Will the 3d printer ever be a household product?

I've always thought that it will given the revolutionary tech, but after seeing the printer's limitations (etc: quality, speed, material, build size)
I dont see how this can be a household product.

Even being a fan of printers like reprap, it seems more like a hobby rather than any practical use.

What are your thoughts on this? Do you think those limitations can be solved in the next 2-3 years?

When people were first buying dot matrix printers they were more interested in their new ability to print rather than the quality, speed and size.

The key limitation I see is the complexity of operation.

Andy

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 08/28/2012 07:05PM by ajayre.

"Household"? probably not within our lifetimes. At least not within the 30 years or so I have left.

Household Shop Tool? most definitely, imo, although your timetable may be a bit premature, for two basic reasons:

1. Technical issues - the list is too long to to post, but aside from auto-calibration, durability, precision, repeatability, etc, there's toxicity.

2. Cost - presently, it's far too costly for most consumers, both in terms of the initial tool investment and in terms of the raw material required for printing. In fact, it's even far too costly for most hobbyists.

edit: please take my comments for what they are, not a condemnation but an opinion regarding practical issues. I'd rather not have to parry anyone's flaming rebukes for providing an OPINION.

Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 08/28/2012 07:24PM by xiando.

Here are some quotes from the past that were dead wrong.


"There is no reason anyone would want a computer in their home."


-- Ken Olson, president, chairman and founder of Digital Equipment Corp. (DEC), maker of big business mainframe computers, arguing against the PC, 1977

"We don't like their sound, and guitar music is on the way out anyway."


-- President of Decca Records, rejecting The Beatles after an audition, 1962
"If excessive smoking actually plays a role in the production of lung cancer, it seems to be a minor one."


-- W.C. Heuper, National Cancer Institute, 1954
"Television won't last because people will soon get tired of staring at
a plywood box every night."


-- Darryl Zanuck, movie producer, 20th Century Fox, 1946


The nonsense stated in the three previous posts here about 3d printing makes me laugh. The stupid and the lazy state such things like how something can't be done and why not. I am grateful that the work of making things happen and work are left to the smart, visionaries that have brought us to this point.

Here's a prediction for you. By the year 2020 3d printers will be as common a household appliance as the television.
Robert McLean
"the3dprinter"

... what you need for a 'common household 3D-printer' is a fabbing technology as dead-simple as brewing a cup of coffee.

With the actual FDM technology this won't happen in the nearest future, but maybe with another methode?

My favorite would be the 'oldstylish' LOM-fabbing, where sheets of paper or plastic were glued/fused and cut with a laser or cutting knife-pen.

With a proces, where the sheets aren't stacked vertically but rolled continuous on a cylinder and a scanning laser line 'punching' small holes in the sheet, this could be reliable enough, so a loaded set will perform without any maintenance until the material roll has to be replaced.

but my personal 'winner' will be a SLS-/DLM-powder-printer with different powdered materials, exchangeable 'on the fly', so the fabbed parts can be complex 3D-assemblies made from plastic, ceramic and/or metal, maybe combined with prefabbed electronics or modules ... but this will take some more effort than the simple 'lathe-LOM'-printers ...

Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 08/29/2012 03:40AM by VDX.

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Viktor
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Aufruf zum Projekt "Müll-freie Meere" - [reprap.org] -- Deutsche Facebook-Gruppe - [www.facebook.com]

Call for the project "garbage-free seas" - [reprap.org]

Robert McLean Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> The nonsense stated in the three previous posts
> here about 3d printing makes me laugh. The stupid
> and the lazy state such things like how something
> can't be done and why not. I am grateful that the

I'm not stupid or lazy - thank you.

I posted that I think the key limitation is complexity. I think that will be reduced making them easier to use and *then* it will be a mass market product. See Apple - they were not first with an MP3 player but they made it popular because theirs is easy to use.

Andy

There is no need for a 3D printer in households at this point of time when designing and printing custom plastic parts is a larger overhead compared to a quick drive to Walmart or Target (or ordering online) to get the required part.
Fume exhaust is another big concern.
I see the future of custom 3D printing as a small business industry at best.

In my opinion...I think one of the problems with it becoming more widespread is partially awareness. When I built my RepRap in may, one of the things I printed off was a small octopus. When i showed it to my Geometry and English teachers, they just kind of looked at it and were like "What the heck is a 3D printer?". I think its an impressive and useful technology, but its still sort of in its infancy and there's a vast percent of the population that dosent even know it exists.

-Nick

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 08/29/2012 10:48AM by N314.

... but it's a quite grownup infant

When I've first started with RapidPrototyping/3D-printing with LOM-fabbing it was around 1987 ... now it's 25 years later!

Since then I've tried maybe every 5-7 years to sensitize associated people, but it stayed 'mostly comercial only', until 6 years ago, when some articles were posted that found some 'critical mass' around fab@home and RepRap.

Here in Germany this 'critical' activity level was reached maybe two+ years ago, so it's depending on some other variables too, if a theme is accepted widely or not ... even if it's known/aware of it for more than 20 years ...

