What Needs to Happen Before There’s a 3D Printer in Every Home?

Today's guest blog is by Scott Harmon, Z Corporation VP of Business Development.

It seems like the 3D printing industry has more buzz now than it ever has. Recent articles in the New York Times, the Economist etc., have all touted a brilliant future for 3D printing. Respected technology thinktank, The Gartner Group, publishes an annual Hype Cycle chart.

The chart describes expectations of different technologies over time. In the Gartner 2010 Hype Cycle chart, 3D printing appears to moving into the area known as ‘Peak of Inflated Expectations.’ Gartner notes that a relatively small group of users are already getting great value from 3D printing.

For participants in the industry, manufacturers, service bureaus and users alike, it’s worth taking a moment to consider what the future really looks like. Will 3D printers exist in every home? Will manufacturing plants ultimately move from large centralized facilities to your basement? Perhaps more importantly, what will it take to get to that future?

Many people compare the early days of personal computers to the current state of 3D printing. The price points are similar, self assembly is in many cases required, and the early adopters certainly share a creative spirit and a techy bent. It seems almost a foregone conclusion that like personal computers, 3D printers will follow a similar path to mass adoption.

I’m an optimist, and I wouldn’t work in this industry if I didn’t think ‘everyone’ would use 3D printers at some point. So the question is not whether 3D printing will ever reach broad adoption, but rather ‘when, why, and how?’

In general, I think there are a few key factors that are likely to determine how quickly 3D printing achieves broad adoption. They include price, part quality, 3D CAD adoption, and the emergence of new applications. Unlike many in the industry, I’m 100% convinced that price is not the key driver. Price will have to come down, but low price alone will not be close to sufficient. Is a low cost 3D printer the path to broad adoption, or a highly capable system that makes great parts and is operated as a service?

What’s on your list? What are the key events, applications, enabling technologies likely to drive broad adoption of 3D printing?

We’ll go into some more detail on these ideas and others based on your feedback over the next few weeks.

http://www.zcorp.com

Restoring My Grandfather's Lamp

I remember my grandfather as a jack-of-all-trades and an engineer of sorts. I’m not sure if he ever earned a degree in engineering but he was one of the most technically competent people I have ever known. He was a pioneer in thermoforming GE’s new “Lexan” (polycarbonate) in the late 50’s and early 60’s. I remember when I was a child in the early 70’s, going with him to Sweetheart Plastics where he was an innovation and technical troubleshooting consultant. Around that same time he tinkered with a window box solar heater and designing and fabricating plastic injection molds.

Years later, after he passed away, my mother handed me a bag of stuff. One of the things in the bag was an old broken lamp that was from my grandparents' house. It used to sit on a corner table in their den. I remember it well because, as far as lamps go, it was the kind a young boy might be interested in - dark brown, bronze, and black with an etching of a colonial era sailing ship. The ship was back lit with a low wattage bulb that gave it a soft glow. I recall flipping the switch so that first the back light clicked on, another click and the back light went off and the main light under the shade went on. One more click turned both lights on.

What I never fully appreciated was that my grandfather built the lamp himself. Long before I can remember he must have come across the copper etching used for making prints of the ship. Somehow he came up with the idea to turn the copper plate into a lamp. Copper etchings are sometimes attached to cylindrical drums, coated with ink, and rolled across paper to transpose the image. It is likely that the copper plate was cylindrical when he found it. From there, the construction was fairly simple, two pieces of turned wood for the top and bottom, a standard lamp kit, and some sort of fake wood patterned plastic strip to close the back side of the copper plate.

By now you are probably wondering what this story has to do with 3D printing. As it turns out, when the lamp was given to me it was in pieces because over years of use the internal lamp melted the fake wood plastic strip enough so that the spring force of the copper plate broke everything apart. It seemed a simple enough fix. I’d have to find a new plastic strip to rejoin the ends of the copper plate, tighten up all of the parts, replace the blown bulbs and buy a new lamp shade.

As with most things, it wasn’t quite that easy. I never paid any attention to the cheap plastic wood looking strip because it was always in the back, facing the wall. It didn’t detract from the lamp’s attractiveness at all. Now, it became the biggest challenge to putting the lamp back together. After a few trips to various hardware stores and home improvement warehouses, I realized that this simple looking part wasn’t going to be easy to find. To this day I have no idea what the actual purpose of it was because I never found anything like it. It never really matched the colors of the rest of the lamp and the assembly required wood shims in order to match the thickness of the copper plate, so it didn’t take long for me to shift gears and consider a better solution.

