<story><title>MakerBot&apos;s bold bet that 3D printers would become common</title><url>https://backchannel.com/the-3d-printing-revolution-that-wasnt-60b000c3a3ed#.chdpvs3bi</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>sslalready</author><text>OpenSCAD is great for these things. A gasket would be the difference() between two cylinder()s for example. Check this out: &lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.google.de&amp;#x2F;amp&amp;#x2F;s&amp;#x2F;cubehero.com&amp;#x2F;2013&amp;#x2F;11&amp;#x2F;19&amp;#x2F;know-only-10-things-to-be-dangerous-in-openscad&amp;#x2F;amp&amp;#x2F;?client=safari&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.google.de&amp;#x2F;amp&amp;#x2F;s&amp;#x2F;cubehero.com&amp;#x2F;2013&amp;#x2F;11&amp;#x2F;19&amp;#x2F;know-onl...&lt;/a&gt;</text></item><item><author>mbrock</author><text>For random DIY stuff you don&amp;#x27;t always need advanced modeling.&lt;p&gt;If I had a 3D printer right now I&amp;#x27;d want to make a circular gasket with an outer diameter of 78 mm. That&amp;#x27;s the simplest modeling imaginable but it would be useful for me.&lt;p&gt;It&amp;#x27;s like how a power saw is useful even if you don&amp;#x27;t know advanced furniture construction...</text></item><item><author>rebootthesystem</author><text>Well, the issue with 3D printing as I see it is 3D modeling.&lt;p&gt;Anyone can fire-up a word processor and produce interesting looking documents and flyers.&lt;p&gt;A lot less people can fire-up a paint program and produce interesting images.&lt;p&gt;A lot less people than that can fire-up a 2D CAD program and produce 2D mechanical or architectural drawings.&lt;p&gt;And yet a lot less people than that can run a 3D modeling program and product much beyond trivial trinkets.&lt;p&gt;Beyond &amp;quot;Look! I printed this tiny Statue of Liberty from a file I got online&amp;quot; and &amp;quot;Check out the letter A I made!&amp;quot; lies real mechanical design. This is where mechanical things start to become useful.&lt;p&gt;At that level you now need far better understanding of how to design multi-component mechanical assemblies, materials, etc.  Anyone can do a little pyramid in Sketchup. Not everyone can design a full robotic hand with differential drive and force compliance.&lt;p&gt;I imagine most folks buy 3D printers, print a few things they can get online and that&amp;#x27;s the end of it. A very few are inspired to learn some more and do some basic modeling.  I can only see a very, very few go all out, learn advanced modeling and mechanical design and start to extract value out of their 3D printers.</text></item><item><author>wanderingjew</author><text>This gets the current state of 3D printers half right. I wrote the same thing seven months ago &lt;a href=&quot;http:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;hackaday.com&amp;#x2F;2016&amp;#x2F;04&amp;#x2F;28&amp;#x2F;the-makerbot-obituary&amp;#x2F;&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;http:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;hackaday.com&amp;#x2F;2016&amp;#x2F;04&amp;#x2F;28&amp;#x2F;the-makerbot-obituary&amp;#x2F;&lt;/a&gt;, and yes, the downfall of Makerbot was due to going closed source and shipping faulty &amp;#x27;smart&amp;#x27; extruders.&lt;p&gt;However, the author gets it completely wrong by not looking at any of the other companies shipping reprap designs. &lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.lulzbot.com&amp;#x2F;&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.lulzbot.com&amp;#x2F;&lt;/a&gt; has seen consistent yearly growth, from tens of thousands a month when the first MakerBots came out to tens of millions per month today. &lt;a href=&quot;http:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;prusaprinters.org&amp;#x2F;&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;http:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;prusaprinters.org&amp;#x2F;&lt;/a&gt; is experiencing the same growth, and that&amp;#x27;s despite an obscene number of clones of their machine on the market. The growth of 3D printing never stopped. If you look at the well-respected companies in the field, they&amp;#x27;re seeing consistent, increasing revenue.&lt;p&gt;The trouble with the industry is Makerbot. They burned their community with the change to closed source, they killed their industrial&amp;#x2F;educational market with the Smart Extruder problems, &lt;i&gt;but&lt;/i&gt; they were the darling of the media. When Makerbot laid off employees, it made headlines. When manufacturing was outsourced to China, tech bloggers stumbled over themselves to get a post out. As Makerbot went south, so went the perception of the industry.&lt;p&gt;3D printing is still a growing industry, and the tech in low-end printers is getting really, really good. It&amp;#x27;ll never be a printer on every desk, but if you find a household with a circular saw or a soldering iron, you&amp;#x27;ll probably also find a 3D printer. That&amp;#x27;s what it should be, anyway: a tool, and not a fetishized technology.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>IshKebab</author><text>No it isn&amp;#x27;t. OpenSCAD is great for mathematically defined objects, like gears and fasteners.&lt;p&gt;For everything else traditional parametric CAD is a million times better. If you don&amp;#x27;t mind closed source, give AutoCAD 360 a try (make sure you use it in parametric mode; direct modelling is a stupid): &lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;knowledge.autodesk.com&amp;#x2F;support&amp;#x2F;fusion-360&amp;#x2F;troubleshooting&amp;#x2F;caas&amp;#x2F;sfdcarticles&amp;#x2F;sfdcarticles&amp;#x2F;How-to-switch-between-a-parametric-or-direct-modeling-environment-in-Autodesk-Fusion-360.html&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;knowledge.autodesk.com&amp;#x2F;support&amp;#x2F;fusion-360&amp;#x2F;troublesho...&lt;/a&gt;&lt;p&gt;If you can&amp;#x27;t stand closed source then there are not many options. Most open source CAD software is worthless. The only one I&amp;#x27;ve found that works as it should is SolveSpace -  &lt;a href=&quot;http:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;solvespace.com&amp;#x2F;&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;http:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;solvespace.com&amp;#x2F;&lt;/a&gt; - but it does have a slightly 80s interface and... well SolveSpace is to Solidworks what Notepad is to Word. But it does do constraint-based sketching and parametric modelling right.</text></comment>
