MY 3D PRINTING ADVENTURE (PART 1)
My adventure into the world of 3D Printing has been awesome to say the very least, and I want to share with you what currently excites me about 3D PRINTING TECHNOLOGY!
I have been taking the 3D Printing and Additive Manufacturing course for a while now on Coursera, powered by the University of Illinois. It is amazing getting in-depth knowledge of something that interests me; amidst other interests like cars, manufacturing in general, 3D modeling, XR, and of course, working for Tesla. I am going to get into details of what currently excites me about this technology. As I get into a deeper understanding of this technology, I will be giving you all an update. The 3D Printing technology excitement started from Youtube, by the way, where I found a 3D printed house, then I found Dr. Olubamiji, then a friend of mine coupled a 3D printer for his undergraduate project and I found it very cool, as opposed to my project where I had to manipulate aluminum with agricultural waste. For those who might not understand the whole 3D printing and additive manufacturing bladiba, It is basically building a product from the ground up. You make a design of whatever you want to make and print it; with the only limitation being your mind! Hold up, I am lying LOL. It is a budding technology and there are currently some setbacks but it does not make any of these less amazing. Limitations currently being the speed of the printer, broadening the range of materials that can be printed, and also modification of these materials (my undergraduate project is not a waste as I thought) to suit its application, among others. There are quite a few limitations, but I am here to excite you as this excites me and not bother you with limitations.
I love how there are communities all over the world, ready to teach you and let you experience the goodness of this technology. The Makerspaces, the Hackerspaces, and whatnot. This brings me to the first area of excitement, The HACKERSPACES. This is just basically a workshop that houses a community of people, products, machines, and tools for additive and subtractive manufacturing, as well as, injection molding. Chris Meyer of Sector 67, whom I met on this course, spoke about the hackerspace and showed us around Sector 67.
“So, the idea of the hackerspaces is that you bring people together who have interests and maybe dissimilar or similar backgrounds or similar experiences, and you bring them under one space. IT’S JUST LIKE A GYM CLUB FOR PEOPLE THAT LIKE TO BUILD STUFF. And so you can come in, you can use the tools, you can use the equipment, you can get training, you can get instructions, meet up with like-minded people and work on projects together. It is not all about the tools, it’s all about the people” -Chris Meyer
Well, If this is not one of the coolest things, then we have to review your definition of cool. Yes, I did exactly what you are thinking, I searched for hackerspaces near me. I found one in the MAKER FAIRE AFRICA and they are doing well. Most of what I found though, were mainly cybercommunities and events. I have had a very big idea on this for a while though, in contrast to what has been done in Nigeria through the Maker Faire Africa course; not just an event but an actual walk-in hackerspace accessible at any time. Remembering what I had to go through to machine and test what I produced for my undergraduate project, a physical hackerspace would go a long way. It would also foster creative minds. Above all, I am happy to see there are plans across Africa to make this a reality. The fuss is currently about software technology today and there are a lot of communities and spaces in Africa to this effect.
My next big excitement is the type of printers there are. There are varieties of mind-blowing printers that are available and still in view. Printers that can print soft materials, liquid metals like terminators, and strong materials like graphene. Printers that can print functional parts like electronic circuits and drone components, and a printer that can print in colors that I would explain explicitly later in another article.
Then there is a 3D scanner that allows you to scan whatever object you want to print without going through the work of design. This technology is used not only for printing but also in the XR community.
Soli is a wonderful project by Google I came across on this adventure of mine that will let users easily create 3D projects by moving their hands in spaces.
The recycling of plastics for 3D printing inspires me a lot because plastics are a major waste problem and headache in the world today. There are currently a dozen of cool stuff that recycled plastics could be used for like blocks and bricks (Dangote does this), infusing them in shoe soles (Nike does this), and clothes among others. People have found a way to reuse plastics for 3D printer filaments; filaments are materials you feed into a 3D printer to print. I would love more awareness of this in Africa, Nigeria especially.
3D Printing for the medical field is not currently a big interest of mine but I love to read stories about how this technology is revolutionizing the medical world from Prostheses to Bio-printing (software and hardware for the design of living tissue and organs). I would probably write another article entirely on how this is an amazing innovation and how it would change a lot of lives.
Another thing is the range of materials currently available for 3D printing. Work needs to be done to not only broaden the range of materials the machines can print with, but also improve the current materials the machines are printing with so that in some applications where strength and some particular properties are required, 3d printing should be able to cater for that.
3D printing is cool. It can not do everything though, so I do not believe it is coming to take over like some claim. One thing I know is, it is here to revolutionize how things are made. Like William Gibson said “The future is already here. It is just not evenly distributed yet.”