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Viktor
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Aufruf zum Projekt "Müll-freie Meere" - [reprap.org] -- Deutsche Facebook-Gruppe - [www.facebook.com]

Call for the project "garbage-free seas" - [reprap.org]

@VDX,

One reason I see right off the bat is this: ~ $10 (US) for a motor that during the 1980s or 1990s would have cost at least ten times that price, a hindrance for all but the select few amongst hobbyists. This isn't a "cheap" pursuit by any means, so it's not like "everyone" can get into it, but it's easy enough to realize that an additional $500 to the price tag, just for motors alone, would force quite a few community members dropout, for simple practical reasons of paying the bills, the mortgage, food, etc. I know that for me, if motors still cost what they used to, I would not be posting right this very minute.

Of course, that's not meant to trivialize the other important things that have led to this project, but it's one that has some merit. Critical mass is an important aspect, and that can only be achieved if enough people are able to participate.

I think 3D printers will be a household product quite soon. If you look at the huge demand for cheaper printers such as Printrbot and Solidoodle, it seems obvious that the demand is there at the right price point. Prebuilt printers such as the Solidoodle will likely also open up the market to even more users who have little inclination to build before they use. The leap from hobby to household is a fairly large one, but a lot of the necessities are in place or developing. The two major features that will bridge the gap are, as has been mentioned, cost and ease of use. Cost will come down with volume, and ease of use is getting better and better on the software side, while prebuilt printers will bring ease of use to the hardware side.

As for the Walmart vs printed parts dichotomy, I don't think that is relevant. We don't buy printers to enable us to print commercial newspapers at home. We buy printers to enable us to print out our own creations. Our own newsletters, photos, etc. We're not going to buy 3D printers to print a copy of the $1 plastic cup at Walmart, we're going to buy them to print our kid's Christmas ornaments, or a custom cookie cutter, or a part for our next robotic creation.

Software needs to catch up before it would go anywhere near being a household item. People just need to hit print. Inkjet printers are complicated machines and good software makes it a dumb appliance type device to everybody.

So I would say its coming soon.

ajayre Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> When people were first buying dot matrix printers
> they were more interested in their new ability to
> print rather than the quality, speed and size.
>
> The key limitation I see is the complexity of
> operation.

Likewise, people print photos on inkjets despite the much higher per-page cost and lower quality than getting it printed at the supermarket / warehouse store / photo lab. Before either of those were available, consumers had to send film to a large processing facility for printing, with the exception of people willing to dedicate money, space, and time to having a darkroom.

We already have the mail-order photo processing facility equivalent in Shapeways, Ponoko, etc that can do various materials at high resolution but for the most part are targeted at industry and hobbyist applications. We have hobbyist printers that, like an enlarger and chemical baths require time and skill to get decent results. Currently there is no such thing as a practical home 3D printer.

So what about the corner store approach? If your $(insert local big box store name here) put up an ad tomorrow saying they could set up a session to scan your family in 3D and print a bunch of color plastic replicas on a commercial machine while you wait, or print your kid's avatar from a game or a model for a school project, people would line up.

bryanandaimee Wrote:
> We buy printers to enable us
> to print out our own creations. Our own
> newsletters, photos, etc. We're not going to buy
> 3D printers to print a copy of the $1 plastic cup
> at Walmart, we're going to buy them to print our
> kid's Christmas ornaments, or a custom cookie
> cutter, or a part for our next robotic creation.

Exactly. I don't see the point of any 3D printer trying to compete with low-end mass manufacture goods. The strength of this technology is to bend it to your will, not the other way around. Why on earth would I go buy an stl for a common component that I can design then print on my own?

And this isn't a cheap hobby, mostly due to cost of supplies. But stop for a second and think about the cost of a reprap vs its utility. The reasons this technology hasn't penetrated the larger mass market are numerous, but primarily it is a lack of vision on the consumers end. I showed a friend my printer the other day and he couldn't imagine why I had one. This is a very intelligent person. But when I designed a part and printed it out for a project he was working on its utility became crystal clear. People have to experience that aha! moment and then the world changes in their minds in an instant.

And as far as consumers demanding a more 'finished' surface I think this is irrelevant. There are many things whose utility outweighs it form. Might the ridges/imperfections on a 3D printed part take on another meaning? I think they might.

Oh, and Apple was successful with the iPod because people are lazy or stupid - they just catered to these traits. Know your market!

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- akhlut

Just remember - Iterate, Iterate, Iterate!

[myhomelessmind.blogspot.com]

I remember looking at a color laser printer 15+ years ago for work, it cost $35k and came with an SGI workstation it used as a printer driver.
I think 3D printers are on the cusp of becoming commodity, what they really need to make the leap is the killer app, everyone has a color printer now because they take pictures, I'm not sure there is the same sort of commodity application to drive 3D printers.
The off the shelf prebuilt printers with known hardware like the UP are removing enough of the barrier to entry that with a good enough reason to own one they will move in quantity.
IMO either it'll happen in the next 5 years, or they may be always relegated to hobbyists (though perhaps a broader range of them).

Note I said 3D printers and not repraps, which I think will always be a niche products.

Ah, no...

