Tag: MakerBot

Printing a MakerBot

I’ve already pontificated on the idea that if you’ve purchased a MakerBot Cupcake CNC Deluxe kit, you basically get a second MakerBot for half off.  (Spoiler: it’s because you can print a ton of the most expensive parts that go into building a new one).  I don’t know why, but the idea of replacing wooden parts on my ‘bot with printed parts just fascinates me. 1

So, let’s have a list of potentially (and actually!) printable parts:

  • Electronics spacers
  • 3 large pulleys, 1 small pulley
  • Y stage, the entire thing, as a single print
  • X stage, in three large prints (there would be no need for the end caps if the three pieces were designed properly)
  • Insulating retainer ring
  • Printruder
  • Dinos
  • X stage end caps
  • Z stage captive nut guides
  • Z axis rod bearing brackets

Having more printed components for the MakerBot would reduce a lot of work in it’s assembly.  There’s a lot of tiny fiddly bits in the X and Y stages that would become obsolete.

Heck, it might even be possible to replace some of the bolts with some kind of printable fastener system.

  1. Cue Johnny Cash singin’ One Piece At A Time [↩]

My own plastic gnome

…or Minimum Wage Rights for Robots!

MakerBot posted a screenshot of a RepRap Printed Mendel Parts auction that sold for 420 pounds – roughly $630.84. 1  2  Others have been posting RepRap Mendel auctions as well.  One just sold for roughly $453, another for about $270, with two more auctions around $450 each with at least 3 more hours to go.

Using Spacexula’s Mendel production files, 24 STL sheets of parts, averaging 2-3 hours a print, we’re talking roughly 60 MakerBot print hours. 3  Assuming I only have the patience to print up one STL sheet a weekday and two sheets on the weekends, starting on a sunny Sunday like today, I could finish in 19 days.

Assuming very little human intervention, $600 for 60 hours of MakerBot operation is a pretty good deal.  It’s like having a fussy gnome who eats electricity and plastic living in your home and earning just above minimum wage for you. 4

  1. According to Google and at the time of this post. [↩]
  2. I couldn’t find a link to the actual auction at first, but then figured it must be a private auction.  It turns out this was the RepRap eBay auction posted by Adrian Bowyer a little while ago.  You might need to be logged into eBay to visit that link. [↩]
  3. This assumes no failed prints. [↩]
  4. You know, like those shoe gnomes that made shoes for the cobbler in that children’s fairy tale. [↩]

Making passion

ManDrake responded to my last post about MakerBot being a victim of their own success:

Do you think the expectations difference could be at all connected to Bre’s constant overselling of the product to anyone that will listen? He’s completely disconnected from reality in the way he talks about the Makerbot and what it can do. He’s got the look and feel of the sham dot com boom types, overselling in hopes of getting some bigger company to buy them up, so they could unload their utter mismanaged and badly organized start up. In probably under an year they’ll sell out and then a corporate entity will realize their mistake and kill the product like they did as the boom died.

Here’s my response:

  1. I’m biased.  I think MakerBot have a great product that really delivers.  Thus, I don’t think Bre or MakerBot are overselling anything.
  2. There’s no way to really address ManDrake’s concern about how he feels about MakerBot’s public persona.
  3. Having never seen their books, I can’t say whether they’re mismanaged – but I doubt it.  They’ve grown a lot in a year and hopefully will continue to grow.
  4. I sincerely doubt their plan is to hype themselves, get acquired, and cash out.  There are just so many easier ways to make money.
  5. Even supposing they’re acquired and the new company kills the MakerBot, I’m not left in the cold.  Building my MakerBot has taught me how to build MakerBots.  I can go out and build another one or repair my own.  There are plenty of people selling plastic.  From the day my MakerBot started working I was never going to be without my very own 3D printer ever again.

This may sound unrelated, but bear with me.  Tonight I had the good fortune to hear Dr. Zahi Hawass speak in San Francisco.  If you’ve ever seen an exhibit, TV show or documentary about Egypt, the pyramids, mummies, or King Tut you’ve seen him and heard his enthusiasm.  He gave a piece of advice at the end of his talk:

“If you like something, it is not enough.  If you love something, it is not enough.  Only if you are passionate about it will you make it big.”

When I see Bre and Zach and Adam talk I see people who are truly passionate about their goals.  This is the kind of passion scammers imitate and others wish they had.  Their passion is infused in their products and absolutely infectious.

Victims of Success?

