Makerbot - an open source 3D printer

This week I'm attending a Ubuntu Kernel Sprint and my colleague Steve Conklin brought along a fantastic gizmo - the Makerbot 3D printer. It is most fascinating watching it print 3D objects by extruding a thin ABS plastic trail of plastic in layers. It can print objects up to 4" x 4" x 6" - the imagination is the limiting factor to what it can print. Steve already demo'd it printing a variety of objects, the most impressive being a working whistle including a moving ball inside the whistle. It's not too slow either - it took about 25 minutes to print the whistle, which isn't bad considering the complexity and size of the object.













It's a cool piece of kit - doubly so because it's completely open sourced.