<story><title>MakerBot&apos;s bold bet that 3D printers would become common</title><url>https://backchannel.com/the-3d-printing-revolution-that-wasnt-60b000c3a3ed#.chdpvs3bi</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>sslalready</author><text>OpenSCAD is great for these things. A gasket would be the difference() between two cylinder()s for example. Check this out: &lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.google.de&amp;#x2F;amp&amp;#x2F;s&amp;#x2F;cubehero.com&amp;#x2F;2013&amp;#x2F;11&amp;#x2F;19&amp;#x2F;know-only-10-things-to-be-dangerous-in-openscad&amp;#x2F;amp&amp;#x2F;?client=safari&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.google.de&amp;#x2F;amp&amp;#x2F;s&amp;#x2F;cubehero.com&amp;#x2F;2013&amp;#x2F;11&amp;#x2F;19&amp;#x2F;know-onl...&lt;/a&gt;</text></item><item><author>mbrock</author><text>For random DIY stuff you don&amp;#x27;t always need advanced modeling.&lt;p&gt;If I had a 3D printer right now I&amp;#x27;d want to make a circular gasket with an outer diameter of 78 mm. That&amp;#x27;s the simplest modeling imaginable but it would be useful for me.&lt;p&gt;It&amp;#x27;s like how a power saw is useful even if you don&amp;#x27;t know advanced furniture construction...</text></item><item><author>rebootthesystem</author><text>Well, the issue with 3D printing as I see it is 3D modeling.&lt;p&gt;Anyone can fire-up a word processor and produce interesting looking documents and flyers.&lt;p&gt;A lot less people can fire-up a paint program and produce interesting images.&lt;p&gt;A lot less people than that can fire-up a 2D CAD program and produce 2D mechanical or architectural drawings.&lt;p&gt;And yet a lot less people than that can run a 3D modeling program and product much beyond trivial trinkets.&lt;p&gt;Beyond &amp;quot;Look! I printed this tiny Statue of Liberty from a file I got online&amp;quot; and &amp;quot;Check out the letter A I made!&amp;quot; lies real mechanical design. This is where mechanical things start to become useful.&lt;p&gt;At that level you now need far better understanding of how to design multi-component mechanical assemblies, materials, etc.  Anyone can do a little pyramid in Sketchup. Not everyone can design a full robotic hand with differential drive and force compliance.&lt;p&gt;I imagine most folks buy 3D printers, print a few things they can get online and that&amp;#x27;s the end of it. A very few are inspired to learn some more and do some basic modeling.  I can only see a very, very few go all out, learn advanced modeling and mechanical design and start to extract value out of their 3D printers.</text></item><item><author>wanderingjew</author><text>This gets the current state of 3D printers half right. I wrote the same thing seven months ago &lt;a href=&quot;http:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;hackaday.com&amp;#x2F;2016&amp;#x2F;04&amp;#x2F;28&amp;#x2F;the-makerbot-obituary&amp;#x2F;&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;http:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;hackaday.com&amp;#x2F;2016&amp;#x2F;04&amp;#x2F;28&amp;#x2F;the-makerbot-obituary&amp;#x2F;&lt;/a&gt;, and yes, the downfall of Makerbot was due to going closed source and shipping faulty &amp;#x27;smart&amp;#x27; extruders.&lt;p&gt;However, the author gets it completely wrong by not looking at any of the other companies shipping reprap designs. &lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.lulzbot.com&amp;#x2F;&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.lulzbot.com&amp;#x2F;&lt;/a&gt; has seen consistent yearly growth, from tens of thousands a month when the first MakerBots came out to tens of millions per month today. &lt;a href=&quot;http:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;prusaprinters.org&amp;#x2F;&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;http:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;prusaprinters.org&amp;#x2F;&lt;/a&gt; is experiencing the same growth, and that&amp;#x27;s despite an obscene number of clones of their machine on the market. The growth of 3D printing never stopped. If you look at the well-respected companies in the field, they&amp;#x27;re seeing consistent, increasing revenue.&lt;p&gt;The trouble with the industry is Makerbot. They burned their community with the change to closed source, they killed their industrial&amp;#x2F;educational market with the Smart Extruder problems, &lt;i&gt;but&lt;/i&gt; they were the darling of the media. When Makerbot laid off employees, it made headlines. When manufacturing was outsourced to China, tech bloggers stumbled over themselves to get a post out. As Makerbot went south, so went the perception of the industry.&lt;p&gt;3D printing is still a growing industry, and the tech in low-end printers is getting really, really good. It&amp;#x27;ll never be a printer on every desk, but if you find a household with a circular saw or a soldering iron, you&amp;#x27;ll probably also find a 3D printer. That&amp;#x27;s what it should be, anyway: a tool, and not a fetishized technology.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>grogenaut</author><text>It&amp;#x27;s even easier in sketchup, inventor, or solidworks. And I don&amp;#x27;t have to feel like I&amp;#x27;m wrestling with an HP calculator when I&amp;#x27;m using it.</text></comment>