
3D printing meets robot design - sylviebarak
http://www.eetimes.com/electronics-news/4231050/3D-printing-meets-robot-design-
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ChuckMcM
tl;dr version - take a Z-corp printer, add some 3D robot parts, let people
'construct' a robot by putting together the parts on screen, and then print
it.

This is a great way to get one of these printers and have it pay its own way
while you're paying it off. There was a company that paid for several of these
machines by printing world of warcraft character models (not easy since the
WoW guys didn't really take into account making these things for real)

The Z-machine uses a sintering process (bits a material are laid down and then
flash heated into solidity) and has the feature that it can do basic colors.

Slowly but surely I think we'll find the materials and the technology to make
this stuff generate things we need 'on demand' at a cost that is comparable to
mass production.

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onemoreact
People have been printing text and photo's at home for a long time and it's
still not cost competitive with mass production. IMO, the real test of 3d
printing is when it's cheap enough that shipping something costs about as much
as printing it at home.

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sylviebarak
Totally agree! Can you imagine being able to get your overseas family to print
out all their own Christmas gifts? How awesome would that be instead of
getting saddled with a $250 posting fee all the time. But price of printing
does need to come down

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sandhu13
Cool, good read!!

