Just when you thought the Fabaloo DIY Fab@Home 3D Printer machine was a big sticky mess by squirting goo onto things, there is a new even more sticky 3d Printer design you have to see. The CandyFab 4000 machine by a company called Evil Mad Scientist Laboratories is a DIY 3D printer that utilizes hot air and sugar to craft real life 3D objects. The low-cost method used in this 3d printer is called Selective Hot Air Sintering and Melting (SHASAM). The printer uses sugar as a powder they is laid onto a flat bed in thin layers, then the CNC hot air blower melts the sugar wherever the 3d computer model has a solid body. As each layer finishes a new layer of sugar is put on and the process is repeated until the entire model is complete. After completed, the heated and melted sugar is very hard and glassy. The finished object is a bit rough on the edges, but can be smoothed out. The 3d sugar printer can fabricate fairly large scale objects.
The software for the CandyFab 4000 3D printing machine is designed to be open source for the DIY do it yourself home builder. Evil Mad Scientist Laboratories wants this project to be available for interested hobbyists who want an alternative more affordable rapid prototyping machine. The open source software makes this a project that other people can help improve as well. Hopefully in the near future the designs will be greatly improved with higher resolution prototypes.
The CandyFab 4000 printer is the cheapest 3d printer available today, the total cost of building this 3D printer is only around $1000 plus some spare parts laying around. That is much less than any other design out there. And not only that, you can build it yourself! There are even 3D Google Sketchup models available online for free. All you have to do is order the parts and send some of the parts to local machine shops to make the parts and then you have you very own personal 3d Printer! I think it’s a great project because the materials are so affordable! At the cost of only $1000 you could even build more than one! B)
For those of you like me, there is always a new invention coming to mind, but these ideas usually just end up on paper and stashed somewhere or forgotten. The ideal of rapid prototyping has been around for many years with very expensive machines that could easily cost 100,000 or 200,000 for basic models, but a few years ago there has been much smaller machines that are powder based verses liquid, that cost much less. Typically there is a laser that slowly solidifies a plastic liquid, or powder that fuses together, both of which were still very expensive. However, recent technology has brought rapid prototyping 3D printers to a more realistic level for consumers. The “Fab@Home” printer is the cheapest 3d printer available today. And not only that, you can build it yourself! There are even 3D Solidworks models available online for free. All you have to do is order the parts and send some of the parts to local machine shops to make the parts and then you have you very own personal 3d Printer!
There are different Fab@Home printer models. The different personal fabrication machines come in 2 different models, a single syringe tool or double syringe tools. Currently the Fab@Home printer is limited to printing gel like substances using only a syringe tool, but future models are expected to also fabricate metallic materials. I find it amazing, but the makers of the Fab@Home printer are confident that in the future you will even be able to fabricate your own batteries, using this similar rapid prototyping technology. But by “rapid prototyping” I mean the machine will do most of the work for you and you just plug things in and get a basic rough idea of what a full production model would look like. Typically rapid prototyping is still very slow relatively speaking. Even with the Fab@Home, it could take 8 hours or more to produce something. For the Fab@Home, most of that time is probably because it has to wait for previous layers to dry first. It looks like The Fab@Home creates a much messier finish than much more expensive models of rapid prototyping machines. Personally I think it needs a lot of improvement, but it looks very cool. I’m not sure I believe it yet, but they claim it’s possible in future versions to create a small robot that would walk out of the machine, and possibly self-replicating robots!
The Fab@Home website says the Model 1 design will cost you around $2300 USD before shipping. That includes all the hardware including a USB interface that you can purchase from various vendors they have already found for you. There are also places to buy pre-assembled models if you like. Just check out the link at the bottom.
Here is an audio subwoofer that uses a new way of generating sound. This subwoofer uses a rotary design to spin at high speeds and generate very low sound frequencies at downwards of 5 hertz or lower. Frequencies of 5 Hz is almost unheard of from standard cone shaped woofers. A standard speaker design does not allow the freedom of fitting in small spaces either. This rotary speaker design uses the same effect that occurs on a propeller driven aircraft. The propeller blade’s tip generates sound as it spins in air and the sound frequency is controlled by the pitch and speed of the propeller blade. Although this particular design is patented, I would encourage you to experiment with various home grown design that would be fun to play with. Hooking propeller blades to high speed servos to rotate the blade pitch should give you the desired frequency you want as long as you program it correctly. The Parallax Propeller chip can be programmed to handle the audio controllers added. Your rotary speaker design will be able to produce sound frequency waves that could create the ultimate home theater system. Not only that, if you designed your own home system, you could make the ultimate home audio control system that would perfectly balance your audio in your home. Your home audio theater system can be completely designed and controlled with the Parallax Propeller chip. Maybe you could even make an audio set up that would automatically balance according to where you were sitting in your room. Now that would be the ultimate home theater system! Perfectly balanced sound at every frequency in the spectrum.
Here we have a project that everyone can appreciate and not just your peers who also know how to make things work. Public water displays are a amazing way to attract people or for you to show off your skills. The water show shown in the video is one of the most impressive and in located in front of the Bellagio Hotel in Las Vegas. If you want to really impress guest around your house or work make a small version of one of these with the Parallax propeller chip.
(this first video is in hi-def)
(Be carefull not to get your electrical hardware wet! You don’t want to damage your hardware or risk getting electrical shock!)
