Rainbow Ceramic, Stainless Steel, and Gold Plate
We’ve updated some of our 3D printing material info pages with gorgeous (and useful) photos.
4 new photos including Shiny Gear, Empty Cube, and both positive and negative text examples.
RepRap offshoot uses SLS to make wax positives for metal casting
Andreas Bastian has been making some fantastic progress on his DIY SLS printer.
The goal of this project is to provide a method for rapidly manufacturing complex pieces in metal by manufacturing a wax “positive” of the object, which is then used to make a mold for the lost wax casting process. Current metal rapid manufacturing techniques rely on high-power lasers, plasma jets, or electric arcs to sinter metal powder. This approach sidesteps the higher costs and dangers of these high-power systems in favor of a relatively low power laser-sintering technique.
Using a home-built laser sintering wax printer to cast complex metal pieces at home: the DIY-force is strong in this one! Now all he needs is a DIY microwave smelter.
new fabrics & plywoods
We’ve added four new materials to the NZ making hub!
First up is a new 3mm thickness of Hoop Pine Plywood. It’s an interior grade level plywood and produces very crisp laser engraving results. Good for furnishing and accessory designs like boxes, small furniture, shelves, displays etc. A P1 size is just $4.30. Get a sample for $3NZ.
Next we have 1.5mm thick Upholstery Leather in Driftwood. It’s vegetable tanned and finished with oils and waxes. The underside has a soft suede finish, great for use with bags, wallets, shoes, or decorative pillows. Prices start at a little under $14 for a P1 size piece. Get a sample for $3NZ.
Best of the Blog 2011 – Materials
Digital manufacturing techniques like 3d printing, laser cutting, and CNC routing are pretty amazing, but they’re only as good as the materials they use. Thankfully we live in a time where research efforts are bringing out new materials all the time. Here’s a round up of some of the best news in materials in 2011, including some giveaways and special deals.
Sugru is every hacker’s favourite silicone rubber material. Here’s a story on how you can use it mold precise flexible parts like a pro. And hey, get in quick and you can win a multi-colour pack of Sugru to play with.
rocketships, sliceforms, perfect packaging, and file optimization
We’re throwing our second Prototyping Party and giving away FREE cardboard for the rest of the month when you make something with Ponoko.
To give you some design ideas we put together a post of 20 inspirational designs made from cardboard.
With just two a little over two weeks left on this promotion, it’s time to get down to business. So here are 6 resources to get you started.
discounted new materials from our Italian making partner
Vectorealism, Ponoko’s partners in Milan, have added four new acrylics to their materials catalog. And each one is 30% off through the rest of January!
There’s a gorgeous gold mirror acrylic. A really cool looking frosted black acrylic. A no-shame cherry red acrylic. And a bright lime-green acrylic. Nice!
getting creative with cardboard
If you haven’t heard, we’re making our cardboard materials FREE all month when you make something with Ponoko.
Cardboard is a *great* material for prototyping your design and making it in another material later. But that doesn’t mean you can’t use cardboard in a final product. Check out these 20 inspirational designs made from good old fashioned recyclable cardboard.
Artist Mark Langan creates stunning works of art entirely out of cardboard — from original gemoetric designs, to masterpiece interpretations, to corporate logos and signage.
This student project Anirudha Surabhi demonstrates the impact resistance of corrugated cardboard. His Kranium cardboard helmet stood up to four times the amount of impact withstood by typical polystyrene shells. (Video of a DIY arduino powered test in the original post.)
37 in 2011
Materials are the spice of life when it comes to making your own stuff. And this year we added THIRTY SEVEN new materials to the Ponoko making hubs (not including new material thicknesses)!
Before we jump into this, one of the best ways to see what materials you can use to make stuff is to check out the Ponoko sample store.
[ USA store here ] [ NZ store here ]
Not only do you get a survey of all the materials we offer, but you can purchase samples for pretty cheap. These samples will show you the quality of the materials as well as the performance of the making process (e.g. laser-cutting, cnc routing, 3D printing.)
So here’s a roundup of all the awesome materials we added in 2011.
(more…)
blog giveaway ends 25 January
Sugru is a super cool, air-curable rubber that you can use to improve, repair, or prototype all kinds of stuff.
It was developed over seven years by a group of product designers and material scientists lead by Jane who started the project while working on an MA in Product Design at RCA in London.
(You should really check out the Sugru story; there are photos of formulation experiments & application tests, the tales of funding struggles, and a new year’s resolution that ultimately lead to success.)
The end result is a simple, useful material chock full of great properties:
• electrically insulating so “it’s amazing for cable repairs”
• waterproof and flexible so it’s great to have along on outdoor excursions
• stable from -60°C/140°F to 180°C/360°F
• curable at air temperature so you don’t have to heat it
• is removable (with a little effort)
• sticks to almost anything & remains flexible when cured = perfect for prototypes
Update: This contest is closed. Thank you all for your comments.
And congratulations to Matthew C, Matthew P-F, Bob, Curtis W. and Stefania M.!! Enjoy your Sugru!
So now that you have an idea of what Sugru can do, we’d like to know…
How would you use Sugru in a Ponoko project? Tell us in the comments how you would use Sugru to enhance something you made with Ponoko’s laser cutting, cnc routing, or 3D printing service.
cardstock comes to Ponoko US = a whole new range of things to make!
Awhile back we gave our most frequent customers the chance to tell us what new material they wanted to see in the Ponoko materials catalog, and we promised to add the top two materials by the end of the year.
We brought on matte black silicone rubber last month, and today we’re announcing CARDSTOCK!
We even let our top users vote on what colors they most wanted, so we’ve got black, ivory, and red.
The cardstock laser engraves really well. It looks awesome, to be honest. And one trick you can do is use a medium vector engraving line to create perfect fold lines. Because it’s paper, its 100% recyclable and can be easily joined with glue or tape.
And you can buy a sample of our new cardstock materials for $2.50 each.
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