Inexpensive, Novel Answer to Our Parts Issues

Here's one for $2500:

http://store.makerbot.com/assembled-makerbot-thing-o-matic.html

Prints plastic parts: ABS or PLA.

 

Rapid prototyping has been around for a while and gets better every year. The problem is that the resolution is not perfect from most of these machines so you end up with parts that have a lot of visible lines in them.

Also the material that is used is often not at all structural so the parts are really only good for checking fit before money is invested in finish tooling. Then there is the fluid or cartridge that these machines use to make the parts from. One machine that I am familiar with has a 9 gallon tank at just over $1000 per gallon. To save on fluid, some machines even have the ability to make parts with little air bubbles on the inside but even then it goes fast.

There are companies making machines that make parts out of sintered metal. Imagine powdered metal that is deposited in layers to make a finished and fully structural metal part. Sure the machines are about $250K for a base model but the components that they can produce are amazing.

Lastly are the digital scanning and engineering costs associated with reverse engineering an existing part. Needless to say for a Dino this may be a little too expensive a route however if you are dealing in some non-production rare cars or do a lot of custom hot rodding, then this may be for you. BTW Jay Leno has a rapid prototyping machine in his garage but it was donated by the manufacturer because guys like us would talk about it.

 

These machines are also used in Medicine for example to make chunks of skull prior to brain surgery and in Dentistry to produce stages in the manufacture of crowns and bridgework. They are mindblowing.
Theoretically you could print an entire Dino!

 

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Here is a piece that we had cast the other day from an SLA pattern. It is the exhaust nozzle of a small turbine engine. The part was vacuum cast in Inco 625. It operates at very high temperature, and presently it is less expensive to cast the part as opposed to fabricating it, or hogging it out of a billet.

Note that there aren't any striations resulting from the SLA process. That is partly a result of the improved SLA technology and also processing of the pattern prior to making the mold around it. The surface finish is about what you would expect from a conventional wax pattern using this mold material.

You could achieve similar results from vacuum casting in aluminum or other materials.

Obviously with today’s technology you can make anything that you want, provided you have deep enough pockets. We have used this process on very intricate parts with similar results. Using this process the pattern is not cheap, but you get what you pay for. In the case of sand castings it is possible to make a conventional pattern and make a short run of parts removing the pattern from the mold.

Another way to do it is to program a mill and hog the part out of a billet of aluminum. This has also gotten a lot less expensive recently, but that also depends on where you are having it cut and how much they are charging for machine time.
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