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First of all, this is just an exercise, useful as is, but the result is going to be far from an industrial level robots. Why doing it then?

For the same reasons we do all exercise: to get an experience. After all, when we write a character recognition «MNIST classifier» neural network, we know that the problem is solved long time ago. But we need to become familiar with tools and approaches. Same here.

Now, why is it called «brainless»?

The USA's National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) has chosen three private companies to participate in the development of landing modules for the new Artemis lunar program. Among them are two enterprises that widely use 3D printing technologies in the production of rocket engines — Jeff Bezos' Blue Origin and Elon Musk's SpaceX. NASA seems to approach the matter carefully and generously, financing the development of lunar manned vehicles in three competing directions at once.

With medical equipment drastically growing scarce, a number of organizations and enterprises have taken up the development and manufacture of mechanical ventilators, relying on fast production by means of 3D printing technologies. 3D printing is often implemented in the medical field, but now, it's proving to be of great help during the emergency.

The first news of 3D printed ventilation apparatus came from Spain (apart from the case of 3D printing of valves at an Italian hospital). Here, we are talking about the so-called Ambu bags — temporary manual ventilators usually applied in the field by, paramedics. A whole consortium was involved in the development of the 3D printed version with the mechanical drive mechanism. The Leitat Technology Center in Barcelona played the leading role; support was provided by the Catalan Health Service, Barcelona's Zona Franca industrial estate, Hewlett Packard Enterprise, and the Parc Taulí Hospital in Sabadell, which houses the Faculty of Medicine of the Autonomous University of Barcelona.

Honda, a Japanese car manufacturer has demonstrated outstanding results in their recent project intended to reduce the weight of the crankshaft and increase its fuel efficiency. In order to carry out such a redesign in an effective and timely-fashioned manner, the company collaborated with Autodesk and applied its software solutions, as well as various 3D-printing technologies.

Copper3D is a Chilean/US-based company that discovered a new mode of application for proprietary filament with copper nanoparticles. As products developed from such materials are very effective in terms of inactivating HIV, they can prove extremely useful in the construction of 3D-printed breastfeeding filters. Such applications cannot be considered new, since 3D printing is widely used for medicinal purposes.

Equipmake is a UK-based company that is currently developing “Ampere” — a traction motor designed to be the world’s best in terms of power density. The device will have a peak current density of more than 20 kW/kg (12 hp/lb), the outstanding value that the company aims to achieve by implementing various technologies of additive manufacturing.

The Chinese company WinSun is helping in the fight against the epidemic of the coronavirus by constructing isolation wards. The company is printing modular mobile isolation wards on its self-developed 3D printers.
3D printing has proven to be a unique technology that has a plethora of various applications, such as space engineering, car industry, medicine, and construction.

Scientists at the Laboratory of Applied Photonics Devices from the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Lausanne (EPFL) are developing a new high-performance 3D-printing technique. Their patent-pending volumetric printing technology features rotational exposure of photopolymer resins to radiation resulting in light-shaping. Another peculiarity is that the part is printed in a single step, not layer-by-layer.

The technology itself seems to be of US origin. At the beginning of the previous year, a team of scientists from Berkeley and Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) demonstrated Computed Axial Lithography (CAL), a 3D-printing method based on LLNL’s previous researches on resin 3D-printing technique that features holographic patterning of light fields. The models were initially formed by laser beam crossing, which is very complex and expensive. Therefore, it’s been decided to alter the technology in favor of rotational exposure of photopolymer resins.

1984, Orwell’s prophetic year of Big Brother, saw the release of the Mac which broke the idea that centralised control could ever be what it was before. That year also saw the first workable prototype for a 3D printer. Built by Charles Hull, the technology was then known as stereolithography. We know it as 3D printing, and that’s a term that covers a variety of different processes which may revolutionise all stages of the global manufacturing and distributing process. In that very science-fictional year, Hull set off a revolution that is only now seeing fruition. 3D printing continues to threaten the social and economic structures which preceded it. When we speak about 3D printing, we’re speaking of a general technique of successive printing layers to form a three-dimensional object at the end. From powder to paper to human tissue, these thin membranes are laid down like the construction of a plaster mask. From that simple concept, the 3D printer offers the reverse of Ford’s mass production revolution. Printing one item is now as cost-effective in some cases as manufacturing a thousand items in the traditional way.

The computer powers 3d printing with printable files known as STLs, guiding the printers themselves as they construct, from the ground up, plastic homunculi that would awe medieval alchemists. It’s not quite the replicator from Star Trek, but it’s in the same Galaxy Class Starship.

Our 3D printing future, however, isn’t liable to look like the utopian ideals Gene Roddenberry envisioned. Instead, we will see both positive and negative outcomes from these machines as the world finds ways to employ the emergent technology.

Guerillas in the Powdery Mist

Are you ready to get started with 3D printing but just aren’t sure about what filament you’re using? You’re definitely not alone because with the multitude of different filaments out there it can really get complicated. You find yourself overwhelmed while you’re trying to research because it seems like everyone has a different idea of what the best option is and it can easily seem like you’re being pulled in different directions. So, let’s take a closer look at how you can make the right decision.

What is 3D printing?

3D printing is a new way of manufacturing solid objects based on the principle of discrete-stacking.
With the evolution of the trend, 3D printing has become a way to promote smart manufacturing, flexible manufacturing and green manufacturing. It can realize the integrated formation of complex structures that are difficult to process or even cannot be processed by traditional manufacturing technologies, greatly enhancing the process realization capability. Subversive advancement in equipment design and manufacturing.

From the past used to manufacture models, and now gradually realize the direct manufacturing of products, 3D printing manufacturing technology is developing towards the integration of “design-material-manufacturing”. According to research, the size of the world 3D printing market in 2017 was 3.86 billion US dollars. In 2018, the scale of China's 3D printing market was as high as 7.75 billion US dollars, which has more than doubled in two years. From behind the scenes to the forefront of the industry, the development of the 3D printing industry has moved from the concept introduction period to the rapid development period, all thanks to: "application." Members of the World 3D Printing Association have said:

“When 3D printing technology goes out of the lab,
Its development motivation lies in its application”