MakerBot Industries

Getting Started with MakerBot

Coming later this year from MAKE and O’Reilly Media, Inc., Bre and MakerBlock have teamed up on a new book: Getting Started with MakerBot.  Here’s just a little blurb to whet your appetite:

Get a hands-on introduction to the world of personal fabrication with the MakerBot, the easiest and most affordable rapid prototyper available. This book shows you how the MakerBot open source 3D printer democratizes manufacturing and brings the power of large factories right to your desktop. Not only will you learn how to operate MakerBot, you’ll also get guidelines on how to design and print almost anything you can imagine — including models, mechanical parts, puzzles, and toys.

What’s more, this book is coming out under a Creative Commons license, and you can read the text of the book as it’s being written,¹ through the magic of O’Reilly’s Open Feedback Publishing System.  The book is available right here.

1. No pressure, right? [↩]

Hey it’s Friday!  In light of that, we’ve whipped up another addition of Robot Hospital, which we hope you’ll enjoy.  We’ve got a new product announcement (new Nema 17 motors), a report from the Blip festival, where we’ll be demoing bots tonight and tomorrow, and the final installment of Matt’s squirrel modeling tutorial.

See that motor there?  That’s the heart of the MK6, the custom-made high-torque stepper that puts the “Step” in “Stepstruder.”

Well guess what — we are pleased to announce that we’ve finally got enough of them to offer MK6 Upgrade and MK6 Plus Complete kits once again!

So hop on over to the store and place your orders so you can experience the joys of high-reliability, finely controllable extrusion, as well as upgrades like 1.75mm filament and reversal.  Yay!

In this episode Keith takes us on an awesome tour of RobotFest 2011 at the National Electronics Museum, Ethan pushes the extreme limits of acrylic T-Slot construction, and Matt traps and traces a massive squirrel- Check it out!

Here’s a great field test report from MakerBot Operator Renosis!

This new heater core, the Mk6+ is awesome. The smaller size of the core and the thermal properties of aluminum, plus the heater cartridge and its placement make it heat up faster and allow for more control. I timed my old core (mk5/6) and it took 8 minutes and 9 seconds to reach 225 C from room temperature (25 C). The new core nearly halved the time, I go from 25C to 225 C in 4 minutes 15 seconds. I am also happy to report that my temperature is much more steady now with the mk6-plus. I only have a variance of 2 degrees when at extruding temperature. And this is running with default PID settings. I bet of a tweak the P I D…. I could get it to be even more stable! Great upgrade!

Thanks for the kind words!

The Stuff of Invention

Today we are launching the third round of our ABS and PLA plastics as they switch to being supplied on spools in Kilogram weights. The last of our classic colors and styles are now available in both 3mm and 1.75mm filament formats, and some previously unavailable formats are now up in the store! I am happy to report that our crowd-favorite UV reactive “Nuclear” green is now in our classic 3mm format, so Plastruder MK4, MK5, and MK6 3mm users rejoice! Also notable is PLA 4043D filament is now available in 3mm and 1.75mm formats- so hop to it if you want some of this great print stock.

Here’s the full selection of new plastic offerings!

Nuclear Green ABS 1kg Spool 3mm Filament

Blue ABS 1kg Spool 1.75mm Filament

Blue ABS 1kg Spool 3mm Filament

MakerBot PLA 4043D – 1kg spool -1.75mm

MakerBot PLA 4043D – 1kg spool -3mm

Yellow ABS 1kg Spool 3mm Filament

Fluorescent Red ABS 1kg Spool 3mm Filament

Red ABS 1kg Spool 3mm Filament

Check out our full variety of plastics in the MakerBot Store here!

The MakerBot Thing-O-Matic is our favorite thing. It makes us so happy to see them go out into the world and make things for you. It comes as a kit and you put it together and it makes you things! Why is it so awesome? Here is our top ten list!

#10. MakerBot Stepstruder MK6 toolhead

MakerBot Stepstruder MK6 Toolhead

The MakerBot Stepstruder™ MK6 is the latest and greatest in MakerBot extrusion technology — and is included standard in every Thing-O-Matic.

You have more control over printing than ever before –  print hollow and fast for prototyping, partially filled, or print solid for heavy-duty parts for usable mechanical prototypes.

And keep your eyes open for the incredible MK6 prints appearing on Thingiverse such as the grouping here and here!

#9. Ninja Customer Support Team

MakerBot Customer Support Team: Isaac, Ethan, Matt

Have questions before you buy? Puzzling over your build? Ready to take your prints to the next level? Ask us!

Our favorite model? The Ninja Fridge Shuriken.

#8. Kid tested, Operator Approved: Detailed, Step-By-Step Assembly Instructions

Putting together a user-assembled kit with as many moving parts as  MakerBot takes some patience. Thankfully, we have an actively-maintained wiki to guide you through the process. Have an additional question about the instructions? Fire a question off to support and we’ll add pictures and text to help you (and everybody) out!

#7. Completely Open Source, with Multiple Toolheads and Modular Design

MakerBot Unicorn Pen Plotter

MakerBots are Open Hardware products, with available source files and plenty of resources to extend, expand, and reinvent your bot any direction your dreams take you. Purchase a Unicorn Pen Plotter and Frostruder MK2 to sketch, etch, or even make food sculptures! And there are even more community-designed case mods and toolheads on Thingiverse.

#6. Epic Choice of Colors and Materials!

A few of our range of MakerBot ABS and PLA Plastics!

We’ve spent a lot of time working to find the best and coolest materials for printing your designs.  Check out our selection and let our research work for you. We release new materials and colors regularly!

