Will This Change the Boating Industry

[hblask]

It is now (or soon to be) possible to 3D-print a house in about 20 hours.

I know you can 3D print fiberglass.

So what does this do to the boat industry when you can design your boat on the computer and have it build for you the same day? What will this do for weight, safety, cost?

[Therapy]

Could make a pretty awsome ferro boat in a hurry.

[Canibul]

what kind of concrete sets that fast?

[GordMay]

... What will this do for weight, safety, cost? .

Nothing?

[callmecrazy]

I think most boat designers already use 3d programs that they are familiar enough with to knock out a rendering of an existing design within 1 day.

New designs take a lot more time. I doubt the 3d homes thing will work any differently. If the design doesn't already exist somewhere, it becomes a new process of engineering and requires all the usual steps. Modular designs are nothing new in the building industry.

So, it's not going to change much... It would be great though to be able to take a paper design, scan it, then automatically have a 3d rendering that you can then play with. But I don't think that's what he's talking about...

It looks like this guys models are simplifying the construction process more than anything else. If the whole process is set up with one 1. 2. 3. type of process, with detailed 3d instructions for each step, pre-determined design philosophies, and pre-fabricated materials, it would greatly reduce the cost of construction. The worst part about construction is dealing with all the different contractors that want to do everything their own way, combined with the homeowners who want what they see in the magazines but can't afford it... This process would change that by setting a standard for each phase of construction that the contractors would have to adhere to, and eliminate the entire design and materials selection process.

Since boats are built by individual companies, you really don't have these same problems. The company can take a design and build it the way they've always built it.

He's also talking about thoroughly automating the entire construction process with the use of robots and standardized materials. Not gonna happen, except maybe in the case of government housing. I don't think anyone would complain in that case, but try taking away the entire construction/design/materials industries via robots and computers and see what happens

[nautical62]

The robotic technology advantage presented in the video is more about having very efficient robotic machinery to greatly speed up construction while almost eliminating human labor.

I can see the wall technology that they demonstrated. I have a harder time with the idea that such a machine could also wire a house, plumb a house, etc. all in a single day.

As someone previously indicated this technology might be more applicable to cement hulls than fiberglass construction, So maybe such an elaborate machine will cut the time to make a cement hull down notably, but will that really notably reduce the price of a finished yacht?

[Anonymous7500]

Originally Posted by Canibul

what kind of concrete sets that fast?

Why do you think that the 3D printer would print pre-set concrete as opposed to concrete that is already set? The chemical composition for set concrete is well known and, therefore, will be easily printable.

The capabilities of this technology, which is still in it's infancy, is almost limitless. It will only be limited by the ability and imagination of the designer. For example, if you were to want all of your wiring to be within PVC conduit and you wanted specific color coding to your wiring, you will be able to print that out. This technology will basically remove the phrase "not possible" from manufacturing.

[Canibul]

Originally Posted by Anonymous7500

Why do you think that the 3D printer would print pre-set concrete as opposed to concrete that is already set? .

what's the difference between 'pre-set' and being 'already set'??

I ' thought' he was using concrete....because he said he was using concrete. Am I missing some code here?

Anyhow you appear to be attempting to preach to the choir on 3-D printing. I just got a new Printrbot Plus assembled this past week. I'm working through some setup learning curves now. It's quite a kit to assemble.

[hblask]

Originally Posted by callmecrazy

So, it's not going to change much... It would be great though to be able to take a paper design, scan it, then automatically have a 3d rendering that you can then play with. But I don't think that's what he's talking about...

What this is about is a printer that prints the actual house. You sit in the office and hit "go" and watch the house being printed outside the window. No more construction workers, no more delays.

And from the sound of it, it can print the pipes and wiring, too. You may need additional printers, since each print head can only print one type of material, I believe.

So how much does a boat cost if there is no human labor in the construction, and it is all one super-strong yet super-light piece of fiberglass and plastic with cushions attached?

If you haven't checked, you can get a 3D printer now for less than $500. They only print plastic (like Lego-type plastic), but more expensive ones can print metal or whatever. I suspect this is where the first impact from 3D printers will be. Imagine if each boat builder, instead of selling parts, sold the CAD drawings of their boats. Now, something breaks, you download the plans and print a replacement yourself. It would probably have to be in port, but imagine anywhere in the world having a replacement part printed in a couple hours for the cost of the plastic or metal. Maybe the established builders won't do this, but a startup that did this could change the industry.

From there it will move on to bigger and bigger pieces, and finally custom boats printed overnight for the price of the plastic.

This technology will change the world over the next two decades far more than the industrial revolution ever did. (You read it here first. Or maybe you didn't, but pretend you did for my sake).

[callmecrazy]

Originally Posted by hblask

What this is about is a printer that prints the actual house. You sit in the office and hit "go" and watch the house being printed outside the window. No more construction workers, no more delays.

And from the sound of it, it can print the pipes and wiring, too. You may need additional printers, since each print head can only print one type of material, I believe.

So how much does a boat cost if there is no human labor in the construction, and it is all one super-strong yet super-light piece of fiberglass and plastic with cushions attached?

