auto-calibration technology that (it claims) will allow the device to run in an efficient, easy-to-use way for quite some time. According to The Verge, the device is space-efficient, quiet, and sips power: 'One of the main obstacles between 3D printers and consumers has been clunky, unintuitive software. Here too, M3D promises improvements, having designed an app that's 'as interactive and enjoyable as a game' with a minimalist and touch-friendly interface.' Do you think 3D printing can capture a massive audience, or will it remain niche for the foreseeable future?"
You think people are going to pay you money so you can get bought out by a bigger company to take 3D printing mainstream? Take it to the VCs.
More like the fact that CAD software packages cost many thousands of dollars, and no good free alternatives exist.
Or that the printers themselves for commercial grade machines also cost many thousands of dollars.
Or that mechanical design is inherently challenging and is an expensive skill to develop.
But nope, just have some big buttons on a touch screen and everything will be groovy.
There are two barriers right now - cost of the printer and time to print.
For cost, you just need a Kinkos or OfficeMax or USPS or FedEx store model - where you have an account and have it printed there and you pick it up.
For time, the above model works fairly well.
We actually have quite a few 3D printers on campus and use them for a lot of things, so you can see it moving - you can even print stuff at the UW Bookstore (which also prints books in the public domain of rare editions).
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This will be good for creating random toys and knick knacks. The problem with 3d software for the masses is that it's technical. When you create a part for use (as opposed to a blob of toyness), holes, edges, parts have to be in a specific place. That requires math, which is beyond the reach of the average user. It's like trying to create a technical drawing with an iPad sketch program. You can make pretty pictures with your finger (okay - artists can, you can just make ugly dogs and weird looking trees), but you can't make a scaled technical drawing for fabrication.
Oh, and kickstarter is not a mainstream consumer outlet. Call me when they have the model for sale at WalMart or Staples.
Is it just my observation, or are there way too many stupid people in the world?
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Over the last few years 3d printing has come on dramatically, it's great for rapid prototyping.
Unfortunately though the average home user doesn't really have much need for rapid prototyping, and most of the things which come out of current 3d printers just don't look polished enough to appeal. They're still very rough looking, more the type of thing which'd come out of a Christmas cracker than the type of thing most people would want as decor.
In terms of software I don't think a more user-friendly 3d editor will help too much. I view 3d product design as similar to writing software, you can make it more accessible but most people are just going to be interested in the library of things other people have developed. Make a library of designs which the average person (not the average current 3d printer owner, they're more enthusiast) will find interesting, attractive, and useful and maybe you'll break the mainstream- until then it's the realm of the tinkerer and the hacker. Most people don't need or want a print out of the Stanford rabbit.
I'm not saying this isn't of interest or use, I may have pledged for one myself if I didn't find paying the import duties to the UK to be so painful (Anyone want to Kickstart a business importing other business' Kickstarters?), but it's still just another 3d printer. I don't think it's the type of thing I'd be recommending to my parents and neighbours though, I just don't think they'd want to deal with the hassles that 3d printers currently bring in exchange for the benefits. How much 3d printing do most people actually need?
What I do see as becoming more popular is the shared printer. People at home make orders for larger and well-finished 3d objects selected from a catalogue and printed on a very nice printer, and they either post them or make them available for collection at central points. I know businesses like Shapeways do this already but the price isn't right for most people yet, it needs to be the case where printing a vase isn't that much more expensive than buying one, and printing a piece to fix your plumbing should be easily affordable.
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This is Yet Another Crap Extruder based printer. That whole class of machines sort of works on good days. None of them Just Work.
The fundamental problem is that they're welding a hot thing to a cold thing. That sucks for metal welding, it sucks for soldering, and it sucks for plastic welding. It's how you get bad welds, cold solder joints, and fractures in 3D printing. The heated build plate systems usually start a build OK, but a few cm from the build plate, that heat source isn't close enough to help much. So many taller builds fail around 2-5 cm.
For this process to work, it needs better temperature control. A heated build chamber (that's patented). A hot air jet or small laser aimed at the target just before the weld (larger plastic welders do this). But nobody seems to be doing that. They just keep coming up with variations in the 3-axis motion mechanism (not hard to get right) and the software (not really the problem). Or they add DRM and overcharge for "print cartridges".
