I saw some pretty implausible things being show in the 3D printer village this year.
The first one I saw was a 3D metal printer made out of a MIG welding rig and a milling head on a 3-axis cartesian bot. It was enclosed in box that was supposed to get filled with an argon atmosphere, but didn’t even have weather stipping to keep it from flowing out (and air flowing in). Worse, it had big window with nothing but a clear plastic sheet. This machine had obviously never been turned on, or someone would have gone blind. When I pointed this out, the builder said that, yeah, we should probably replace it with something tinted. He then said that he wanted it clear so that you could watch the milling (which was supposed to happen each layer), then realized that if he tinted the window, he would only have to turn on the RGB LED strip, apparently not understanding the difference in brightness between indirect light from low-power LEDs and a welding arc.
The second was a printer from http://next-dynamics.com/ (which claims “Print thousands of different materials and colors with a single print”, despite only having 3 inputs) that was supposedly jetting resin like an Objet. This printer supposedly had multiple materials (including a conductive material) fed from cardboard boxes with nozzles sticking down. The guy running the booth swore up and down when challenged that all of the prints he was showing (most of which looked suspiciously similar to Objet prints I’ve seen in the past) had been printed on that machine (which, unsurprisingly, was not running). One of the pieces was even chipped, so I could see that it was definitely made of resin. One of the prints, though, which he repeatedly confirmed was an un-postprocessed print from the same printer, was clearly an FDM print that had been acetoned to within an inch of its life. This was the common treefrog print in two colors, which I knew very well would not look like what he was showing if printed the way he claimed to have done it. The print had also broken in places, revealing FDM infill (something that I’m fairly confident is impossible with resin-jetting), and there were a few other classic FDM artifacts that were. I pointed out the infill, and he doubled-down by claiming that it (including the top-surface bridging over infill that was slightly visible through the translucent filament) could be done with his process.
Yep, the proof via a demonstration of the machine in action, or at the least a video showing the machine in action, is a mandatory step to establish credibility.
In this day and age with smartphone video cameras virtually ubiquitous, there is simply no excuse for not already having a video to show off.
You don’t technically have to cure it in mid air. The angle is far less than FDM and that is definitely an FDM print, but with the way the Objets work your could use the water soluble suport material with it technically.
Having researched a lot on how to make an objet like printer, I will say that even just to get started in buying a dev kit for the nozzles themselves, you might as well buy one of their lower end models
Ugh - this is why I cannot go out in public places like this, and why MRRF is probably the only place I’d behave. I would have sat in front of their booths telling people that they were bullshitting. Kinda autistic like that.
Sounds like low grade scammers. You did the best you could. And milling on welded structure, oh dear. I know there’s a DMG Mori machine that does similar, but not on a MIG weld. But it’s not a fun thing to do.
Well @Whosa_whatsis ; Ability3D is down here, and a buddy of mine called me over during our makerfaire – with the Ability3D guy standing right there, he asked what I thought about it. I told him “I don’t believe it’s true, I’ve already had a trusted mentor look at their machine and call bullshit on it.” – the guy handed me an aluminum piece of metal, and said it was something that came off of the machine, but to be careful to not drop it because it was the only piece they had.
So I calmly looked at him and said “if you have a working machine…how is this the only piece you have?” It looked like a bad casting that had been milled on 5 sides. My guess is that they thought the milling swirls looked like a nozzle path?
It’s possible, but there are other aspects that are cause for concern. Even if they managed to solve the issues of cooling, overheating and turning the part into a puddle of metal, it wouldn’t make sense not to drop it. If it’s working, then the part should be no less strong than cast aluminum. If its so weak, then there is no point in it.
“printing” with a MIG welder is absolutely possible, a friend of mine made a proof of concept last winter by using zip ties to attach a MIG welder to a large CNC table, this was the result on the second try (and yes, the back wall is supposed to lean outwards): https://www.instagram.com/p/BBye8pjhYgL
It gets worse, they’ve got $550k in funding now for a printer they claim works. Problem is, they made the mistake of buying a model from shapeways and passing it off as their own until the owner of the model saw it and busted them. a bunch of unsuspecting people who dont read the comments are about to lose their shorts this week https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1947576577/the-nexd1-the-first-multimaterial-and-electronics/comments
Instead of working, I’m lurking for days now (since Bathsheba tweeted it) at Kickstarter and kicktraq and following this thriller with shudder - and pity for all the pledgers who do not read the comments ;->
