Building a machine for less than $500 calls for simplifying it down as much as possible, which he said would make it impossible for a desktop machine to put out detailed prints.
Friday, November 07, 2014
HP doesn’t think it’s possible to build a high-quality 3D printer for the desktop
Building a machine for less than $500 calls for simplifying it down as much as possible, which he said would make it impossible for a desktop machine to put out detailed prints.
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It is interesting that no one seems to be able to make a 3D printer that is high enough quality to please the consumer, but also cheap enough to market efficiently. At this rate, it seems that 3D printing will never be a regular household item, but rather saved only for the commercial industry. Hopefully one day this technology can be produced for a small enough price that anyone can try their hand at 3D printing.
Trying to make desktop CNC machines seems to be a pretty universal goal. Someone came to the shop not too long ago with a potable laser cutter. The point was that it should be moved to different spaces or places in a projects, or flip up 90 degrees and work vertically if the user so desired. The size and portability was nice but we seriously doubted how accurate and precise it really was. For a 3D printer it is important that the resolution be as precise as possible because if someone is using it for prototyping then that person needs an accurate portrayal of what they drafted because if the person gets a wrong idea from a prototype then they could be wasting a lot of time and money, potentially. The same thing could happen if people use 3D printing to make final parts. 3D printing things takes so much time as it is, reprinting can be a waste of resources.
Well this article answers my question about whether or not HP would be releasing a consumer-grade printer in exactly the way I expected, with the answer being no. I think this is too bad but I do understand where HP is coming from in the decision. Making a cheap printer that doesn't work is just as bad as not making one at all. What is more interesting is the clarification of how their printer will work. While I don't exactly understand what some of it means, the ability to make the print head as large as they want is what really interests me. Could they build a giant one and print parts that are feet long instead of inches long? What is disappointing is that the first model will only print in black. If they really aren't releasing them to the market for another 2 years why can't they make that technology available at launch. It just doesn't really make any sense to me. The possibility of specifying properties such as texture, friction, strength, and elasticity is the most interesting possibility. This could lead to some really cool new products. The problem is that this technology will only be able to businesses so the makers, who could probably do the most with this technology, won't be able to get their hands on it. I'll be interested in seeing how this product keeps progressing.
I haven't heard the part about customizing texture and friction yet. That definitely seems like it would be a huge advantage for HP if they nailed this system before any other company could get to it. When it comes to declaring what texture should be printed where I would think that if the object to be printed were composed of multiple sections and then HP just made a pre printing program where the user dictates which section get which material. However, with all of the other features (color printing) that HP is offering, I don't think the quality is really going to matter. This is definitely going to be a more consumer based product for the typical home rather than for precision printing.
HP kind of hit the nail on the head. 3D printers and other CNC machines are simply not going to come to consumers in a manner that is both of high quality and relatively low cost. There are just too many components and the quality control has to be too tight in order for the price to come down enough for average consumers to consider buying them. Although I guess in the light of Home Depot selling 3D printers, I presume many people disagree with me.
Moving on to the HP release in particular, there seems to be some pretty cool innovations that they are talking about. True CMYK 3D printing would be pretty darn awesome, as I don't believe there are any cool mixing printers on the market currently. The printing process also sounds fairly unique, so I look forward to seeing the advantages of this new process. I am excited for HP's development in this market area.
Seems to me that it makes sense, that there is not such that as a desktop 3-d printer. In the some note though, what is high quality. Monster cable sells "high quality" sound cable but a hanger works just as well, according to the green page about a year ago. So define high quality and then define a desktop printer.
What precision is high quality? How fast? Microns? Resolution? Color? Multiple materials? What is it?
Or what is professional grade? So many defining terms these days for equipment and not really sure what it means.
Either way sounds like Hp does not want to compete with Makerbot or hobbiest printers. Which is fine if you just want to make machines for factories and industry.
Can it just print faster?
I believe that HP is onto something in this article. 3D printing, while developing rapidly, is still a new technology. The disadvantage of this is that people are more eager than ever to get their hands on new gadgets. They are used to everything they hear about being available, at least in some capacity, to them. The idea of their not being a simplified home version of something is dying. And this is unfortunate, because if you're going to 3D print, you're going to want to 3D print right. We are just not at a place yet where we can 3D print right at a cost that is affordable to the average individual consumer. That's not to say that we will never get there, but, for now, your typical suburban mom probably won't be printing lego blocks for her kids. And maybe that's for the best, until there is an easy to use way to market this to a variety of different types of households.
It's definitely cool looking at how all of this works and I totally understand not being able to make a consumer version. However, I think it is inaccurate to say it won't be possible. Consumer grade versions of all sorts of commercial grade equipment is possible in my opinion, it just takes time to develop if there is a demand. So, I wouldn't say it's not possible to develop one, it will just take a while. I mean no one ever thought there would be potable computers or smartphones either.
I'm a little disappointed in HP for the quote, as it really isn't true. Just because they haven't figured out how to do it, doesn't make it impossible. Look how far Makerbot has come in just the last 5 years, with that amount of improvement I find it impossible to believe that we aren't within range of a well priced, good quality 3D printer. HP's printer looks like it has some nice features, and will be great for the commercial 3D printing industry, us consumers will have to wait a bit longer, but it will happen.
I’m sure that HPs device is very precise and fast and reliable, I just don’t know that it’s very useful. Or at least, not any more useful than a less expensive 3D printer.
The article indicates that the HP printer is designed for enterprise to go above just prototyping, but to print final parts. I guess I just don’t think there’s a very big market for custom final parts that have such high precision, but are also just made of plastic.
Personally, anything that I would want to print that required more than .050” precisions (which is the typically resolution of a upper-medium quality 3D printing system (like what we have in the School of Drama), would also require strength and reliability beyond that of the current technology of 3D printers. I suppose a material analysis of HP’s design and material might prove that it is just as strong, but I guess I don’t think the world is ready for high end, high precision, plastic, final parts.
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