MakerBot Industries

We’ve been big fans of Inventables for a while. They basically aggregate a ton of really cool, cutting edge materials and technologies. They simplify it without dumbing it down, and make it easy to see what is available in a straight-forward way. It is refreshing to see a service like this designed for inventors. Well, it just got better. They just relaunched their site, and now you can actually purchase the items they write about instead of just reading (and drooling) over them.

Oh, and you can even embed the item in your own site, which is pretty cool:

Who needs a dual head extruder anyhow?

This 2 color MakerBot Coin by wulfdesign may be the first thing uploaded to Thingiverse that is designed to be printed in two colors.  I am, of course, excepting the various chess sets.

I like the multi-part snap-together assembly and the contrast between the colors Wulfdesign used.  I think it really shows how multiple colors of plastics can be used effectively with minimal finishing and would make a great example of what you can do with a 3D printer.  Plus, I like the idea that you could have two ‘bots churning out parts – one set in black, one set in white – ready to be assembled.

You can see just how dirty the MakerBots got at Maker Faire from this photo of the top of Adam’s machine. The clean square there is the outline of a MakerBot sticker he had placed there.

Despite the dust and grime, the MakerBots kept printing away for two straight days. It was amazing to go down the line of ‘Bots and see MakerBot after MakerBot after MakerBot printing and printing and printing.

This wasn’t the first time that MakerBots survived – and kept printing – in extreme environments. Last year some MakerBots underwent impromptu environmental testing in the deserts of eastern Washington state, where the hacker’s convention Toorcamp was held.

Yep. MakerBots = desert proof. Of course, after a good dusting it’s probably a good idea to clean and lubricate your MakerBot’s metal bits (proper MakerBot maintenance is always a good idea). Technically, they are not really desert proof, but last weekend at Maker Faire we definitely saw the MakerBot Botfarm take some dirt, and keep printing through the dust.

Did you ever print something on your MakerBot and love it so much that you wanted to cast it in bronze?

That’s exactly what Livejournal user and designer jarkman did recently.

Lost-wax casting is a 5,000 year-old process. Back in the day, it was used used to turn hand-made sculptures into permanent bronze or brass pieces. It gets its name from the part of the process where a hollow wax cast is burned out from a fire-proof mold, or “lost” during the casting.

In this case, jarkman printed his design with the standard MakerBot ABS plastic, instead of shaping it from wax. The plastic seemed to burn out just fine. Check out this step-by-step picture gallery to see how to transform your latest MakerBot print into metal!

What would you cast in bronze from your MakerBot? Tell us in the comments below!

An automated build platform so cool, it makes me want to misspell the word fierce

Chooch has been hard at work on another printable automated build platform.  What I like about this version over his prior, is that it incorporates a few design changes that give it a lower profile to preserve Z axis printing space, slightly more width by switching the nozzle brush to the other size, and, of course it is printable.  Oh, did I forget it mention it has teeth too? ¹

This is a great addition to the long list of printable upgrades MakerBot owners can use to improve their ‘bots.

Not to sound ungrateful or anything, but Chooch, where’s my Pfierce Z-axis extender kit???

1. I kinda wish we could figure out a way to actually use those teeth in normal operation. [↩]