Science Fiction
Dictionary
A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z
 |
Filabot Turns Dull Plastic Junk To 3D Printed Shiny
Are you swimming in a sea of dull, plastic junk? Filabot can help you turn the problem in to the solution. Or at least the feed stock for your shiny solution, which will be emerging from your 3D printer.
(Filabot video)
For desktop 3-D printers to work, they need some kind of material to work with. Most contemporary printers use plastic filament, available in spools from various suppliers. Filabot reduces the need for that stuff. Instead you can grind up household plastics or even past projects to make new lines.Think a meat grinder on top of a pasta maker and you get the general idea. “Plastic extrusion is nothing new,” says McNaney in the Kickstarter pitch video. “The only thing we’d like to do is adapt it to the desktop environment.”
The need for something like this is enormous. The whole point of 3-D printing is that you can do rapid prototyping and customization of parts. This means that you can expect any given project to have lots of unwanted prototypes, to say nothing of failed prints or other errors. Go into any vibrant makerspace and you’ll find dozens of demo objects, broken parts and failed experiment lying around, the detritus of tinkering with objects. It’s similar to how in the early days of computerized workspaces, the “paperless office” resulted in more paper being consumed as workers reprinted documents over and over.
“I am working on this because this is the next system that is needed for at-home manufacturing,” says McNaney. “3-D printing is in its infancy, and when coupled with a Filabot a 3-D printer will be a complete closed-loop recycling system on your desk, office or school. I also see a lot of potential for helping out third-world countries. With a Filabot and a 3-D printer people can now make things as simple as a fork or cup.”
Fans of Neal Stephenson's 1995 novel The Diamond Age may recall the matter compilers, which served a similar function.
Via Wired.
Scroll down for more stories in the same category. (Story submitted 1/16/2013)
Follow this kind of news @Technovelgy.| Email | RSS | Blog It | Stumble | del.icio.us | Digg | Reddit |
Would
you like to contribute a story tip?
It's easy:
Get the URL of the story, and the related sf author, and add
it here.
Comment/Join discussion ( 0 )
Related News Stories - (" Material ")
Harvard Metamaterials Change Structure Instantly
'Annealed in any shape for a time, and codified, the structure of that shape is retained down to the molecules.' - Samuel R. Delany
Nano-Chainmail 2D Mechanically Interlocked Polymer
'Nemourlon armor of reasonable weight resists penetration by most fragments and any bullet that is not both reasonably heavy and fairly high-velocity.' - Jerry Pournelle, 1976.
Goldene - A Two-Dimensional Sheet Of Gold One Atom Thick
'Hasan always pitched a Gauzy - a one-molecule-layer tent, opaque, feather-light, and very tough.' - Roger Zelazny, 1966.
FlexRAM Liquid Metal RAM And One Particular SF Movie Robot
'Its lines wavered, flowed, and then painfully reformed.' - Philip K. Dick, 1957.
Technovelgy (that's tech-novel-gee!) is devoted to the creative science inventions and ideas of sf authors. Look for the Invention Category that interests you, the Glossary, the Invention Timeline, or see what's New.
Science Fiction
Timeline
1600-1899
1900-1939
1940's 1950's
1960's 1970's
1980's 1990's
2000's 2010's
Current News
FTC: Says Ring Employees Illegally Surveilled Customers
'Then she looked up with a smile and moved closer to the camera.'
Switzerland May Cap Population At Ten Million
'The population of Castle Hagedorn was fixed...'
Project Silica Offers 'Long-Term' Digital Storage
'... folios and tapes and playable discs of platinum alloy.'
Can 'Tactical Umbrellas' Shield One From Drones
'... another corner of his mind began to think about the shields.'
Crystalline Structures In Space, You Say?
A massive space borne lifeform from ST:TNG.
Garçon! A Menu For Artemis II, S'il Vous Plaît
'Michel Ardan, as a Frenchman, was declared chief cook, an important function, which raised no rival.'
Amazing Photonic Crystal Light Sail
'That sail will be twenty thousand miles at the wide part.'
Blue Collar AI Goes To Work To Mine Its Own Crypto
Blue collar bot.
Rogue AI Replicated Itself
'Sapiro’s computer just kept dialing at random, hanging up on humans, until it got a fellow computer of the same type as itself.'
HandelBot Helps Two-Handed Robots Learn Piano
'I request that you feed the correlation between those dots and the levers of the panel into my memory banks.'
Woven Fiber Electronic Skin For Robots
'... all the feel and appearance of human flesh and epidermis.'
When AI Takes Its First Breath
Any suggestions?
Chinese Aircar Light And Airy, Not For Blade Runners
Daytime version.
The Morphing Wheel And The Smartwheel
'If you surf over a bump, the spokes contract to roll over it.'
Transporting Antimatter
'...drawing plans for the magnetic tongs and bed plates and relays.'
Polish Turns Your Nail Into A Stylus
'He wrote on it, using the pointed fingernail of his right forefinger...'
