Tag: 3D Printing

3D Printing and Scanning

Written on by John Henry

I saw my first 3D printer at an H-P plant in 2001. They had printed a fully articulated V8 engine in about 1/4 scale. It was love at first sight. Theirs cost about a quarter million dollars then but today’s systems are much more capable and much cheaper. Fairly good, if basic, systems can be had for under $1,000.

One of the problems with 3D printing is that it requires a 3D drawing. This can take some of skill and time to produce. For a complex geometry getting the dimensions right can be close to impossible. Wrong dimensions make a useless part.

I was watching some YouTube videos of how Jay Leno uses scanning and printing in his garage to restore 100 year old cars. When he has a broken part he scans it with a FaroArm www.faro.com This gives him a drawing, accurate to an incredible 0.0009” that he can tweak in AutoCad if needed. Then into what he calls his “magic oven” (the printer) and a few hours later he has an exact part in plastic.

After checking for fit on the car, he sends the drawing to a machine shop to CNC the real part out of metal.

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What a concept for a plant maintenance shop!

How often is a machine down for days for want of a simple part? It may be a custom piece that the machine builder does not stock so you have to wait for them to make one. If it has to come from Europe it may be weeks or even months. Some maintenance shops have wizard machinists who, given a Bridgeport and a lathe, can make anything from scratch. Those folks are getting harder and harder to find and even if they can do it, it takes time.

You think nothing of spending $10-$20,000 for a machine tool for the shop. How about drop a few bucks for a 3D printer and scanner? Compared to the cost of downtime, the ability to get back up and running in hours instead of days is peanuts.

If you don’t have a scanner and printer already, buy one. If nothing else, you need to find out what it can do.

The two Jay Leno’s Garage episodes are here:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q3SVTBrKyZk

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7ZrJsrTT4EA

 

 

Rapid Prototyping: Another way

Written on by Rich Frain

3D printing is amazing. It allows a dreamer to imagine something and have it in physical form hours later. In recent years it has gotten good enough to be used for on demand manufacturing of such sophisticated parts as jet turbine blades.

Well and good but what about your product? 3D printing isn’t the only rapid prototyping available these days. Let’s say you’ve come up with an idea for a new product. You can do samples and focus groups but there is only one way you will know if it is successful. You have to make it in commercial quantities and get it into the marketplace.

Where, despite your best efforts, it is likely to fail. Don’t feel bad, eighty percent of all new consumer goods products do. When it does, you’ve got to be ready to move to your next potential hit as quickly as possible.

The traditional process of come up with an idea, get a budget, buy equipment, get it to market no longer works. It takes too long, for one thing. Idea to market may be 18 months to 2 years. It costs too much in the event of failure. The company winds up with a brand new line that they can’t use.

Prototype

These 2 factors make companies risk averse and limit the number of products they can try on the way to finding the next hit that will cover the failures.

Suppose you could do the equivalent of rapid prototyping? Suppose you could rent existing machinery, customized to your product and be up and running in 2 months instead of 2 years? This would allow quick development and quick success or failure. If it fails, send the machinery back and try again. If it succeeds, then buy the high speed, high capacity machinery needed to meet demand.

The ability to try 2 (or more) new products per year rather than 1 every 2 years will get you to the hit much more quickly with minimized commitment to the failures.

This ability to try risky ideas with low risk is the essence of rapid prototyping.

At Frain we rent and sell individual machines, complete integrated lines and everything in between. You will be amazed at how quickly we can get your new product into the marketplace. Visit us online at www.Fraingroup.com Better yet, visit our plant in Carol Stream IL, minutes from O’Hare Airport.