I think this is a key question for any 3d printer / software setup. Most of the posts on Slashdot seem to center around "designing something for real" (prototyping, replacing a part, etc.)
But I think a recreational version would take off if done right. For example, my 7 year old granddaughter loves minecraft, and spends hours building things there. I think she would love the ability to print out stuff she has built there. She also likes to make her own videos. She will arrange her dollhouses and stuff animals and make up a story involving them, and record it. I think she would love the ability to design her own dollhouses, sets, etc.
For her, a minecraft approach of dropping and destroying pre-made blocks, etc., would work very well. Especially if she can paint and color her model of whatever after it is printed. She won't care about the exact dimensions, etc., as long as it fits together. Let the software handle that.
So the problem becomes, I think, "know the audience" and design appropriately for that audience.
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A 3D printer for under 500$USD is nothing new.
The Printrbot Simple Kit has available for months, for 349$USD.
Still too expensive? For 200$USD, you can get a Makibox A6 LT.
Want to go even lower? You can get a Peachy Printer for only 100$CAD.
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This topic has been re-hashed here before several times (e.g. here)
Let's see what is actually innovative or different on this printer when compared to the existing ones:
- automatic leveling - ok, but they seem to use a sensor ("motion sensor chip"?!) in the printer head (?!) and not moving bed. I am not really sure how this could actually work ... ... ... ...
- non-heated bed - they claim it is not needed because of autoleveling, but that is BS. You need heated bed for ABS to stick to it, level or not level, otherwise the moving head will lift the print or it will warp. Nothing to do with the bed being level.
- tiny working volume
- autocalibration - again some magical "motion sensor chip" is mentioned, without any explanation what that autocalibration is nor how it works
- they are keen on the artistic look of the thing, but I have serious reservations about the rigidity and accuracy of the device - the claimed 15um is only the theoretical resolution of the steppers, not actual resolution of the printer (depends on the nozzle size which is 0.45mm by default!). The ABS body doesn't instill much confidence!
- reduced power consumption is somehow supposed to make things lighter and cheaper (?!) - that argument seems backwards to me
- startup, they don't have any other products - who knows when they will actually be able to deliver. The August date is completely unrealistic.
- their team doesn't instill much confidence - 1 electronics guy, 1 CNC guy, 4 CAD people, 2 sw people, but they have 8 artists, 2 PR agencies and 4 lawyers! Not a healthy balance, IMO
- incredibly cheap price ($300), but you get what you pay for IMO ...
- they have exceeded their funding target 10x already
Honestly, I don't see how this printer will make 3D printing somehow accessible to the unwashed masses - there are still all those issues of CAD, mechanical design, toy-like device with nebulous claims and nothing to back it up.
So you mean they will soon get as clunky and unreliable as 2D printers?
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The point isn't just that it's cheap ($300!), it's that it's a consumer-friendly printer that can be used "out of the box". So price matters, but so does the "out of box experience" and usability.
The Printrbot Simple is a very nice little printer. But at that price it's a kit that requires assembly, and the result looks like a weird machine made of wood and wiring with moving parts exposed. And the software is the same techie-looking software everyone uses. Which means that it's not an option for someone who wants to buy a printer, plug it in, and use it. And even the assembled cheap printers (Printrbot, Solidoodle) are terrible looking with not-great software. That's fine for early adopters who want to learn and are willing to suffer a bit (i.e. people who hang out on Slashdot). But if you don't think that consumer friendly industrial design matters, you're probably confused by everyone bought iPod instead of the HanGo PJB-100 (the first MP3 player with a hard drive).
And the Peachy (I'm a backer) isn't at all comparable. For $99 you're really only getting a part of a printer - you need to provide two water reservoirs, and a frame to hold it all together, and dedicate a computer to driving the Peachy. Because resin printing is extremely slow. So the Peachy is a fine learning experiment to cheaply play with resin printing, but other than the very low price, it's nowhere near consumer friendly.
Now, how this printer it plays out in reality is anybody's guess. But if they can deliver a printer that "just works" for normal consumers, for $300, that's pretty impressive, and I think it'll get them some serious attention. They're already well over their target, and it's only been a day.
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