What Is A “Real Manufactured Good”, Anyway?
Need everyone’s input on this. Someone just posted a comment on a BusinessWeek feature on MakerBot and our CEO Bre Pettis.
I Like Bre…Great Charisma and energy. I wish him well. I think his printers will be successful but ultimately real manufactured goods will still be made with industrial 3D printers. I believe that his equipment is perfect as an educational piece, hobbyists or even classrooms.
Is this true? This sounds like the commenter is taking for granted that manufacturing will never change, as if it’s always been the same. We make MakerBots so that people can make the things they want and need, not just one copy of something that was made a million times. The way things are done now satisfies the broadest base of customers.
What does it mean to say something is a “real manufactured good”? Does that mean that something you make for yourself can’t be just as good as something that was made for you? We totally disagree.
By the way, the article in BusinessWeek today is great. And in case you’re wondering, you can now scan yourself in a number of ways that don’t involve cornstarch! But the cornstarch method is still fun. 4Chan founder Moot and new media guru/Internet philosopher Clay Shirky were into it! Watch the video of their scans below.
| Tagged with | 3d printing, 3D scanners, 3d scanning, additive manufacturing, businessweek, digital fabrication, fdm, makerbot in the news, personal fabrication, personal manufacturing | 6 comments |
6 Comments so far
martin
I think that a part that is made on a makerbot is just as valid a manufactured good as a part made any other way. The point where home making hits a wall for me is when you want to make something more complex that requires many parts made by different methods in different materials. The average consumer who isn’t a hobbyist will want to push a button and print a finished object without any additional making or finishing work required.
As an aside I work for a ‘real manufacturer’ in design and development. For me the most exciting potential of the makerbot is to bring printing costs and plastic parts down to really low prices for manufacturers without having to spend £X0 000′s on industrial printers. When we can combine makerbot printed parts with laser cut steel and bent tubes to make flexible designs at low cost we will be able to let our imaginations run wild in a way the average consumer won’t.
Brian
The easiest way to respond to this is look at where ‘hobbyist’ desktop computing vs corporate mainframe computers was in the 1960′s and 1970′s. Same arguments, “Too complicated for home users”, “Need lots of specialized personnel to maintain the machine”, “Desktop computers are just toys.” Then the killer app came out of Visicalc, my Dad had an Apple II with Visicalc and that’s what got me into computing.
Now take a look at where computing has come. Lot’s of businesses have started and grown with someone starting with a desktop computer. The company I work at right now was started by an accountant who learned how to program on a desktop computer. Now we have companies like Facebook that took an idea that started on a desktop and have grown from that seed.
So I think the best way to respond to this article is discover or create the killer app for 3D printers. The one thing that everyone will want because of what it can do. For me personally the fact that I can create little hooks and connectors that allow me to fix something without going to a hardware store, or throwing out the entire product is value enough. It’s only going to go up from there.
Andrew
Really nice input from both of you, thanks. @martin, I want to be clear that we have the utmost respect for engineers and designers who work on your end of things. Many of you are our customers and are discovering the applications of technology like ours. I am thinking you have some pretty cool partially-MakerBotted projects up your sleeve.
@Brian, yes. And I think we’re finding that the killer app is different to different people. Stay tuned for the story of a foot and ankle surgeon who just published a paper about why a MakerBot could help save hospitals several thousand dollars on a single surgery.
Pete Prodoehl
Changes scares some people, the future is what we make it, so let’s get with the making already!
cf
I think Martin had some really good points. Although a makerbot may be fine for producing some widgets that really are nothing but plastic (I have made disposable high-heel protectors, for instance), most products people buy have multiple materials, electronics, labels, etc. You could use a makerbot for part of that process, but likely not the whole thing.
In the context of the article, when it comes to printing ‘real objects’ with a more expensive 3D printer, I think it mostly comes down to materials and surface finish. I think the MBI Replicator is actually pretty competitive (especially on a $$-basis) with any other FDM machine out there, even expensive Objet machines, in terms of quality. Things like SLS machines can produce things out of metal that can take severe mechanical stresses, and other powder+binder style machines can do better surface finishes, full-color, etc.
As Martin mentioned, Makerbotted parts will likely find there way into small-batch manufactured parts, since they don’t require any expensive tooling and can realistically be produced in modest volumes.
M. Makosiewicz
Aside from the computer analogy one of my favfurite is the wood analogy, which helps to realize how we attibute value to materials and objects in our lifes. The question is how can we adore super smooth uniform materials and wood which has knots and can give you splinters the same time?
I think that one of the answers can be the origin of the material. Wood is organic, therefore its feel is different from “industrial” materials. And since wood gives you this benefit, you no longer care about its “imperfections”. You experience these objects a whole different way.
So what is similar in the above case is the smoothness of plastic objects from Chineese factories and non-smoothness of objects from FDM 3d printers. Why should we care if the FDM objects aren’t so super smooth as long as they are functional and serve our needs? FDM objects have other values that can dim their “imperfections”, but we are just accustomed to a certain kind of aesthetic with plastic objects. I think that anybody who designed or downloaded an object and then 3D printed in desired color and size (moreover: customized it) on personal 3D printer experienced the magic of 3D printing and looks at these objects in a whole different way. At least I observed this fascination phenomenon in casess of all the people which I have shown a 3D printer and a printed object live
Soon the number of people who experienced the personal production of FDM objects will get larger and the aesthetics understood and popularized. Then, I presume, the FDM objects, can be the new wood if you get my point
Especially if it comes to PLA 
And as for ABS, maybe not organic, but eco-friendly, if you recycle your plastic with a Filabot for example 
Cheers!