Your quick guide to 3D printing and why everyone is talking about it.
3D PRINTING & MANUFACTURING
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20 JULY
08:30 – 11:30AM
New ways of doing old things
3D printing or additive manufacturing is not a very new concept, the first patents and prototypes were already filed in the 1980s. And the basic idea is as old as human civilisation itself: place building blocks of a durable material on top of each other in a structured manner and after many layers you will have a house or a wall.
The difference is that the laying down of new layers of material to form three-dimensional objects is now being done robotically based on digital files – and the types of structures that can be created this way is almost limitless.
The object freed from the designer
Another important aspect of 3D printing is that the additively manufactured object can now be made in any location in the world, freed from the presence of the designer and a whole chain of production constraints.
All you need is electricity, a computer, a relatively affordable 3D printer and a design to download.
Why the excitement?
When you break it down, 3D printing is just another way of producing something – something that was previously produced in a factory setting by robotic assembly or by workers carrying out the repetitive work, of say, layering a mille-feuille cake (Napoleon’s favourite).
But making old things in a new way has profound consequences on the way the economy works, on labour-markets and the rate of innovation. Here is a list of the ways in which 3D printing is going to turn our world topsy-turvy:
- The cost of manufacturing something on a small scale with 3D printing is so low that just about anyone can do it
- Many types of work usually carried out by humans will now be done by 3D printing robots
- 3D printers can work with just about any material imaginable, from plastics, to metal and organic cells
- The idea of a centralized manufacturing process is hereby virtually dead: anyone, anywhere with a 3D printer can download a design for what they need and make it (issues of cost and scale permitting)
- Rapid prototyping just became something that anyone can do
- Innovation will sky-rocket due to the ability to quickly prototype something
- The costs of shipping goods will, in a long-term perspective, drop close to zero
Why we should be wary?
With any new leap forward in manufacturing techniques and efficiency, there will be a price to pay for unskilled labour: redundancy.
In this brave new world, the pressures to acquire an education and the fight for the few jobs as ‘designers’ will mean that only a very small elite, world-wide, can count on having secure job-prospects. Everyone else will be printers or consumers or both.
The key problem to come will be to find ways in which people can benefit from 3D printing without suffering its downsides. How do we build a world around ubiquitous manufacturing? How do we make it sustainable?
3D printing is here to stay and will change the world as we know it. As a business leader and an owner your job is to make sure you’re not building your house and tearing it down at the same time.
For a full guide to how 3D printing works, check out this page by 3dprinting.com.
Want to find out more about 3D Printing and Manufacturing? Make sure you sign up to the DSMLF meeting on 20th July and join your peers for a lively debate on the matter.