#5. Heated Build Platform and Automated Build Platform options ship standard in kit

You decide — do you want a non-motorized Heated Build Platform for the ultimate in adhesion and ABS shrinkage prevention?  Or do you want to use your Thing-O-Matic as a high-volume desktop fabricator with the Automated Build Platform?  It’s all in the box.

#4. An Endless supply of objects to print from Thingiverse.com

Thingiverse.com

New to 3D printing? Check out Thingiverse to see what MakerBot Operators the world over are designing — then print their models yourself! Many modellers on Thingiverse are MakerBot owners, so their files are already set to print!

Already have designs? Put them up and get feedback and props from the community.

#3. Our MakerBot User Groups are fun

MakerBot User Group: Bioengineering Design & Prototype Studio, Arizona State University (Tempe, AZ)

User Groups as far away as New Zealand have been meeting up and bringing their MakerBots together.

#2. Print off SD card … and via the MakerBot Gen4 Interface Board Kit!

MakerBot Gen4 Interface Board Kit

Prep your models on your computer, copy them to an SD card, trigger your print, and then unplug your computer!

Have a Gen4 Interface Board? Scroll through print models on your SD card right from the sexy control interface hanging off the side of your bot. (No computer necessary!)

And the number one reason to love your Thing-O-Matic….

#1. Make Anything!

MakerBot Operator Schuyler Loves His Thing-O-Matic

Your imagination is the limit with this machine and there is no more satisfying experience than watching something you designed or downloaded materialize before your very eyes.

After months of intensive research and development, MakerBot Industries is proud to announce a newly realized capacity of the MakerBot Thing-O-Matic 3D Printer- the ability to print listenable vinyl records from the desktop.

“The process of transcribing an audio file into a vinyl record is so simple, anyone can do it.” Said Chief Audio Engineer Isaac Dietz. “Right now, I’m using the Automated Build Platform to rip my entire MP3 collection to individual records!”

“It’s an exciting innovation for MakerBot, as we all grew up listening to vinyl. We all wish that more records were available with the latest hits,” said Audio R&D Associate Marisol Murphy. “I can never get enough Justin Bieber or Rebecca Black until I listened to them on my turntable.”

The process utilizes the MakerBot 96khz AudioNozzle™ technology to print audio waveforms in real time. Using the MakerBot Generation 4 Electronics microstepping capacity, the AudioNozzle™ modulates the amount of plastic deposited to create a high-fidelity waveform. The results often surpass the dynamic range of 24-bit recordings and can contain frequencies up to 57khz — even higher than the Nyquist frequency for 96khz digital recording. You can even record directly to your 3D Printer by attaching a microphone to your computer, and singing into it.

Says Ethan Hartman, Vice President of Audio Operations: “MakerBot’s pioneering spirit has always hearkened back to early inventors like Thomas Edison. We are honored to be able to re-invent the audio record for the personal manufacturing space in the burgeoning 20-teens.”

Pre-orders for the 96khz AudioNozzle™ will be available shortly.

MakerBot 3D Printed Vinyl Records can be downloaded from Thingiverse here.

The MakerBot Gen 4 Interface Board Kit!

Today we are happy to announce a new product in the MakerBot Thing-O-Matic line, our new MakerBot Gen 4 Interface Board Kit v1.1! This is a fun DIY Interface that allows your to operate your Thing-O-Matic independently, without the use of a computer! So you can pop in your SD card into the Generation 4 Electronics, and regulate, operate, and print from your machine by this interface alone.

With the great set of programmable buttons and LCD interface, you can turn this hackable board into an control surface for almost anything as well! We are using it in-house here and are really pleased with the live feedback it provides during a build- monitor temperature, percent completion, and view files on the SD card are all available. Plus manual jog control of the stages, and extra assignable switches are available for new inventive uses.

It’s a fun soldering kit as well, and the complete through-hole construction makes the level of difficulty appropriate for even beginner kit-builders. This kit is open source, so you can use it to control anything you build, even your robots, or homebrew CNC device. Advanced users can match it with our Gen 4 electronics kit and use it to control any machine they can design with our electronics. It’s flexible, open, and provides programmable feedback depending on your application.

A Thing-O-Matic warming up in Monitor Mode

We are installing a group of these on the BotFarm™, so we can quickly fire up builds and monitor progress on multiple machines without needing computers attached. It truly turns the Thing-O-Matic into a standalone 3D Printer that just needs a power cord, and your files on SD card to operate. Awesome! The lasercut wood body includes tabs so the MakerBot Gen 4 Interface Board can hang nicely from the top or side of your Bot.

Check out the store page and buy the MakerBot Gen 4 Interface Board Kit v1.1 now!

Flattr w/Thingiverse, Readability, Demotix: Rewarding Creators and Crowdfunding

This coming Saturday morning at SXSW Interactive in Austin, Texas, MakerBot / Thingiverse Web Warrior Marty McGuire will take part in a panel discussing crowdfunding and micropayments in general, and Flattr in specific.¹

I’ve been enjoying the arrival of Flattr to Thingiverse,² and dream of the day in the not-to-distant future that services like these can help 3D modelers on Thingiverse located anywhere in the world both share their work globally with those who might use it, and receive a healthy influx of cash-love back from those benefitting from their efforts.

If you’re going to be at SXSW Interactive this Saturday at 11am, go check out the Flattr panel, cheer Marty on, and join in some lively discussion about living in the future!

1. This is actually the second time Marty has spoken on behalf of MakerBot / Thingiverse, but the last time was as a Citizen MakerBot Operator at MakerFaire Detroit. This time is for realsies! [↩]
2. A chance to tip folks one month, and then pour my Flattr revenue from the previous month back into tipping the next month’s folks! [↩]