Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Peachy Printer - The world's first $100 3D Printer

3ders.org

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

101–110 of 117 posts

Re: Peachy Printer - The world's first $100 3D Printer

#101

Post by stinos »

DanBC wrote: post #38

> The software we wrote as an add on to blender takes the data from that 3D model and translates it into an audio waveform. It then plays the audio file out to the printer through the headphone jack in your computer. This waveform drives a pair of electro magnetic mirrors. The higher the volume, the higher the voltage, the more the mirrors move. The purpose of these mirrors is to reflect and control the path of the l…

I look forward to people doing weird interesting things with this!

my first thought was: do they have a reverse add-on as well? And then: I would love to see the output of various types of music :P

Re: Peachy Printer - The world's first $100 3D Printer

#102

Post by ajuc »

jlgreco wrote: post #43
oakwhiz wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This doesn't really work, though, because to the 3D printer, 0 volts is a valid signal in the domain of the input. Never use a value in the domain of your input as a null value. Additionally, it is difficult to define what the sound level of a continuous signal really is, since it is usually computed using an averaging, integrating, or low-pass filter (not sure which.) Just like an old-fashioned VU meter, it takes a…

I'm thinking you would throw in a cheap microcontroller and basically use it as a modem to control the printer. If the carrier signal is lost, then it stops printing. This would retain most of the benefits of using the audio jack, including being able to re-compute prints and play them back with something like an mp3 player instead of a proper computer.

I wonder what mp3 compression would do to your objects :)

Re: Peachy Printer - The world's first $100 3D Printer

#103

Post by grannyg00se »

I was just talking to my mom about 3D printers on Friday, trying to explain the processes of the different types, and how the most accurate ones like this (lasers, laser-sensitive liquid, directed high precision curing) are the best but also the most expensive. That conversation would have gone much differently had I seen this project a few days ago.

One hundred dollars is a major game changer. I've been somewhat reserved on the 3D printing hype because of a lack of necessity for most people, and a lack of precision/usefulness at the lower price range. This can change all of that. For one hundred dollars you no longer have to worry about longer term entertainment value or interest for children. It's the cost of a couple of video games. And for project work, you don't have to worry about needing it for multiple projects. At $100 a single use justifies the cost many times over. I'm looking into spending $400 right now on a single 3D print for a small product I'm working on.

I love rewarding ingenuity. BACKED!

Re: Peachy Printer - The world's first $100 3D Printer

#105

Post by grannyg00se »

robomartin wrote: post #98

It's clever and really neat. That said, please don't think you are going to get parts of the quality, accuracy, surface detail and durability attainable through other more established methods. The only reason I am funding it is to support someone thinking outside the box. I really have no use for it due to the issues listed above. I'll probably gift it to someone who might. I've done that a number of times with KS pr…

If you wouldn't mind, could you indicate which other methods you are referring to? I'd like to check them out. As far as I know stereolithography is the most accurate method known. And I can't foresee any accuracy issues inherent in this particular solution that can't be improve with a slight increase in materials cost.

Re: Peachy Printer - The world's first $100 3D Printer

#106

Post by MertsA »

nanofortnight wrote: post #91

I wonder if you're able to get accurately sized objects for gears and such. The resin for photolithographic printers normally suffer from shrinkage after printing.

On makerjuice.com you could get the SubG+ resin that shrinks "less than 3.5%", but the shrinkage should be consistent enough to compensate for that by printing slightly oversized parts.

Re: Peachy Printer - The world's first $100 3D Printer

#107

Post by SwellJoe »

anigbrowl wrote: post #73
SwellJoe wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've had good luck with my Focusrite Saffire USB device. Both Windows and Linux. I recall orneriness in older devices...my old Firewire Focusrite had problems. But, it's sad that any MIDI device can possibly have problems anywhere so long after its invention. I have a MIDI interface on a Commodore 64 that works reliably! Likewise, I used to do sequencing on an Amiga...worked fine for MIDI. Multi-track 16 bit audio wa…

I was having a converstion with some friends about this the other day - people still miss their Atari STs and decades-dead products like Opcode's StudioVision. Microsoft just does not seem to get MIDI, which is one reason (among several other non-MS related ones) that I do almost all my sequencing in hardware.

There's still a large community of people making music on those old machines. Mostly chiptunes, rather than MIDI-oriented stuff (as far as I know)...but, some folks are driving their old machines via MIDI and simply using them as sound devices.

Boots Riley of the Coup talked about using an ST for many, many years after it was out of date. I think he was using it up until Party Music (released in 2001, but it might have been the prior record. Atari Teenage Riot also keep pounding away on their STs well past their prime.

