Rapid Metal Prototyping
 

At some point we'll have 3D metal printers at home. Replicator anyone?

http://www.ipmd.net/news/001087.html

http://www.ipmd.net/assets/userfiles..._2011/eos3.gif

The above was created by direct metal laser-sintering (DMLS).

Ladies and gentlemen, the future is here.

Well if I wasn't getting pushed out of a job by 13 year olds in India this will certainly not be helpful. Cool as heck though. There are already polymer modeling printers in use in the jewelry biz that print from CAD files eliminating half of what I do by hand.

"Not be helpful"?

Let's ban MS Word so that typists can have their jobs back!
Let's ban dictation software so secretaries can have jobs!
Let's ban the sun so that light bulb manufacturers will stimulate the economy!

Yeah, pretty much not be helpful to me, as an independent self-employed jeweler who can in no way afford such technology (even if it was available to be used with precious metals). I'm not knocking this printer...frankly it's pretty badass and I'd love to have one so I could whip up a new manifold. I'm just biased towards handmade goodness since that's what pays my bills. If I could weld worth a damn then I wouldn't even need it for the manifold lol.