The picture above on the left shows the fake wood plastic strip. In the picture on the right, you can see the wood shims used to match the copper plate thickness. You can also see the melted plastic toward the bottom. Also note how thin the web is between the two edges of the copper plate. Ideally, this part would be a bit smaller, not require shims, and match the dark brown and black colors of the plate.

I knew that creating the right profile in SolidWorks would be a snap. I was also sure that I could find a texture map that matched the colors better. If not, I knew I could apply a dark brown or black color to the part before printing. I created two different profiles in SolidWorks. I exported them as .stl files. I opened these files in ZPrint and applied several texture maps to them using ZEdit. I put all of the parts into one build file and printed it on a ZPrinter 650.

The picture on the left is the profile and color option I used. The one on the right has a wood grain but the color was too light to be a good match. This part measures 3/8” wide by 8” long. The slot is 0.040” and the center web is 0.060”

I can’t say that I was surprised, but I was very happy that the assembly went together the first time without any issues at all. The most difficult thing was finding a new lamp socket to control both lamps separately. They aren’t rare, but not all hardware stores carry them. Without the ZPrinter 650, I would have been at a loss as to how to fix that lamp. I could have machined a piece of aluminum, purchased an SLA (although I’m not sure the material properties would have been sufficient), or I might have been able to fabricate a piece of real wood. I would have had to paint the aluminum and SLA parts and stained the wood. There are other methods, but to me ZPrinting the part seemed like the best option. I think my grandfather would be pleased. Here are the pictures. You be the judge.

The first picture shows the edge of the copper plate inserted in the slot of the new ZPrinted part. In this picture you can see the natural curvature of the plate forms a half cylinder. This is an indication of the spring force when forming a full cylinder. The second picture shows the ZPrinted part holding both edges of the plate.

The first picture shows the ship backlight on only. The second picture show both backlight and main light on.

The last two pictures show the lamp from behind. Compare these to the first picture in this blog. With the new ZPrinted part, the lamp is no longer relegated to the corner of the room.
 
http://www.zcorp.com

Can You Teach Innovation?

Today's guest post is by Scott Harmon, Z Corporation VP of Business Development.

“We need to out-innovate, out-educate and out-build the rest of the world”
-President Obama
 State of the Union, Jan. 25, 2011

For years, leaders across business, government and education have expressed increasing concern about America’s continued decline in fields like engineering and manufacturing. Student performance continues to lag other developed nations, especially in math, science and engineering fields. Companies continue to ship engineering and manufacturing jobs overseas. Government efforts to counteract these trends do not appear to be working.

Everyone seems to agree that there’s a problem. Everyone seems to be trying to solve it, but for some reason we continue to lose ground in critical innovation competencies like engineering and manufacturing. Why? Because Thomas Edison was right. He said:

“None of my inventions came by accident. I see a worthwhile need to be met and I make trial after trial until it comes. What it boils down to is one per cent inspiration and ninety-nine per cent perspiration.”

Trial after Trial. 99% Perspiration. Real innovation is hard. Engineering is hard. Math is hard. Science is hard. It’s no wonder kids don’t like learning these subjects. They see all the trial and hard work, but don’t get to experience the joy of innovation, the inspirational aspects until much later.

Z Corp. developed a basic curriculum of materials that will help students derive the most educational benefit from their ZPrinters. The curriculum is oriented around the National Science Education Standards for Technological Design as developed by the National Research Council. The members of the National Research Council are drawn from the National Academy of Sciences, the National Academy of Engineering and the Institute of Medicine.

In the hands of great teachers, Z Corporation 3D printers and the accompanying curricula provide the kinds of inspirational experiences that motivate students to explore tough subjects like engineering and architecture. Low cost, easy to use 3D printers in the classroom help kids experience the joy of making things, the thrill that comes from creating something that works. With 3D printers, kids can experience engineering and architectural design all the way through to the physical solution they designed. They’re not simulating. They’re not pretending. They’re not looking at someone else’s work. They’re creating.

“Showing off their innovations in the trophy case is a point of pride for SITHS students and keeps them inspired to continually improve their work.”
-Frank Mazza, Instructor, Staten Island Technical High School

“When students hold parts in their hands, they’re closing the loop. Until then, it’s all conceptual, virtual and 2D. Completing the circle is important. It turns kids on.”
-Bruce Weirich, Instructor, Ontario High School, Mansfield, OH

Innovation, invention, and engineering may be 99% Perspiration, but if we can help kids experience the 1% Inspiration, the joy of creating, maybe we can get back to out-innovating, out-educating and out-building the rest of the world.

http://www.zcorp.com 

What Does 3D Printing Have To Do With Sustainability?