If you haven't checked, you can get a 3D printer now for less than $500. They only print plastic (like Lego-type plastic), but more expensive ones can print metal or whatever. I suspect this is where the first impact from 3D printers will be. Imagine if each boat builder, instead of selling parts, sold the CAD drawings of their boats. Now, something breaks, you download the plans and print a replacement yourself. It would probably have to be in port, but imagine anywhere in the world having a replacement part printed in a couple hours for the cost of the plastic or metal. Maybe the established builders won't do this, but a startup that did this could change the industry.

From there it will move on to bigger and bigger pieces, and finally custom boats printed overnight for the price of the plastic.

This technology will change the world over the next two decades far more than the industrial revolution ever did. (You read it here first. Or maybe you didn't, but pretend you did for my sake).

OHHH!

Somehow I missed that in the video, thanks for the explanation.

So basically, it's a star-trek style replicator

very interesting...

This could do wonders for certain industries. Much like CNC. Just type it in and it appears on the table! But seriously? 3d printing out a house, or a car, or a boat? Not in our lifetime...

[Anonymous7500]

Originally Posted by Canibul

what's the difference between 'pre-set' and being 'already set'??

The difference is the moisture content. Concrete continues to dry for a very long time. "Old" concrete will be just as easy to print as "new" concrete.

In regards to preaching to the choir, I don't try to preach to anyone. I was attempting to express where this technology will be going. The day will come that stores will be obsolete and instead, consumers will have printers to download files to print out consumer goods.

Of course, this is only my opinion.

[Anonymous7500]

Originally Posted by callmecrazy

This could do wonders for certain industries. Much like CNC. Just type it in and it appears on the table! But seriously? 3d printing out a house, or a car, or a boat? Not in our lifetime...

Depends on how long you plan to live.

There is currently a competition in the robotics arena to print out a robot that will walk off of the printer platform under it's own power. At that point, the difference between a robot and a car is simply scale.

Personally, I fully expect to see this in my lifetime.

[callmecrazy]

Originally Posted by Anonymous7500

In regards to preaching to the choir, I don't try to preach to anyone. I was attempting to express where this technology will be going. The day will come that stores will be obsolete and instead, consumers will have printers to download files to print out consumer goods.

Of course, this is only my opinion.

I believe that's possible. But without trying to make this political, I think the powers that be would have to be eliminated first There's a reason we don't all drive electric cars, have single solar cells that can power a house, carry cell phones that charge over the cell signal, and about a million other incredible technologies. There's just too much money left to be had in old tech.

I truly hope you're right and I'm wrong...

[Adelie]

The technology for 3D printing is limited to plastics at the moment and I would guess for a fairly long time to come.

I could see printing cement but it would take several extra steps to place it, wet it and compact it in place. Printing a grout (cement and sand) mixture would be a bit more complex but probably doable. Printing an actual concrete (cement, sand and gravel) would be exceedingly complex.

Printing ferrocement would be impossible, printing the metal parts would be prohibitively energy expensive compared to normal wire production and the heat from that printing process would damage the cementicious portion of the printing. It might be possible to print cement around an existing wire shell but it would be difficult to get the the cement paste into all the interstitial spaces between closely spaced wires at laps and wire junctions.

For the same reason it would be difficult unto impossible to print wires with insulation on them already in conduits.

This is not to say that major portions of a boat could not be printed, that seems much more achievable in the near term.

[hblask]

Originally Posted by callmecrazy

OHHH!

This could do wonders for certain industries. Much like CNC. Just type it in and it appears on the table! But seriously? 3d printing out a house, or a car, or a boat? Not in our lifetime...

They can do the concrete now. It's probably not cost effective yet, but this is an example of how 3D printing is going:

Two years ago I started looking into 3D printers. The cheapest one was about $2500, and had very limited capabilities.

A year ago it was around $1100.

Now you can get one for under $500, and can print to (I believe) 0.1mm accuracy.

That's two years, an 80% price drop. The goal is to ship them with the plans to print themselves, so once you buy one, you can make as many as you want. Imagine a hundred thousand engineers figuring out ways to use these things, to make the printing process itself cheaper. It is almost certainly going to follow the improvement curve of computers from 1980 to now, except that we've already got the computers and the internet and open source to accelerate the speed of that revolution.

If there is not a self-driving, 3D-printed car on the road within 20 years I will be extremely surprised. The plans for it will be free on the internet. (The printers and supplies will still be out of reach of most people, I predict, but car-printing stores will replace car dealerships). This is not Star Trek dreams, this is a revolution on the brink. Open source production will become a way of life, very soon.

It seems like the boat industry would be a great industry to be on the edge of this revolution. It has low volume of very picky buyers, no two people who agree on what a "good boat" is, with large construction costs despite basic principles that have been understood for a long time. Imagine hybrid hulls made of different materials at different spots depending on strength and weight needs, fused with nano-particles in ways that are impossible right now, and custom designs made at the push of a button. Even if the cost is the same (and it will likely be cheaper), that would *still* be a huge change.

Apple IIe, meet the iPad. That was around 30 years from A to B. We just moved past the Apple IIe of 3D printers into the first PCs and Macs......