Devlin posted a comment in response to my last post which really deserves it’s own space:

Thank you! I share your sentiments. However, one would argue that we already have our MakerBots and have some kind of bias. I got mine about a month after I ordered and I was pretty excited the whole time I was waiting but I knew it was worth the wait.
MakerBot is starting to get hurt by its own popularity. It seems the userbase is getting more mainstream and there will be people that will be expecting this $750 machine to print the same stuff as a $30,000 printer, will want it to print things right out of the box with one click of the mouse and not contribute to making the machine better.
People that buy a MakerBot must understand that it is still in its infancy. To compare it to a previous revolution: the MakerBot 3D printer is at the same stage as personal computers when they were only available as a kit, programs had to be keyed in on 16 key pad and were displayed on seven-segment displays. If people can not deal with the problems this might entail, then they should wait the PC’s ten years for their own IBM PC/Apple/Atari/Commodore to come out or for someone to build the parts needed to make a RepRap for them (something I need to work on myself).
MakerBots are not a product that you go out to BestBuy and get because you saw it in some magazine or blog. It is a product that you buy to build and modify to make stuff. It is closer to a fruiting potted plant than a printer you buy at BestBuy. It requires tending, understanding and maybe even love.

There’s a lot to think about here.  Let’s take Devlin’s points in turn:

  1. I may be biased since I’ve already got my MakerBot.  I ordered my MakerBot on November 23, 2009, it was expected to ship about December 3, 2009, shipment was delayed until December 11, 2009, and I didn’t receive it until December 15, 2009.  Now, I chose to pre-order a MakerBot. Had I pulled the trigger a few weeks earlier I could have picked up one of the last kits from Batch 8.  Like me you probably waited to buy a MakerBot.  I was so excited about getting my MakerBot that I started this website, started designing things to print, and started stocking up on the materials I needed to build it.
  2. MakerBot is getting hurt by their popularity. More mainstream people probably are interested in picking up a MakerBot.  However, I don’t think anyone’s hopes are too high.  They may want a MakerBot, but there’s no escaping that the only way to get one is to get a kit and put it together yourself.
  3. MakerBots are not commercial yet. Not, not yet.  Then again, this MakerBot Industries’ end game – distributed manufacturing and a 3D printer on every kitchen table.  We’re not yet to the plug-n-play – USB port recognizing, “New device connected – 3D fabricator!”  In fact, the software is probably still some of the most frustrating part of using a MakerBot.  Skeinforge is a harsh mistress.  However, since everything is open source every one of us is just one alcohol, nicotine,  and caffeine intoxicated hacker away from this reality.

Winning for losing

The poor guys over at MakerBot just can’t win for losing.

People just begged for pre-orders.  Now people are upset they have to wait because of pre-orders!  Without pre-orders everyone would be guaranteed a longer wait time.

  • When you place a pre-order you get a place in line.  Otherwise you just have to be the fastest clicker when they post the new kits.
  • When you place a pre-order they can use those funds to get your parts, get parts for the next batch (while they work on yours), or, heaven forbid, eat.
  • When they get to use your funds to get parts for the next batch, that means they used the funds from the prior batch to get your parts.  This means your wait time was shorter because of pre-orders!

If you pre-order a MakerBot it may feel like you’re waiting a long time for your kit – but waiting on a pre-order is so much better than waiting for a sold out product to be placed back in stock.  In the meantime, there are so many ways to get ready, participate, and contribute.

Seriously, get started right now!  There’s not a moment to lose!

Upload right now!!!

Do you have an idea for a printable object that’s been kicking around in your head?  Perhaps you even designed a digital object and you’re patiently1 waiting for your MakerBot to arrive.  Sure, it might be untested or even unprintable.  I discovered that no matter how obscure one of my designs might be someone else is going to be interested in it.  Someone is going to print it, improve it, or give you some feedback.

So, upload the design files and see what happens!

  1. or impatiently [↩]

Dremel Flex-Shaft Mount

I don’t own a dremel1 but I particularly like Andrew Plumb / Clothbot‘s Dremel Flex-Shaft Mount for the MakerBot.  This thing will turn your MakerBot into a mini-drill press or mini-CNC mill.  But that’s not the reason I like it.

I like this thing because the design is totally functional and completely nuts.  It’s just not the kind of thing you’d ever find in a store.  And yet you can just whip one up in about half an hour with a MakerBot.  Amazing.

  1. Yet [↩]

Like little lambs

I just assumed I would have no followers on Twitter except those interested in my particular MakerBot.  But then I see people with HUGE numbers of followers/followees who are following me.

Thus, I ask these non-rhetorical questions: Do some people on Twitter follow you for the purpose of getting more followers in return?  How could anyone with monitor more than a few dozen friends without giving up their day job?