RepRap: Blog

We've had a wee bit of discussion on an idea which we can't really take any further due to lack of all sorts of important stuff like time and resources. But it deserves to be blogged nonetheless. Perhaps someone will even take it to The Reprappers Blogspot, where people who are actually doing some building live :)

The general concept is to use a CNC router to cut sheet acrylic or polyethylene to form the basic essentials of a RepRap prototype for keen hobbyist developers. This is a little controversial, because it isn't a pure-bred RepRap and it isn't a made-from-scratch masterpiece. It sits somewhere in the middle, shuffing its feet uncomfortably. There are two main areas in which this idea has some merit:

1. There is a thriving CNC router community who know a thing or two about desigining axes and stuff. They often have the technology and curiosity necessary to want to play with RepRaps.

2. It turns out these things are readily accessable at reasonable prices to all and sundry, including those to whom CNC is one of the Dark Arts. The local signmakers are a secret clan of machine shops.

Signmakers, you see, take vector drawings and use computerised routers to cut shapes out of sheets of acrylic. These sheets can be up to 10mm (3/8") or so thick, though a reasonable thickness for one-pass cutting is more like 6mm. Holes of 3mm and greater can be cut with the general routing bit. Acrylic and polyethylene are reasonably inexpensive, so materials for the thing could be <$50 for all parts. But...

One of the reasons RepRapping is so appealing is you only pay for what you use. With CNC routing you pay for all the material, and then you pay extra for the "cutting lines" needed to hew your part out. So someone would need to convert the basic "Da Witch" parts, or ther functional equivalents thereof (we've a few sensible changes in mind already), to a 2D vector image (AI, DXF, SVG etc.) using a minimal amount of cutting. Instead of being full of lightening holes to save plastic, for example, the gears would be solid. Other designs are undoubtedly better, but we do know Da Witch actually works.

Given this plan, anyone in a conveniently civilized spot with sufficient cash can then stroll into a signmakers, say "print me one of these on so-many millimetre/inch acrylic, my good fellow, and be snappy about it," and come out with a funny look and snap-off sheet of flat-pack RepRap bits.

It's a thought.

Vik :v)