The simplest way to answer this question is to answer the following question.
"What is the one household item you absolutely need that is cheaper/healthier/easier to print on a 3D printer rather than buying it wholesale?"

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 08/30/2012 06:17AM by peddiparth.

1) the object that is not available anymore (replacement part for an old furniture for instance).
2) the object that doesn't exist yet (adapter part for instance).
3) the object that is only sold in large amount when you only need one (clothesspin...).

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Most of my technical comments should be correct, but is THIS one ?
Anyway, as a rule of thumb, always double check what people write.

Custom sized/fitted things that work and fit in your life will drive the desire for a home 3D printer. Along with hobbies and innovating things that don't yet exist. The absurd one-off object/fitting/device becomes possible and just general gifts and hand-made / designed items that mean something more than buying them from a shop.

Yes, in some form or another additive manufacture will play a part in our lives and one day be a household must have appliance.

It already is for me.

Also check out Nudel's everyday application of 3D printing, some great examples of what, where, when and how a 3D printer can help or be an enjoyable enhancement to your everyday life

Another 'Will 3D printing change the world' article here - [www.forbes.com]

Then read is 3D printing over-hyped? [blog.ponoko.com]

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[richrap.blogspot.com]

I'd say 3D printers are not necessary. They are like sewing machines in use, good as a hobby.

At the right price and design, they could be in every home, like a microwave. Useful to have but not used every day.

I don't think fixing parts in the home is really their killer app. Maybe educational like the bbc micro.

... it's the pricing, (non-) availability of plastic parts and curiosity, what's defining the personal 'must-have'-level.

If it's cheaper/easier for you to buy a part at say Walmart or order it from China, then you aren't in urgent need.

But it's really different, if you can't order a spare part and/or live in a region, where no Walmarts or postal offices are araound ...

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Viktor
--------
Aufruf zum Projekt "Müll-freie Meere" - [reprap.org] -- Deutsche Facebook-Gruppe - [www.facebook.com]

Call for the project "garbage-free seas" - [reprap.org]

of course it will be. my guess is in 3-5 years time.

I think 3d printers are really not for the consumer. Yes they can design and print things at home, possibly with a simple "customizing" program. But why would they buy one if all they want to make is a few trinkets? They could easily order one from a 3-d printing company at a much lower cost. And since 3-d printers are coming down in price, the competition for companies that do 3d printing is on the rise, which will drive down cost.

You can't really compare it to paper printers, because there is a much larger need for paper prints than 3d ones. Before the printer came out, there were typewriters. There was always need to write on paper. Same with computers. People have always searched for better ways to communicate, and that is exactly what the computer did. Before the internet, the computer was just another work machine.

I think 3-d printers are going to be big, but not for consumers. For manufacturing plants.

Think about how lean manufacturing is overcoming mass production. This is because of the flexibility in what they can make. Mass production is very hard to change, and requires huge costs to redo all of the equipment and training for the workers. Lean manufacturing aims to change that by using machines that can do many different things. This is where the 3-d printer shines.

For instance, you find out that a portion of the part is too weak. In mass production, this means huge amounts of cost. With 3-d printers, you just have to update the file, and you are done. This especially benefits small companies rather than large ones, since a small operation can produce the same product at the same cost as a large operation. This is not possible with mass production.

So in conclusion, 3-d printers are primarily beneficial for small companies and hobbiests. No, they will not be in everyone's home, just like how not many people have a lathe in their house.

i remember the time when i bought an inkjet printer to print out colored photographs. i consider myself a consumer who wanted to try to save myself some time from going to and fro to the photo labs to finally get what I want.

in the end, the inkjet printed result could not be compared to a commercial photo machine but I still use it.

I think 3d printers might be something similar here for consumers.

I don't belive this generation of 3D printers based on FDM will become a household item. A specialist item, sure, for individuals and offices which deal with design. Still, if we're talking about Repraps, they require a big investment of time before you actually manage to print anything (This is if you're building one from scratch). Printers like the Mosaic2 and UP! do reduce the entry bar as they're mostly plug in and play.

The next generation of printers based on photopolymers (lemoncurry) is very promising though. Only one axis to move, less points of failure compared to a Reprap. And surely, the price of resin will eventually be cheaper than an inkjet printer cartridges.

I look at 3D Printing like Thermo-Nuclear War.

As soon as one Company "Drops the Bomb" everyone else will as well.

I believe that if I can build a RepRap in my garage, that Apple, HP, General Electric, etc. can build a better one cheaper and mass produce it.

I think that the internet, social media, and dropping tech prices are allowing hobbyists to tackle projects never before possible.

New Hobbyist achievements will reach the ears of the common man due to social media, which will lead to a market demand, which will lead to these devices hitting store shelves.

It might not be an FDM machine exactly, but I bet some kind of home manufacturing machine will hit Wal-Mart or Home Depot shelves in 5 to 10 years.

Everyone will want one especially when the printers become more capable to work multiple materials i.e foodstufs like chocolate, cooking batter... I've seen clay and paste extruders. Adrian the reprap designer is working on the printers so they can print the electronics. Once it gets to that stage everyone will want/have one.