This week’s guest blog is by Scott Harmon, Z Corporation Vice President of Business Development.

Over the last several years there has been a global push to improve sustainability. Sustainability in general seems like a pretty complex topic. It seems to combine efficiency, environmentalism, renewable energy, recyclability, etc., etc. I think back to my days camping as a kid. The motto was ‘leave it better than you found it.’

Rapid prototyping in general makes strong contributions to corporate sustainability. Reducing waste represents one of the key objectives of most sustainability efforts. Smart companies are doing everything possible to reduce the amount of waste material generated throughout their supply chains. Improving quality, reducing packaging and miniaturization are all methods that companies use to reduce the waste they generate. Interestingly, architectural designers have created specific certifications to improve how architects approach challenges in sustainability.

Intelligent use of 3D printers to make prototypes and scale models reduces waste in many different ways. By pushing errors and changes earlier in the design cycle, prototypes and scale models reduce the waste streams caused by those errors. When you catch an error in the prototype, you cut less steel and waste less plastic. In architecture for example, the savings are even more dramatic because the scale is so large. When you use prototypes and models to create better designs, you reduce the number of final products that get thrown in the trash.

However, despite the positive contributions that rapid prototyping systems make to corporate sustainability efforts, there are enormous differences in the waste streams created by these processes. I have heard stories of companies whose RP systems generate more waste than printed part material, at enormous dollar costs. Support material, shaving uneven surfaces, dissolving chemicals, etc. contribute substantially to the total cost of prototyping. These systems generate significantly larger hidden costs as those waste streams get flushed down the drain.

Z Corporation obviously prides itself on having the most efficient 3D printers in the industry: no support structures, no cleaning material disposal, no disposable build platforms, no chemical waste water, recycles 100% of the build material. Less waste today, better world tomorrow.

Is your company is starting to think about a more sustainable design process?

See Al Dean's Develop3D blog: Z Corp's Recycling Smarts

http://www.zcorp.com

Engineering Challenge Part II - 3D Printed Rockets

A few months ago I wrote about an extracurricular rocket design activity that a number of Z Corp. R&D team members took part in. I finally had a chance to sit down and write the update which is timely given that Apollo 13 heroes Gene Kranz (Mission Control Director) and Jim Lovell (Astronaut) recently took the stage at SolidWorks World 2011 to tell their story of that famous NASA mission.

Many lessons were learned during our Z Corp. rocket design project. One of which is that just because you can print it doesn’t mean it will fly straight, or in some cases, fly at all. On the other hand, a surprising number of unconventional rockets did fly, and few straight. An oversimplification of designing a rocket for stable flight is that the center of gravity must be above the center of pressure or the central point of aerodynamic forces on the rocket. In other words, the cg should be closer to the nose and the cp closer to the tail. When designing rockets with crazy geometries, figuring out if it will have stable flight is pretty straight forward and relatively quick. By tying a string at the center of gravity and swinging the model around, the rocket will flies nose cone first if the cg – cp relationship is correct. If not, an adjusted model can be quickly 3D printed on a ZPrinter and tested in the same manner until stability is achieved.

Here are some photos of the rockets we designed, 3D printed on a Z Corp. ZPrinter:

Surprisingly, some of the designs above that look like they should not fly actually do, and some of the designs that look like they should fly don’t. Then again, the opposite is also true in that some of the designs that look like they have no business flying live up to their expectation. What is noteworthy is the number of rocket designs that went from design to test flight in a very short amount of time due to the ZPrinter's incredibly fast speed.

These two videos represent the extremes of success and failure:
https://zcentral.zcorp.com/attachments/1555_Derek.wmv
https://zcentral.zcorp.com/attachments/1555_Nick.wmv

http://www.zcorp.com

Pixar Brings Digitized Characters to Life with 3D Printing

In a blog last year I mentioned how Pixar created a Zeotrope of Toy Story characters printed on a Z Corp. Spectrum Z510 3D printer. Although this was not the first Z Corp. color printer, it was the first 3D printer with truly amazing color quality.

A recent Time Compression blog reminded me about one of the exclusively unique capabilities of 3D printing, and more specifically, color 3D printing. In my blog last year I wrote that Toy Story characters were “trapped” inside the digital world. The only way to release them into the real world is to 3D print them. To be clear this is not the only way. After all, you can buy a character doll at most toy stores. What I mean is that color 3D printing is the only way to reproduce exactly what the creator intended, right down to the last crease of an eyebrow or the exact cow skin pattern on Jessie’s chaps because 3D printing uses the data directly from the digital character.


