Q for the 3D design folks

[kalbert]

Something like that would be excellent for making masters to cast in pot metal or resin, or if you're just doing parts for your own use. Shapeways has the benefit of an online marketplace where ideas can be shared and made available to others. Granted there is question of the quality and consistency, and Shapeways is the only one getting rich off it, but the community is there, and that is something. For a guy who lacks the wherewithal to keep up on casting and filling orders and customer service (like that infamous decal maker) services like Shapeways makes sense to make stuff available to everyone that otherwise wouldn't be available at all. Then there are the guys who would rather have nothing at all than have something with flaws imposed by the manufacturing process, they would probably be better served by another service.

[6axlepwr]

Something like that would be excellent for making masters to cast in pot metal or resin, or if you're just doing parts for your own use.

Although I am just a beginner at casting, this is exactly what I am doing. I can justify the cost because I will then have masters to make parts for all my future projects. I have the added advantage that my son-in-law is a dental caster. He has his own business. I send him a tree of parts and he makes a permanent metal master for me. Then if I ever wanted to mass produce the parts, I can send the metal master to a white metal casting shop and they can make a nice spin casting mold and make me hundreds of trees. Detail parts are so small that shrinkage is negligible. I do not have to design it in.

Shapeways has the benefit of an online marketplace where ideas can be shared and made available to others. Granted there is question of the quality and consistency, and Shapeways is the only one getting rich off it, but the community is there, and that is something. For a guy who lacks the wherewithal to keep up on casting and filling orders and customer service (like that infamous decal maker) services like Shapeways makes sense to make stuff available to everyone that otherwise wouldn't be available at all. Then there are the guys who would rather have nothing at all than have something with flaws imposed by the manufacturing process, they would probably be better served by another service.

As a hobbyist, this sort of thing is all personal preference. What do you want to achieve with your models. I set high standards for myself (not anyone else), just myself. So I know my hobby budget is high. I would rather it not be, but there is nothing can do about it. I either model to my satisfaction or I do not model at all. I wanted to make it a small business producing parts. But I neglected to factor in one huge factor. There are not enough modelers interested in the type of modeling I do to make it worth my effort to produce said parts. I do it for myself and I enjoy it.

You are definitely correct. Only Shapeways is getting rich off their services.

[C855B]

Brian, why are the better ships so pricey?  Is it the cost of the machine or the limited supply of services that demands the high rates? ...

Bottom line first - while the machine isn't cheap, it seems to be supplies and labor costs driving the pricing. For one thing, the raw materials come in cartridges unique to the device, so you are married to the manufacturer. The Perfactory (and other high-quality commercial-grade "printers") also have a baseline cost per print run, that you are going to consume X amount of raw materials regardless of the size or resolution of the final output. Labor comes into play with setup, QC on incoming files, QC on output, babysitting runs, corresponding with clients. Those costs run out of control very quickly.

You might notice that Shapeways prices are based on volume. Either this is output management (batching jobs) to minimize the per-run waste, or the device they use for FUD (sintering?) only consumes what is in the finished output and leaves the remaining raw material for subsequent runs. I suspect a combination of both.

I ran 2D output service bureaus 30 years ago, so with this experience I've been seriously researching the idea of buying a Perfactory and providing a 3D output service geared towards modelers. Several things are preventing execution of this idea:

• I'm retired and want to remain retired to "play" with my trains. Service bureaus are hard work. I'm recalling the nightmare of 60-70 hour work weeks trying to get acceptable output from cranky, new-tech devices.
• Perfactory devices aren't cheap. Initial investment is going to be $60K and up for modeler-quality resolutions.
• I'd only learn about the real-world supplies costs with actual production. Experience tells me that cost estimates before committing are going to be extremely rosy.
• I have corresponded with one Shapeways seller who is not interested in using independent service bureau regardless of quality. He likes the convenience of the hands-off storefront. OK, so this means that any modeler-oriented service bureau now gets into managing a commerce site, too. More hard work.
• The new 3D tech, like the old 2D, has all the earmarks of being a time sink. Are modelers going to pay for technician time needed to make their file work? Unlikely - nobody I did work for in the old days would, they expected $12/page no matter how screwed-up their file was. That's the main reason why every operation I ran was a loser. The boss mandated fixed pricing, but if we raised prices to cover all the costs, the wet-behind-the-ears competition would undercut us by a factor of 2 or 3. They'd be out of business a year later, but our pricing feet would still be held to the fire by the next one to come along.

So... that's the long answer to why pro-quality output costs so much. It's going to take the "consumer grade" tech (<$10K) improving resolution by an order of magnitude before it's a hobbyist's modeling tool.

BTW - I don't see that Shapeways is "getting rich". I think they're keeping their heads barely above water, with profits invested in new materials and the equipment to produce the new stuff. They do, however, know where their hottest market is, and it's not modelers, for sure.

[6axlepwr]

Thanks Mike. That was a good education.

My knowledge and process is as follows.

1. Find a shop that has the highest resolution machine.
2. Create my part in Cubify, write out a file.
3. Upload the file to the shops system.
4. Send an email that the file is uploaded and ask for a quote.
5. Get the quote and decide if the cost is worth it to me.
6. Give them the go ahead.
7. I receive my part in about three days to a week.

That is as much as I know about the 3D printing industry. Not much.

[C855B]

You're welcome.

Allison (Austin) says "Hi!". I'm on one of her committees here.

[VonRyan]

Haddon Car Shops' double-door B&O wagontop project has been slowed due to the high costs of just getting 3D artwork done, plus I'm taking a class in AutoCAD.

As I'm sure many of you would agree, we would rather work on other projects in the meantime than rush this one. This way we can provide the highest prototype-fidelity possible with resin-casting.

[robert3985]

I also looked seriously into the Perfactory hardware, process and materials.  Certainly if you had the money (lots of it) it is the way to go as far as resolution is concerned.  They use a different process other than "layering" they claim gets rid of most of that and deals with a form of pixelization instead.

For my own purposes, they run materials that are clear or tinted (absolutely necessary for some applications) and as has been stated, the resolution is around half a thousandth or an N-scale .077"

Another thing that I really liked about the Perfactory hardware I looked at is that it was produce a 3D model in maximum resolution from material that is both heat and pressure resistant, which is designed specifically for creating a vulcanized rubber mold from.  This is then used to produce wax masters which are then invested and cast in metal (brass, silver, gold, bronze).

The main problem was the hardware I was looking at, including the UV table (necessary) was around $135,000.  They have less expensive hardware, but they're less versatile as far as the materials they use.

I just went to the Envisiontech site to look around, and their hardware has changed along with the published specs. Not looking good for the N-scale modeler.