Spoiled for choice with so many printers?

Wednesday, February 22, 2012 by Susanne Zeitler

Since the number of 3D printers increases gradually, chosing the right one for each different requirement gets harder and harder. ProtoParadigm tries to add clarity. On their blog they published an article about the six most popular printers, which they had tested: Mosaic, Thing-O-Matic, Ultimaker, Replicator, Printrbot and Printrbot+.

They scrutinized the machines closely for build envelope, layer resolution, linear speed, and also for preferred plastic and price. If you're thinking about purchasing one of those printers, this article will definitely help you on that.

via ProtoParadigm

Category: 3D Printer

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Reduce pain with 3D printing...

Tuesday, February 21, 2012 by Susanne Zeitler

Most people are terrified when the dentist tells them, that they need a surgery on their jawbone. It's something you definitely want to pass by as quickly as possible with the least amount of discomfort. Dr. Bernd Kessler, dentist and implantologist from Zurich, Switzerland, found a way to provide that by means of 3D printing.

He creates 3D files Dr. Bernd Kessler of his patients' jawbones, edits them and sends them to his RapMan 3D printer. On the models of the jawbones he can plan the surgery for dental implants. That way, he doesn't have to make any cuts through the patients' gums, because he already knows the conditions and dimensions of the jawbones. „This method of implantology keeps the risk of infection to a minimum and allows the patients to heal more quickly,“ Dr. Kessler explains.

When he started preparing files for 3D printing, he needed a software that was professional enough to handle medical data, which demand very high standards. „With the netfabb Engine Basic for RepRap, I've finally found a suitable and affordable software,“ he says. „netfabb has made it a lot easier for me to deal with 3D-data every day.“

What's more to say? Nothing, really, but you should still take a closer look at Dr. Kessler's work at our case studies.

Category: 3D Printer

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Dale Dougherty: We are makers

Monday, February 20, 2012 by Alexander Oster

In this fantastic TED-Talk, the founder of MAKE Magazine describes the maker movement, and gives wonderful examples of what people can do on their own. Get inspired:

via TED - Ideas worth spreading

Category: 3D Printer

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The Harvard Monolithic Bee

Sunday, February 19, 2012 by Alexander Oster

A fascinating type of Additive Manufacturing is used by Harvard's SEAS Robobee Project. In order to pursue their reasearch goals in swarm intelligence they had to master the difficulty of mass-producing small scale robotic insects in high numbers - and they came up with a fantastic solution that envisions a future direction in Additive Manufacturing:

Adding 18 layers of different materials, they combined the building of linkages, electronics and geometry into one automated pruduction scaffold. The final assembly is done by folding the construction like a children's popup-book:

These principles takes the concept of Additive Manufacturing to a completely new level. Fully functional micro-robots out of your 3D printer are not that impossible as it sounds. Just check out the explanatory video.

The question is, if this does not again turn out to be a scary Pandora's Box. Not to imagine, if anybody could easily build his own fleet of robotic insects for a reasonable price. As Cory Doctorow recently pointed out in a visionary speech, the scary social and political impacts of these technologies have not even been outlined by Hollywood Movies yet.

via Harvard School of Engineering and Applied Sciences

Category: 3D Printer

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Ultimaker Hacking Session

Friday, February 17, 2012 by Alexander Oster

The last two days, we had a nice visit from Martijn, Siert and Florian from Ultimaking Ltd., which brought us a new updated version of their awesome open source kit Ultimaker.

We used the time to improve a lot of details in our Engine for Ultimaker - which will increase the ease of use and the print quality significantly. Also the MacOS X Version - as beta version used to miss some features until now - has become ready for primetime.

Thanks to the three guys for taking the long way to us through ice and snow, and we are happy to release a new version 4.9 soon, with a bunch of unseen features.

Stay tuned and don't miss the newest update!

Category: 3D Printer

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Watch out for flying Vampires!

Thursday, February 16, 2012 by Susanne Zeitler

As we're always looking for inspiring new 3D printing projects, we came across something really interesting on thingiverse.com today and we'd like to share it. You might have read our blog entry about 3D printed helicopter blades some weeks ago, but now we've found a whole printed heli! It's creator – Peter from Sweden – called it PL1Q Vampire. „Because it looks evil,“ he explaines - and he's absolutely right, don't you think? Take a look at it!

via thingiverse, youtube

Category: 3D Printer

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flattry will get you to netfabb's Cloud service

Tuesday, February 14, 2012 by Susanne Zeitler

There's a lot of stuff on the internet. Some of it we like, some of it we don't. Anyway, for a long time there hasn't been any chance to give credit to the services you cherish. Then Peter Sund e, co-founder of the torrent search engine The Pirate Bay, launched flattr two years ago and invented a simple way to pay a small obolus for content you enjoy and would like to reward.

Maybe you are already one of our netfabb Cloud users? The Cloud is a server based solution for the automatic processing of large volumes of 3D data. We're very proud that we can offer this service for free! But if you're happy with it, we would feel flattered by finding your appreciation via flattr!

via flattr, Youtube

Category: 3D Printer

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Design & Fabrication for Future Thinking

Wednesday, February 08, 2012 by Ulf Lindhe

Sarat Babu and Richard Becket at BREAD Ltd are showcasing a project carried out with netfabb Selective Space Structures at the Surface Design Show in London. Launched in 2004 Surface Design Show is a leading event for Architects and Interior Designers to find innovative surface solutions for the built environment..

Cilia is a double sided surface tile, constructed from over 50,000 0.5-0.8mm hairs laid onto a 1.5mm core printed as a single piece of Nylon using Selective Laser Sintering. Varying the thickness and length of each individual fibre, Cilia, reacts to air and light casting complex shadows while also being selectively soft to touch.

Produced using netfabb Selective Space Structures, Cilia pushes the limits of SLS technology and material / shape modelling.

For more information on the process of design check out BREAD's blog post.

Category: 3D Printer

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How netfabb can improve your home

Thursday, February 02, 2012 by Susanne Zeitler

Are you tired of buying all things for your home at those impersonal furniture giants? Well, you don't have to be. Just take a look at the latest project of our customer Joachim Strerath. He's an early-retired and he was looking for a challenging new hobby. He chose to learn how to create things three-dimensionally and got himself his own 3D-printer and netfabb Studio Professional.

Browsing through Google, he found a sketchup file of the Statue of Liberty. "I had the idea to print it and to use the statue as an illuminated sculpture for my living room," he says. He hollowed the statue and cut it into pieces, so that they were suitable for his printer. "With netfabb, that was really easy to do."

When the job had finished, he bought an ordinary inspecion lamp - the ones you use for repairing cars. "I prepared the lamp, so only the electronics and the 8 watt neon tube were left and added a hand switch to the cable. Then I assembled all the loose parts - and finished was my very special, unique living room lamp!" he explains with a hint of pride.

We think this is a great new way of using our software and we're impressed by the creativity of our customers. If you are curious about Joachim or about other projects, visit our case study website!

Category: 3D Printer

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freewaregenius.com about netfabb

Friday, January 27, 2012 by Susanne Zeitler

freewaregenius.com is a great website for those, who need to have an eye on their wallet. It talks about, evaluates and recommends free software. For example, you get to learn about racing games and translation programs, at no cost for you. It lately published a nice article about netfabb Studio Basic! We're glad that so many people from the most different topic areas discuss on us. Greets to freewaregenius! Read more.