The future of 3-D Printing

[vinny]

We have just started using 3D printing for prototypes and see a future for it in low volume applications. While it will affect hi volume applications, I think those applications will remain with something more like our traditional manufacturing metheds.

Disruptive? Absolutely, but here to stay and it will explode like desk top computers in the 80s and 90s.

 

[Marc]

Doctors save baby?s life with 3D-printed tracheal implant

 

[AnaMariaVR2]

WORLD'S FIRST 3-D-PRINTED BULLETS JOIN A GROWING DIY ARSENAL
http://www.fastcompany.com/3010157/fast-feed/worlds-first-3-d-printed-bullets-join-a-growing-diy-arsenal

 

[Wes Bucey]

WORLD'S FIRST 3-D-PRINTED BULLETS JOIN A GROWING DIY ARSENAL
http://www.fastcompany.com/3010157/...-d-printed-bullets-join-a-growing-diy-arsenal

Close, but no cigar - just a plastic slug fired from an existing shotgun shell (including the explosive and primer to spark the powder)

personally, I prefer the stories about biological 3D printing - much greater ultimate benefit to humanity.

 

[Wes Bucey]

How about Standards for 3D Printing?

Since I'm on a watch list for 3D Printing articles, this hit my in box this afternoon:
Is AM [additive manufacturing] Ready for Standards?


http://www.deskeng.com/articles/aabjxx.htm

 

[lfrost]

Here is something that we all could "wait" for!

http://theweek.com/article/index/244481/why-nasa-is-funding-a-3d-pizza-printer

NASA's "Food Replicator!"

 

[AnaMariaVR2]

Technology can increase your cancer risk, and technology can cure your cancer...It saved Dick Cheney many of times, right?.

I also prefer when technology serves an ultimate altruistic purpose (i.e., used to satisfy unmet medical needs like bio-printing promises to do, over bullet printing) but knowing historical human nature, there have been plenty of examples of misuse or abuse with sad consequences.

Technology is neutral tool but everybody has their own take on how it should be used (for greater good or not). We create technology but during its creation process technology also shapes those that uses it...some will be inspired or driven to solve problems while others might abuse it for selfish reasons.

We also have a responsibility to use technology for good, & not for fraud/theft or using it to spread hatred. When a new technology appears it is hard to understand how its use is/will be affecting other areas of our lives and other people's lives. I am from the mindset that we should use every technological advantage in our hands for good, to solve problems, to offer new opportunities, for peaceful purposes... & not for ridiculous/superfluous reasons.

President Franklin Roosevelt said, "Great power involves great responsibility".

So now what do we do with every new technology?
Does comprehensive, professional regulatory oversight and ethical education needs to be put in place to prevent misuse every time?
Are we going to become paranoiac about new technologies every time?

Technology: blessing or a curse...the eternal dilemma

 

[ProDad]

Eventually it will be possible for a "3-D printer"--in the futurist literature, a replicator--to make a copy of itself.

And not long thereafter, it'll be possible for a replicator to make (almost) anything else of a physical/mechanical nature that fits within its working size limit.

I don't know whether that will be within my lifetime or not. The economic and social disruptions will be substantial.

That is actually what got the desktop 3D printer started: www.reprap.org

You've seen The Terminator, right? Skynet? Isn't this where it starts?

 

[Wes Bucey]

Additive manufacturing (3D printing) is making deeper and deeper inroads on traditional manufacturing. Metal powders are now being used to make products with properties equivalent to or greater that traditionally manufactured ones
http://www.deskeng.com/articles/aabmxc.htm