3 ms·
A mixture of patent protection, China’s (lack of) precision manufacturing at scale at that time, and software immaturity. LM8UU around 15 years ago when I start
by syntaxing 2y ago
A mixture of patent protection, China’s (lack of) precision manufacturing at scale at that time, and software immaturity. LM8UU around 15 years ago when I started my 3D printing journey was upwards of $15 PER PIECE. You need at least 8 for a Mendel or i3 style printer during the reprap boom. Just the bearings alone would have cost you, $100 or so. Then factor in chrome rods, stepper motor, stepper motor drivers (Pololu just released their A4988 boards), you’re looking at almost $1K just for the parts. The software like slicers and even gcode interpreters weren’t even made yet. Merlin wasn’t even a big thing until about 10 years ago. We take for granted how much work the community has put into 3D printers to get us where we are today.
- regularfry 2y agoI don't think you can underestimate the development of efficient slicing algorithms. It might just have been something that would have happened anyway with other parts of the story in place, but there was a point in time when slicing anything complicated was very painful.
- tjoff 2y agoYou don't start with anything complicated though. You start with cubes, make fixtures etc. And with waiting 5 hours to print it isn't unreasonable to wait an hour or two for the slicer either.