I’m not so sure it is as innovative as the article claims, but it is definitely a bit different.
Wow, that thing looks super shoddy. Sadly, though, it will probably get funded anyways.
@Thomas_Sanladerer what looks shoddy about it?
So its a Sumpod with ventilation. Hardly innovative.
More hype than anything. And how the hell does it weigh 60lbs if its carbon fibre…sounds more like cast steel.
I thought the trend was toward moving the extruder in x and y, keep the part still, [had a part fall off after 9 hours printing]. Seems this is regression…
The only thing I’m interested is the rack & pinion setup, probably why they went for a stationary head route. 60lbs is a bit outrageous though.
- The cutting job on the carbon panels looks like crap
- They didn’t even bother to put the sticker on properly
- The riveted corner profiles are on crooked
-The photos are blurry and out of focus. Plus, there’s not a whole lot of them to show things off. - They are wasting money on what looks like 10mm thick carbon. It’s the completely wrong material for that application.
While those things don’t necessarily mean that the printer itself is shit, it does give some context to their claims of innovation.
@Nigel_Dickinson That’s what happens with gimmicky carbon fiber products.
@Thomas_Sanladerer - It has a foam core. which brings the cost down substantially as compared to solid CF. Regardless, there is very little benefit to using carbon fiber sandwich panels in such a manner. Not to mention fastening to sandwich panels requires some care. You can’t just wrench down a bolt as it will crush the foam core and ruin the panel. Normally hard points are inserted into these locations during manufacture of the panel. You can’t run screws directly into it. Lastly, bearing loads will wear quickly unless there is some sort of hard point sleeve.
Worst design I’ve seen in a long time. Not only does the platform move in X/Y (minimizing the ratio of build volume to machine volume, maximizing the likelyhood of print failures due to parts breaking loose, and increasing the inertia that the axes have to fight to do the rapid acceleration required for 3d printing), but rack-and-pinion drive means that each axis has to carry its own motor, further increasing that inertia.
Not only that, but the rack and pinion…is on…WOOD?! What the actual fuck?
Reminds me of this: http://forums.reprap.org/read.php?1,130192,131341 The rack sticks out kind of far, but otherwise a superior design.