Yet another Hacker News

RepRapMicron

117 points RobotToaster 1 hour ago 19 comments

godber 1 hour ago | parent

Thank god, in 18 months we can start making our own RAM.

7373737373 52 minutes ago | parent

Just need a garden shed: https://youtube.com/watch?v=HfSO-LCKmrA

swiftcoder 38 minutes ago | parent

That is proper mental. And extremely cool

thenthenthen 1 hour ago | parent

Very cool, and I understand the off the shelf parts ambition, but what are those usb microscopes used for? These are absolute garbage (but light weight).

idiotsecant 1 hour ago | parent

To see the print? Weird comment.

ZiiS 54 minutes ago | parent

Phisics dictate they have a small depth of field but they can be absolutely incredible.

wongarsu 38 minutes ago | parent

Sounds like they are used for homing. They just need to observe a tiny spot at known distance with high resolution

To look at the output they recommend a separate regular microscope

CarVac 1 hour ago | parent

And the channel's preceding few videos covering the development of the prerequisite technologies.

chris_swart 27 minutes ago | parent

This video was amazing, thank you for sharing. What are the main applications for this technology with a home setup?

carterschonwald 55 minutes ago | parent

omg, ive wanted a precision computer controlled flexure motion system for yearssssss. i may also just really love tiny tools and devices.

mlyle 18 minutes ago | parent

So that's existed for a long time in the form of OpenFlexure. The microscope is a pretty easy / fun build.

swiftcoder 44 minutes ago | parent

I did not expect this would be achievable to such tight tolerances - this is very impressive. Excited to see a new wave of micro-manufacturing in our future

le-mark 39 minutes ago | parent

I know it is a preposterous proposition to think this thing could create a 1/1000 version of itself, hence 1/1,000,000 3d printing, but why?

wongarsu 32 minutes ago | parent

Calling it a RepRap, with full explanation that that means a printer that can print itself, does make it sound like it could be a goal

But even if you could get a positioning system that small, I'm pretty sure you can't scale resin printing down three orders of magnitude smaller than this printer. Maybe a tiny CNC?

Or more likely they refer to eventually printing the mems devices used in the printer

InsideOutSanta 17 minutes ago | parent

None of the reprap 3D printers can fully make themselves. They all still need additional parts that can't be 3D-printed, like motors and controllers.

kadoban 25 minutes ago | parent

A mechanism that works at scale X doesn't necessarily work at scale Y.

Different forces and material properties are all at relatively different levels.

The one I know offhand that will mess with stuff is the square-cube law. If you double the linear dimensions of something, it's twice as big, linearly, but 4 times the surface area and 8 times as heavy. The strength of anything that depends on area (like friction) won't scale at the same rate as anything that depends on mass or volume or anything.

Not to mention I'm sure this thing can only print a few different materials. Unless those are also all of the materials it's made out of, it couldn't even make itself.

jlawrence6809 39 minutes ago | parent

Okay my tinker-lust has been aroused! Can someone tell me what I can make with this thing so I have an excuse to build it?

wongarsu 23 minutes ago | parent

If you get this to print conductive resins you could probably build a number of mems devices. Accelerometers, gyroscopes, tiny speakers

Being able to make structures this small could maybe make DIY inkjet printers viable, if you can simplify them enough?

The most exciting are the applications nobody has thought of yet

post-it 19 minutes ago | parent

Does this mean we can print vinyl records?