Photo Credits  Woody, Jessie and Spanish Buzz, all 3D printed from original data on Pixar's ZPrinter.

Photo Credits Lotso 3D printed from original data on Pixar's ZPrinter.

A similar example is video games, such as World of Warcraft, where not only are the characters locked in cyberspace, they are also unique to each player. It is hard to imagine any other way to bring a character to life than through 3D printing. Check out http://www.figureprints.com/ to see some of these amazing ZPrints.

For a typical design process where the intended result is a physical object, 3D printing is often used to create prototypes. In the examples above, the final product is not intended to be a physical object, but is intended to remain digitized. 3D printing is a way to bring them to life. I wonder how many other examples exist where 3D data is the intended final product yet can be brought to life by 3D printing.

Video of the Zeotrope in action.


http://www.zcorp.com

MCAD and 3D Printing as a Sales Tool

This week's guest post is from John Kawola, Z Corporation CEO.

I had the pleasure of attending SolidWorks World 2011 last week in San Antonio. I have attended many of these events in past years and SolidWorks always does a great job in providing a complete agenda for engineers and designers to learn new skills, learn from other users and share ideas. As usual, the first day kickoff included an introduction by SolidWorks management. As many have heard, there have been changes at the top at SolidWorks. Congratulations to Jeff Ray for his new position within Dassault Systemes and Betrand Sicot for his new role as SolidWorks CEO.

In that first day session, Dassault CEO Bernard Charles and Jeremy Luchini from SolidWorks previewed a new technology called “Post-3D.” In the demonstration, they showed the power of using 3D data as a sales tool. For complex products, ones that don’t transport well and/or ones where some type of product demo is key to sales success, this concept can prove invaluable. They simulated a sales process, presenting a product called “CAD-Chair” in a virtual environment to a sales prospect in China. They were able to describe the product and outline features and benefits. But, most importantly, they were allowing the prospect the chance to “experience” the product. Impressive.

SolidWorks CAD-Chair

So, this brings me to the use of 3D printed parts as sales tools. Historically, prototypes and 3D printed parts have been primarily used by engineers, testing designs and checking form, fit and function. However, the number of use occasions and applications for printed parts is rapidly expanding into the customer-facing, sales environment. Z Corporation has numerous customers using the technology in this way.  Here are just a few examples:

Spirax Sarco: Leader in steam-related products and services

Spirax Sarco ZPrinted model

-Sales models of 1,000 lb. products reduce time, shipping, labor at tradeshows
-Sales staff is able to bring models of large products on sales calls
-3D printed model of a heat exchanger helped seal $600,000 sale, beating companies with only 2D drawings

Continental Tire: Largest tire maker in Germany, and fourth largest in the world

Continental Tire ZPrinted models

-Generated new revenue by putting early prototypes into hands of sales force
-Helped close sales on existing products because salesmen had physical models to help communicate product advantages to customers in sales meetings

Converse, Inc: A wholly-owned subsidiary of NIKE, Inc. offering men’s and women’s footwear and apparel

Converse ZPrinted model

-Among many other uses for 3D printing, Converse uses ZPrinted models to visualize design ideas with sponsored athletes in order to sign top athletes as sponsors

OBM International: highly prestigious design-consulting firm specializing in master planning and architecture for luxury hotels, resorts and mixed-use developments globally

OBM International ZPrinted model

-Dramatic 3D printed models make a deeper impact on prospective clients than 2D renderings or computer animations
-3D printing is galvanizing OBMI’s long-standing reputation as a leader in the global architecture community
-The 3D printer’s positive impact on securing business and minimizing redesign makes it a “bargain”

Gilberts: Gilberts, 16 person architectural practice

Gilberts ZPrinted models

-ZPrinted models improve the quality of proposals being produced which has a positive impact on business won
-3D printed models enhance the understanding of proposals and improve public perception of proposals
-Organizations presented with high quality 3D printed models appreciate the effort put in, hence subconscious reception is improved

These uses have been enabled by the rapid improvement in performance, ease of use, cost and full color capability. While virtual environments like “Post-3D” may prove to be powerful for some sales processes, it can be argued that the ultimate virtual experience is actually holding the product or part in your “real” hand.

There's nothing like holding a 3D printed model in your "real" hand

Related Resources
To learn more about how digital and physical prototyping work best together in specific applications, including sales and marketing, I highly recommend a white paper by By L. Stephen Wolfe, P.E. called, “Physical and Digital Prototyping Belong Together.”

If you’d like to learn more about other departments and applications within an organization where 3D printing can be used for strategic advantage, see this free Webcast called “3D Printing Across the Organization.”

http://www.zcorp.com