DIY Wire Bender with 3D Printed Parts and Arduino Control

Project page with all the details:

https://howtomechatronics.com/projects/arduino-3d-wire-bending-machine/

I just like watching industrial CNC machines...

Small Industrial Grade Metal 3D Printing Factory

Major players in 3D printing are developing new miniature-factory manufacturing cells. Consider them as precursor to Star Trek industrial replicators. They can operate almost without human workers and create very valuable high-tech products. This will be a major shift in decentralized manufacturing and have a huge economic impact.

OpenSCAD Tips and Tricks by Benjamin Engel

Benjamin Engel created this great OpenSCAD tutorial where you will learn few useful tips and tricks.

MIT Software for Drone Design

MITCSAIL developed an interactive system for computational design, optimization, and fabrication of multicopters. The computational approach allows non-experts to design, explore, and evaluate a wide range of different multicopters




Project paper in PDF: http://cfg.mit.edu/sites/cfg.mit.edu/files/copter.pdf

Hopefully this software will be open sourced one day. I could not find it online.

Useful DIY 3D Printed Tools for your Workshop

Marius Hornberger is a master woodworker who made a video showing how he uses many 3d printed tools in his workshop. Cool stuff,




His Thingiverse page with all of the files: https://www.thingiverse.com/MariusHornberger/designs

DZL's DIY 3D Digitizer

DZL created this DIY 3D digitizer and published code and instructions how to build it.

Project blog page: http://blog.dzl.dk/2018/08/21/3d-digitizer/

Project GitHub: https://github.com/dzlonline/3D_digitizer2

Lost PLA Aluminum Casting Based on 3D Printed Pattern

YouTuber "myfordboy" posted a video of the entire lost PLA aluminum casting process. Very educational. Stay safe kids!

DIY 3D Printable Axial Flux Stepper Motor

Proto G Engineering designed a partially 3D printable axial flux stepper motor.




Instructables page with detailed guides:

https://www.instructables.com/id/3D-Printed-Stepper-Motor-V11/

Low Cost DIY Smart Glasses Based on Arduino

YouTuber DdelectroTech.com made this sub-10 USD DIY smart glasses based on Arduino. Cool cheap project!

Cytosurge 3D Printed Impossible Objects on Microscopic Scales

Company news release with more details:

https://www.cytosurge.com/page/press-release-impossible-objects-made-possible

Two useful DIY tools: 3D printable cordless screwdriver and small disc sander

Cordless 3D Printed Screwdriver

Project page: https://hackaday.io/project/162497-3d-printed-opensource-tools

Files are on Thingiverse: https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:3243862


Mini disc sander made from MDF on laser cutter 

Thingivers files:  https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:3191552

How to design 3d printable parts that don't need supports

Angus from Maker's Muse YouTube channel has created another great tutotrial on how to design parts that don't need supports.

NERA 3D Printed Electrical Motorcycle

Project description:

BigRep's NOWlab built an electric motorcycle that, excluding the electrical components, consists purely of 3D printed parts. The e-bike, NERA, was designed by Marco Mattia Cristofori and Maximilian Sedlak and NOWlab's co-founder, Daniel Büning, directed the project. As Mashable has previously reported, NERA is not for sale, but it is a use case that highlights what can be achieved using BigRep's large-scale 3D printers and demonstrates the current state-of-the-art in additive manufacturing.

CAD Tips and Tricks for Better 3D Printed Holes

Angus from Maker's Muse shows how to design holes that are easier to print.

Replace broken optical drive with RasPi on 3D printable tray

Ollie242 replaced an broken old ThinkPad optical drive with 3D printable tray holding a RasPi. It connectes to the notebook with internal wiring.

Detailed build guide: https://www.instructables.com/id/Re-purpose-Optical-Drive-With-RPi/

DIY 3D Printable Hand Cranked Emergency Powerbank

Another great and useful project by GreatScott! who made DIY 3D printable emergency powerbank.

OWind 3D Printable DIY Wind Generator

This wind generator uses a new design that can use wind from any direction and still move the generator in a single axis. Very suitable for urban power generation.




More info: https://hackaday.com/2018/11/22/tumbleweed-turbine-wins-dyson-foundation-award/

CLS Architetti 3D Print a House in One Week

More info: https://www.dezeen.com/2018/11/19/video-mini-living-3d-printing-cls-architetti-arup-movie/

Some very cool industrial robots and machinery!

How to cut 6mm plywood with your DIY 3D printer

Tech2C is cutting 6mm Plywood, to make a motor bracket,  with a Dremel style rotary tool attached to his HyperCube 3D Printer. It's a powerfull little mill that can be done on most DIY printers.

DIY PCB Milling on HyperCube 3D Printer

Using your 3D printer as small CNC mill for making PCB is a great extension for your machine. This video by Tech2C will show you how to use the HyperCube DIY 3D printer to make electronic boards with DIY mill attachment.

Tutorial on how to hide secrets inside .stl files by Angus

Angus from Maker's Muse shows how to hide a printable geometry or entire objects inside a .stl file.

When you need an extra pair of hands ...

Source:

https://www.youbionic.com/

Complex 3D Printed 5 Axis Rack System

Source: Henry Segerman

NASA 3D Printed Mars Habitat Competition Projects

NASA announced the projects to enter the third phase of their 3D printed Mars habitat competition. Here you can see some amazing technological concepts. Hopefully I'll see some of them being used on Mars sometime in the future.

Team Zopherus

AI SpaceFactory MARSHA

Kahn-Yates Construction

SEArch+/Apis Cor

Northwestern University

NASA page with more details:

https://www.nasa.gov/directorates/spacetech/centennial_challenges/3DPHab/five-teams-win-a-share-of-100000-in-virtual-modeling-stage

Dexter High Precision DIY Robot

Dexter is a high precision 3d printable robot that can be trained by the human operator.

