3D Printer

Mark sent me this. It might actually be recent news. 3D prototyping techniques have been around for a few years now. I think I have seen the ball bearing trick before. I have not seen anyone make a wrench though.


ZCorp's 3D Printer replicates a wrench
Plastic is getting amazingly strong, but there are still situations require metal. A plastic wrench might work well enough for a demo, but it is not going to work on real iron. Of course, if your whole machine is made out of plastic, a plastic wrench would probably work just fine.

The comment about the accuracy and human hair got me to do a little checking. 40 microns is about one-and-one-half thousandths of an inch (0.0015"). According to The Physics Factbook, the diameter of human hair ranges from 17 to 181 µm. (µm is the abreviation for microns, also known as micrometers.)

Update February 2017 replaced missing video. Zcorporation has been taken over by 3D Systems.