printrbot

By Andrew Terranova, Make Magazine

If you were hoping to pick up Brook Drumm’s new Printrbot Simple at Maker Faire Bay Area this year, well…you’re too late. The Printrbot Simple beta edition sold out Saturday afternoon. Still, with alpha availability slate for June, you don’t have too long to wait.

Printrbot’s latest model is true to its name. The kit can be assembled in under two hours with only a screwdriver and an Allen wrench. Simple and inexpensive, the Simple lowers the entry barrier for 3D printing further than ever before. Which has been PrintrBot’s goal all along.

Maker Faire is the Greatest Show (and Tell) on Earth and Printrbot will be there on May 18 & 19 in San Mateo, CA.  Maker Faire is a family-friendly festival of invention, creativity and resourcefulness, and a celebration of the Maker movement. Part science fair, part county fair, and part something entirely new, Maker Faire is an all-ages gathering of tech enthusiasts, crafters, educators, tinkerers, hobbyists, engineers, science clubs, authors, artists, students, and commercial exhibitors. Read More…

So what have you been doing with your Printrbot?  Well now’s your chance to let us know as we will be showcasing several of YOUR prints in our booth at the upcoming Maker Faire in San Mateo on May 18 and19.  All you have to do is click on the button below and complete the online form.  If your print(s) are chosen, we will pay for your print or give you store credit as well as the shipping to have it sent to Printrbot HQ.  Your name will be proudly displayed under each print in our booth and we will be sure to give you the well earned props you deserve!

Maybe you have printed nifty little castles like @Jerrill or maybe you have been printing colorful shapes like Jake. Then again, maybe you have printed a simple part to repair your beloved old Espresso machine or maybe you are printing parts for prosthetic arms like Easton LaChappelle.  The possibilites are endless, so gather up all those cool things you have been printing and submit your entry today!  We would love to hear your story!

By Steven Kurutz, The New York Times

In his State of the Union address last week, along with the standard calls for education reform and energy independence, President Obama gave a shout-out to a growing technology. In a lab in Youngstown, Ohio, the president said, “Workers are mastering the 3-D printing that has the potential to revolutionize the way we make almost anything.”

When Brook Drumm saw clips from the speech at his home outside Sacramento, Calif., he wanted to reach through his TV and give the president a fist bump. Mr. Drumm, a bald, goateed father of three, designed the Printrbot, a desktop 3-D printer kit. Like a number of other 3-D printers, it uses heated plastic — applied layer by layer to a heated bed by a glue-gun-like extruder — to turn designs created on a computer into real objects.

As Mr. Drumm illustrated in the Kickstarter campaign he used to raise more than $830,000 to start his business in late 2011, the Printrbot is small enough to fit on a kitchen counter, next to the Mr. Coffee. “The goal for the company,” Mr. Drumm said in world-beating tones, “is a printer in every home and every school.”

By mark, 3DPrinter.net Founder

Unlike at his inauguration, President Obama spent some time on the U.S. economy in his State of the Union Address last night. As he was talking about ways to create new American jobs, out came the words “3D printing.” It was a fine moment of retribution for us believers who have had to listen to all the cynics that have been telling us that 3D printing is just for hobbyists that want to print little plastic doohickeys. Take that! Of course, we always knew better.

“Our first priority is making America a magnet for new jobs and manufacturing. After shedding jobs for more than 10 years, our manufacturers have added about 500,000 jobs over the past three. Caterpillar is bringing jobs back from Japan. Ford is bringing jobs back from Mexico. After locating plants in other countries like China, Intel is opening its most advanced plant right here at home. And this year, Apple will start making Macs in America again.

Here’s an excerpt of the relevant part of the speech:

Easton LaChappelle shows off an earlier version of his robotic arm. [via Popular Science]

When he was 14, Easton LaChappelle built a robotic hand because he thought it would be cool. He made the hand out of Lego bricks, fishing wire, surgical tubing for fingers, and five independently-controlled servos. The robo-hand won Easton third place at the Colorado state science fair in 2011, but he was unsatisfied with the robot’s functionality so he set about improving the design.

The second version of the hand grew into an arm and featured a combination of 3D printed parts, dental rubber bands for tendon-like spring action, nylon-coated jeweler’s wire for ligaments, a telemetric Nintendo Power Glove, and a brainwave-activated headset to control the arm’s movement. For muscle power, he made a servo by adding a potentiometer to a DC motor.