Hackaday summary video:




Detailed videos showcasing the robot's features:




Hackaday project homepage:

https://hackaday.io/project/158779-dexter


Project description:

Dexter is an open source, 5+ axis robotic arm. It is built from 3D printed parts and held together with carbon fiber strakes for reinforcement. Dexter uses five NEMA-17 stepper motors with three harmonic drives in conjunction with optical encoders to get extreme precision, with a 2.5 micron stepping distance and 50 micron repeatablity. 

Dexter is also trainable, meaning that you can manually control it and have playback of the exact path it took. This makes it easily programmable for applications.

Dexter can also be controlled with our software, Dexter Development Environment (DDE). DDE utilizes a modified version of JavaScript that allows for a more traditional approach to programming while still being friendly to those who are newer to code. It also contains a simulator that will show playback of Dexter's movements using a pane in the development environment.

Dexter even has a Unity library that one of the members of the Dexter community put together, complete with haptic feedback. This could potentially be used for video games or even real world applications where a Dexter must be remotely controlled

Ivan takes his 3D printed tank for a ride

It's not a full sized tank, but still a great project :-)





Ivan has a great YT channel and documents his project build process in detailed way:

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCF3cDM_hQMtIEJvEW1BZugg

Cytosurge Improve their FluidFM µ3Dprinter with Pinpoint Accuracy Tech

I wrote about Cytosurge technology before. They developed a 3D printer that can print metal on the micro-scale. A true technological wonder. Just imagine small robots floating in your bloodstream to repair your body or extremely complex and fine electronic parts like micro-antenna arrays. Star Trek stuff. This is a technology that makes a large step towards that future. 
The company has now improved their machine with ability to print directly and precisely on complex surfaces like existing electronic component boards or microchips. 

Tech description:

The new pinpoint metal additive manufacturing process is made possible by two high resolution state-of-the-art cameras integrated into the FluidFM µ3Dprinter. The cameras enable automated loading of the print tips (FluidFM iontips), printer setup, calibration and computer-assisted alignment to print on already existing structures as well as the visualization of the finished structures. The bottom view camera is mainly used for internal system processes, like controlling the automated gripping of the FluidFM iontip. The top view camera images the object or surface to print on. With the high-resolution live video, the exact position of the object or surface to be printed on can be manually chosen and set as starting point for the printing process.

This procedure allows the user to print metallic objects on contact pads that are pre-defined on the surface of an integrated circuit, on micro-electromechanical-systems (MEMS) or on other components.

This unique capability of the FluidFM μ3Dprinter to add 3D printed structures directly onto existing objects or surfaces with pinpoint accuracy opens the door to a new world of additive manufacturing of complex metal objects.

You can learn more about this amazing tech at: http://cytosurge.com/

LBRY 3D Printing and Design Contest - Win some Cryptocurrency!

I wrote about LBRY before as a great possibility to decentralize your DIY projects and keep them out of corporate controlled platforms. Here is one example of archery project uploaded by Juleah.

LBRY just announced a small 3D printing and 3D design contest with cryptocurrency rewards. Here is the summary:

Design a chess set that sparks our imagination & win $100 in cryptocurrency. Upload your chess set design (use a zip folder for multiple files) in either STL or OBJ format to the LBRY (library) network. Once finished, email the lbry:// address (automatically receive 10 Library Credits for your first upload) to james@lbry.io by July 4th.

You can win 100 USD for the first place and 50 USD for the second place paid in LBC cryptocurrency. 

Here is the link to the full post with detailed contest rules: https://lbry.io/3d-contest

Good luck!

LulzBot Cluster 3D Printer Manufacturing Farm

Lulzbot presents their Lulzbot Cluster for manufacturing of 3d printed parts. It's an interesting video that shows the technology and how it evolved and scaled up.

New versions of GCodePrintr and GCodeSimulator Just Released!

3dprintapps.de just released a new version of their 3D printing apps GCodePrintr and GCodeSimulator.

Version v3.0 comes with many improvements and several new features, which will help to maximize the capabilities of your 3D printer.
GCodeSimulator App is the free sibling of the paid GCodePrintr App. Both together have been downloaded from Google Play more than 50000 times and are actively used by more than 6000 users.

The new version is available on Google Play now (staged rollout just started).
GCodePrintr on Google Play: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=de.dietzm.gcodesimulatorprinter
GCodeSimulator on Google Play: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=de.dietzm.gcodesimulator

Most important changes:

v3.0 comes with dual extruder support!

• Dropdown list to quickly select an extruder
• Show temperature for each extruder
• 3D view colored by extruder
• Calculate extrusion by extruder
• and more

GCodePrintr v3.0 comes with several improvements to the UI interface:

• Customizable button to quickly access your favorite macro.
• Dialog to enter customer step size for manual movements
• Dialog to control Fan speed (long press on Fan button)
•  New status dislog to see status of printer connection, web interface, network receiver...

The web interfaces design has been refreshed and is now using a responsive web design. Additional functions added:

• upload gcode through the web interface and start a print remotely.
• use the build-in camera to show a picture of the print
• manual axis movement and homing  
• and more   

Extend the list of supported 3D printers and printer electronics:

• New printers added to supported list (e.g. Tevo Tornado)
• Better print time estimation by taking M201 acceleration into account
• Add fallback for unsupported USB devices (e.g. unknown VendorID)
• Send line numbers and checksum to the printer  
• Gbrl improvements

Many usability improvements (e.g. new help dialogs) to simplify the 1st time use of the App.

See http://3dprintapps.de/version30.html for a full list of changes.