I use a C64 and a Game Boy for music production these days; but I mostly play the 64 live (using the keyboard...not even a MIDI keyboard of piano overlay) and the Game Boy just exists as an independent music device. I've never tried combining its output with anything else. But, probably will eventually. If I were to find an Amiga 1200 or one of the latter day STs, in really good shape for not a lot of money, I'd probably pick it up. But, there are so many collectors of the old machines now, and so few remain in working condition, that it's not common to find them. I need to acquire a backup C64, though, for sure. I don't think there's good resources for repairing them the way there were when I was a kid.

Re: Peachy Printer - The world's first $100 3D Printer

#108

Post by robomartin »

grannyg00se wrote: post #105
robomartin wrote: post #98

It's clever and really neat. That said, please don't think you are going to get parts of the quality, accuracy, surface detail and durability attainable through other more established methods. The only reason I am funding it is to support someone thinking outside the box. I really have no use for it due to the issues listed above. I'll probably gift it to someone who might. I've done that a number of times with KS pr…

If you wouldn't mind, could you indicate which other methods you are referring to? I'd like to check them out. As far as I know stereolithography is the most accurate method known. And I can't foresee any accuracy issues inherent in this particular solution that can't be improve with a slight increase in materials cost.

In talking to a number of people who've purchased or built a range of what I would characterize as hobby machines the common thread is that they are nearly unusable or a complete pain to use for real commercial work. Everyone I know who uses 3D printing for non-trivial business purposes either contracts out the work to 3D printing service bureaus with heavy duty commercial grade machines or they actually invest on such machines to do the printing in house.

That's not to say that hobby-grade machines are useless. The degree of interest these projects garner on sites like KS means something. Perhaps it means that people are clamoring for significantly cheaper solutions. Or, perhaps, it means they are happy to have 3D printers that perform reasonably well with some TLC.

At some level I equate it to what happens with CNC machining equipment. I've built and purchased many low cost home-brewed CNC machining solutions. In retrospect they were always a pain in the ass to use in one form or another. It was always far more time and cost effective to send parts out to have them machined by capable shops with capable industrial-grade machines.

I eventually purchased my own industrial-grade machines. I had Haas VMC's and a lathes in house. That's when I saw the light. The difference between the hobby/garage machines and what the pro's are using is massive. It went from screwing around with the machine to make it work, maintaing tolerances, deal with software issues, repairing it, etc. to just using it and producing very high quality parts every single time.

CNC machining, at that point, became a source of creativity that did not detract from the design process but almost added to it.

This drip 3D printing gizmo is great. Like I said, I am supporting it. I could be lots of fun. A professional tool it is not. Not at this stage anyway.

Re: Peachy Printer - The world's first $100 3D Printer

#109

Post by tripzilch »

anigbrowl wrote: post #25
kevingadd wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not referring to 16 bit precision per sample, more to 44khz and the potential for multi-millisecond audio glitches on most modern PC configurations. Glitch-free audio is pretty tough, still.

That's not true at all and hasn't been for a long time. Maybe if you're mixing more than 8 tracks on a low-power CPU, but even a chromebook can do that sort of thing. Even my phone (several years old) can do that. Playing back stereo audio (which all that's required here) is something that can be done from a device that fits on your keyring. What you're arguing hasn't been true since the 90s. Certainly, it would be b…

But wasn't he talking about controlling it with your laptop? On Linux, this'd be no problem. But on Win7 I have this weird issue that causes my audio to go BZZZZPPT every few minutes or so (I think it's something to do with USB driver interrupts, but I haven't been able to dig up the root cause). It's usually not very noticeable small glitch (though annoying enough that it makes me rewind videos sometimes), anyway, but that would probably make for some "interesting" glitch lines in 3D printed models.

Re: Peachy Printer - The world's first $100 3D Printer

#110

Post by tripzilch »

anigbrowl wrote: post #21
kevingadd wrote: post #7

I wonder how much error is introduced by the use of the headphone jack to drive the printer - you've gotta deal with line noise from the computer's sound card, mixing latency/glitches from the OS, and the device sampling rate, along with any noise introduced on the audio cable. Does a 3D printer like this not actually require high-precision data to work correctly?

Line noise is a bit of an issue, but that's usually quite high frequency which means it can either be filtered or that the errors will be correspondingly small. Latency and glitches are not likely to be an issue at all, even the crappiest computer nowadays can handle multitrack audio and delays of a few milliseconds that would interfere with music performance are not going to have any impact here. Likewise sampling r…

> Note also that the audio input allows playback from an mp3 player or other sources, suggesting the audio can be wholly precomputed. Imagine how useful that could be in places like Africa so that you could print thing without necessarily needing a high-power device like a laptop.

This is an awesome idea. You could broadcast objects over FM radio! Just like they used to do for software when early home computers used cassette tapes for storage.

Post reply on HN