Easton’s inventions created a stir, both because he was so young, and because the devices were flat-out amazing. Oh, and when he started, he knew nothing about electronics or programming. He taught himself. Easton, who lives in the small town of Mancos, Colo. near the Four Corners area, got coverage in Popular Science, Popular Mechanics, and MAKE and won a 2nd place ribbon at the Intel International Science and Engineering Fair, the nation’s top science fair.

As impressive as the robotic arm was, Easton realized he wanted to create something that did more than clutch a can of soda. A girl at the Colorado science fair last year gave him the inspiration he needed.

A CAD rendering of Easton’s robotic arm.

The young girl was born without a right arm and wore an $80,000 prosthetic limb. She controlled the arm via a spinal implant. As a maker, Easton was impressed by the technology, but distressed to learn the girl would need new arms as she grew, a tremendous expense for the family.

“That kind of opened my eyes,” said Easton, now 17. “I thought I could turn (my invention) into a prosthetic arm and help a lot of people.”

His mission was to build a robotic arm that was as functional as it was affordable. He thinks he’s done it.

Version 3.0 of the robot uses a Teensy Arduino microcontroller as well as amplifier circuits and Bluetooth receivers. To control the arm, the user flexes a muscle to choose from a menu of movements then performs a series of eye blinks to select pre-loaded gestures such as hand, elbow, or wrist movements. Once a movement is selected, an EEG headset measure brainwaves to control the movement. Total cost for the device? $250.

Except for the gears, motors, and screws, all parts were 3D printed on a Printrbot. Easton counts Printrbot founder Brook Drumm as a key mentor.

By Goli Mohammadi, Make Magazine

Printrbot founder Brook Drumm built the first 3D printer kit he purchased (the MakerBot Cupcake) with the help of his two daughters and his son, intentionally involving them in the process. His kids have grown up with 3D printers being common tools in their household. Here he shares with us his insights on how 3D printers open a whole new world of possibilites for kids, and why he believes it’s so important to integrate them into schools.

Generation 3D by Brook Drumm

When I was a kid, I used to follow my dad around asking questions: “Why?” “What for?” “Why?” “What is that?” “How?” “Why?” He had an office in the back of the house full of wonderful gadgets, and he encouraged my desire to take everything apart to see how it ticked. He was always ready to explain what he knew about electronics and machines, which to a young boy sounded like pure magic. Somewhere along the way I acquired a soldering iron and I was in love. Being allowed to ask, explore, tinker, hack, and even fail set me on the course to being a maker.

I’ve carried on the tradition of encouraging my kids to ask questions and explore the healthy stash of electronics and gadgets I collect. Each of my three kids has tackled projects with me one-on-one, but we all converged on our first 3D printer in January 2011. I’d been inspired by the MAKE issue that featured Bre Pettis [of MakerBot, on the cover] and saved up for months to buy my Cupcake 3D printer.

By Brian Heater, Senior Associate Editor, engadget

Printrbot GO – Here’s yet another in the long line of consumer-facing 3D printers brought into the world with a little Kickstarter love — well, more than a little. Printrbot creator Brook Drumm managed to raise a staggering $830,000-plus after setting a $25,000 goal. The company designed the device “to be the simplest 3D printer yet.” A small kit can be assembled relatively quickly by beginners — a sort of IKEA-esque approach to the world of 3D printing, if you will. The company also has affordability in mind, with the low-end, foldable Printrbot Jr. running an astonishingly low $399. That price helped the foldable device snag a “Best Value” from our friends over at Make Magazine late last year. The company’s line tops out at $1,500 for the moment, which will get you a Printrbot GO [pictured], a portable 3D printer that fits in a briefcase for the traveling maker. That one was created with help from Ben Heck, of course.

By Michael Wolf, Forbes Contributor

Like many who jumped early into 3D printing, Brook Drumm found the lower cost printers required a significant degree of assembly. Think Ikea, but with soldering guns, wires and less documentation. So he set out to build his own.

Brook Drumm always liked to create things.

But the  former pastor turned web developer had spent the last few years in a profession where the product was on the screen – websites and iPhone apps – rather a physical product he could touch, and it was beginning to leave him a little unsatisfied.

“It kind of left me wanting to build something that I can hold in my own hand,” said Drumm, who I recently talked with for the NextMarket podcast.

So one day when he read about Jay Leno‘s efforts to produce exotic car partsusing 3D printing technology, something clicked. After all, Drumm was a car nut himself, a self-described “maker” who liked to tinker and create in his garage. He thought if Leno could do it with equipment that may cost hundreds of thousands of dollars, in today’s world of rapid technology evolution, it wouldn’t be long before the technology came to him.