I would want to use one like Mark Gasson uses, that prints with that smooth finish hard orange material. But even their table top version is near $50K. When that level of quality hits the $10-15K range, I am in. The Make My Model stuff turns gray and disentegrates after a couple years, and is very fragile, and hates paint.
@FSM1000, It's not a question of not willing to answer. I really don't know what to answer. Where we got everything for nothing, and even received proto prints for an acceptable price at printservices like Shapeways, nobody is thinking of investments in own machines. And yes, of course these type of 3D Printmachines are very expensive. The printmaterial itself, the plastic powder, is rather cheap. For our proto you need 7,2 cm3 material. The price for the powder is about 50 cts per cm3. When you want a simpler solution, the LOM printer of Solido cost about 5.000 dollar. We think this printer is perfect for making half relief gables. And the material is also quit cheap. Kind regards, Hans van de Burgt
@Pray 59, Can you tell us, what specific material they use. In our research we saw a range of different stuff, fragile and very strong. Some of them were not suitable to paint and others quite well. But I agree, for modelmaking we need high standards. Hans van de Burgt
Ok so the plastic model costs about $3.60 to make. That is what I meant. Not the price of the picture. How much was the cost of making the actual model. Anyhow ok so 50 cents per cubic centimeter time 7.2 got it. Thank you.
If I were you, I'd go for it now. You need money to buy the machine (layoffs coming), power to run it (quadrupling electricity prices), it's an import (protectionist tariffs) and lots of money in the bank to buy it (asset reallocation). An any event, all the models show are BIG. How will it do with small models?
jBurgt that is some awesome things you've got going. Thanks for sharing. I wonder how long it will be before that type of manufacturing is on my cost level of our hobby?
@Tony Burzio, Certainly yes, One of our fellow in the taskforce-group, named “Spoors“ made several 3D Printed N-scale models. He uses the 3D printservices of different organizations, including Shapeways. This one was his first model: See for more information: Fabbing - spoors.nl Not small enough? See for an ameezing little city: 3D Printer Models an Entire City @FSM1000, A little remark for the mentioned prices… 0,40 ct. per cm3 is possible via a fablab. Serial production is not possible. For commercial printservices the price is between 1 and 2 dollar per cm3. Kind regards, Hans van de Burgt
Mcor Technologies from Ireland has developed now a new type 3D LOM printer. It’s even a very expensive machine (about 15.000 to 20.000 dollar), but this 3D LOM printer uses… normal paper. To make a model costs no more than 0,01 euro per cm3. Probably not suitable to make modeltrains, but so cheap that modelhouses are quite possible: See for an example this little house (120 cm3 e.g. 1,20 euro): The material seemed to be similar like wood or MDF. Our 3D/RM Taskforce-group is already in charge with Mcor Technologies, and of course we are studying the possibilities of this new approach. While we also don’t own a 3D printer, we are centainly find someone with our succesfull contacts e.g. Shapeways. The really renewing of our hobby is to learn to draw with CAD programs on a computer. At the other hand, several youngsters are rather familiar with these tools. It’s a very good instrument to enthusiast youngsters for our hobby. In a club or individual. Kind regards, Hans van de Burgt Beneluxspoor.Net Foundation
More buildings... Spoors, one of our members of the 3D/Rapid Manufacturing Taskforce group, developed a beautiful Dutch railway station. it’s a model of a Dutch railway station, a so-called “4e Klasse Waterstaat station”. Of this type of a railway station, about 15 were built all over country between 1862 and 1865. This railway station in N-scale (1:160) consists of 6 different parts. Walls, roof and porch roof, in so called “black detail” quality by shapeways. The model has been sprayed with a base paint of Revell (Spoors tested Tamiya base paint on another model and tat works fine too). After which He painted it with Vallejo Acrylic paints. The acrylics from Tamiya are great. The doors and windows are made of etched brass ... in this scale they would become too thin (0.25 mm) to print. See for more info: here Kind regards, Hans van de Burgt Beneluxspoor.Net Foundation
I asked that same question a few years back. Back then a 3D printer was about 50,000.00. But some had come out for cheaper. One thing about the 3D printers I have seen is that the end result needs to be sanded. Maybe the quality is better these days. The one I saw samples from had a definite grain to it. I'm sure once those become common everyone will consider it standard just like a Xacto or Dremel.
@Traingeekboy, Where some are looking for their own 3D printers, we find it more and more feasable to cooporate with 3D printshops, similar to Shapeways. The quality is increasing very fast, and the price per printed object is more than acceptable. You are right, a 3D printed object is (not) yet the same as a moulded one. They are similar. We don't think, it's a problem to sand it, to glue it, or to paint it. And why should we? Kind regards, Hans van de Burgt Beneluxspoor.Net Foundation
