Blender Runs new 3d printer costing only 100 dollars!

So ive been working at this for a year now and just finally went public.

A unique 3d printer costing only 100 bucks and of course I scripted blender to run it!

check out the project here( indegogo)

or here (kickstarter)

first off a HUGE THANKYOU to the hole blender community!

secondly some ideas:

  1. A unique feature of this printer that im really proud of is the ability to model and print at the same time!
    Lets say you have only 1 hour modle and 3d print an new character!
    and the 3d printer takes an hour to print the character at the scale you need it.

Here is what you do … space add cube, scale z making a base for your character.
now hit print … the printer starts printing the bace, while its doing that you model the chartors feet
by the time its done the base your on to modeling the legs and torso … and so on, as long as you stay above what has already been printed you can change / make it!

fast forward an hour… 3 min after you finish your character hair the print is complete and in a way it feels
kind of instant!

  1. The printer is also a scanner too … so it will be great to print out an object then use modleing clay to make changes and then scan the changes back into blender!

  2. I think it would be great to skip rendering and instead print every frame of an animation and photograph all the prints
    anyone interested in helping pull off a little test of this msg me! I think it would make for a very uniquely dirty kind of look.
    A look with its own set of artifacts that have never been explored befor, could be a great thing for the right short film.

Any way those are just some ideas, the fact is inventors dont usually know much about

how the ideas will actual get used, ether way I hope this project adds some value to Blender!

Rylan Grayston

The idea of communicating with the printer via audio is a clever one, but I wonder how does it affect quality, since the noise will affect the laser. I guess this way the printer would be cheaper than using usb, but I would pay some more and increase printing quality.

Anyway, as a 3D printers guy (I have a prusa i2), and blenderhead, I will back this project.

all good thinking my friend !

here is some enlightening info

1 I was skeptical about my own idea to use the sound card as well… in testing it turns out that im not even able to measure
any problems caused by using the sound card … their to small! This method works amazingly well!

2 There is a pro option that will not use the sound card, but instead will use a micro controller to drive the printer, the pro costs 1000 bucks
and I expect it to preform MUCH better, mostly because of the quality of mirrors we will use in the pro, not because were using a micro controler
instead of the audio card.

3 Great Thanks for your support!!!

very cool. Best of luck!

Hope you guys have patents to protect it from being patented by trolls/competition

I am not expert on 3d printing but is something which I find really fashinating and I would like to start to try something with it! This looks like an awesome project, I really think I am going to back you up! :slight_smile:

Great concept, though I would never buy it as a general rule of thumb. Why? Drip system. Its cool, a bit ancient in terms of technology (seriously drip systems have been used for thousands of years, which much props for thinking back in time) but where tech is concerned I dont want any liquids, especially with such high volume, around my equipment.

I do think you are onto something here, but there has to be a better solution to the drip system and approach. Its a good start, but not ready for prime time yet in my opinion. Some of those approaches should probably tossed out with the bathwater so to speak.

Additionally, I wonder if it would be better for you to set up some form of wireless or bluetooth communication between the device and the computer.

3d Printers will eventually get cheaper, but theres an extent to which cheap wins out. I am in the market for a 3d printer, have been for awhile, but would rather opt to spend a bit more to get one for home.

That said its good to see such innovation being presented. Props.

This looks very interesting! You cant argue with the price point either. :wink:

SaintHaven: it looks like they will be offering a “Pro” version with higher quality parts, a pump (I’m assuming to replace the drip system) and a better lazer. Looks like it will be 1000 usd during the crowd-funding campaign.

You can’t patent something if someone else has already publicly demonstrated the device. It’s called Prior Art.


ETA: Note that trolls may not be able to patent it, but if Rylan hasn’t got patent protection, they could still steal his idea and sell their own version of it. They just can’t seek a patent on it.

Steve S

Congratulations, I hope you reach your goal!

Whooo Just reached our 50 000 dollar goal on Kick Starter!!!

Thanks everyone!

Photopolymers are kinda expensive though, aren’t they? I mean, last time i looked into it, a jug of the stuff was 50-70$. Still way cheaper than the cheapest reprap though… I favor the extruded plastic approach, but you might be onto something here. The idea of using the audio and mic jacks is pretty neat too, reminds me of old 80’s personal computers that used a cassette tape to load programs :smiley:

I am concerned by the change in wording between the Early Bird description:

This includes everything you need to build your own printer!

and the C$100 pledge description:

This includes all the unique parts you need to build your own printer!

The difference between ‘everything’ and ‘all the unique parts’ makes me think there are some non-unique parts that are NOT included in the C$100 Kit that the early birds do get as a bonus. Would you clarify?

[Yes I am too suspicious for my own good, but with all the snake oil salesmen and their weasel worded fine print, can you blame me?]


Tremendous idea. I really love the simplicity of it all.

That said, you could do with this what no other liquid based printer can: multi-materials.

This is a really promising area that I think you’re missing out on, and it would be the best upgrade available from a standard system. It would only cost about 100 dollars more in parts, but I’ll let you figure out implementation. Here’s my idea:

The resin bath contains normally a layer of resin on top of the saltwater that supports it. The key difference would be little “raft” that would float on the surface. It’s “hull” would penetrate beneath the main resin, into the saltwater. The raft would have a hole in the middle of it, like a doughnut. In this hole would be the alternate resin. The two different resins would not mix, because the sides of the raft would keep them separate.

In order to utilize the second resin (resin b from now on), the fluid level would be raised and the raft would be positioned over the print. Then the fluid level would be lowered again. I suggest the use of a displacer that could be raised and lowered into the fluid.

So far, this is what such a set-up would look like, minus actuators and the drip feed:

On top of these concepts, imagine a flexible raft, who’s sides can be expanded to the whole build area. Or perhaps one large raft with several subsections that can be individually actuated, allowing for many types/colors of resin to be used.

All of this could be done without any more computer data lines beyond the audio, because you could use the laser to signal the other actuation circuitry, via light dependent resistor sensors. You could probaby use just one, plus a small microcontroller.

As far as actuating an expandable raft, you may wish to look into nitinol based actuators: they are slow but they are mechanically simple and lightweight.

There is an intresting story behind the price of resin … its going to come down lots more.!resin/cqv3

Here’s a bigger version of that picture.

OK, I guess I was too wordy.

Does the $C100 kit contain ALL the parts needed to build a printer, or just unique parts with commonly obtainable parts not included?

As a developer I am quite interested in this, but I have a couple of questions

  1. The printer comes with “Unique” parts, is their additional parts we need to purchase?
  2. Is this a python addon for blender?
  3. Will the source code be released as open source
  • i.e: Can I develop interfaces around this tool?

Thank you
-Alex Telford

@Drewu: as the displacer rises from the salt water (I assume it is isolated from either resin) it will carry some of the salt water along with it. Since the z coordinate seems to be calibrated around single drops of water from the reservoir, even a single drop of wetness on the displacer throws off z. It would, of course, be possible to add some fancy level detector to find the z coordinate and recalibrate on the fly, but I think that might be expensive.

looks like it got funded :smiley: congrats