Food for thought...

With the rapid development of 3D printing, to include steel today...

How long before we can have new body panels or parts printed to restore our Xs?

Further thought; what will that do to the value of old/antique vehicles?

Think about it...

I could write a textbook on (large scale) rapid prototyping and stereolithography. Yes, systems are cheaper now. It seems everyone (even Home Depot) has a model for sale. But...I don't know how accurately they build when compared to commercial grade systems. I also have not kept up on material types they're capable of using now. The old sinter stations from the late 90s-on built parts out of metallic powder. Depending upon the application, one of these parts could be installed directly into the mechanical workings of some assembly. The new stuff, I don't know what the material properties are. I've been out of that field since 2003.

Mike... If I weren't too busy thinking about...

impotent things... strike that, I mean important things... I'd give this some more thought.

Alas, as Cesare says... they should come out with some biologics as well very soon, then combined with CT scanners we could build ourselves some actual working replicas of "people" we always wanted to "visit" with!

I'm not exactly sure how they might compare to the originals, but I do know the implant industry appears to be thriving...

(HA! Think about that! The Star Trek transporter wasn't too far-fetched after all... and our medical community has seemed to follow Hollywood for decades now, especially those old Frankenstein flicks!)

Ahhhhhh... Progress!

A good friend of mine and I were looking at replicating some of the plastic pieces that tend to break. He already has a very high quality 3D printer, we just need a scanner...

Hmmm, the parts would be very cost prohibitive, not to mention somone needs to create the CAD data as well.

Body panels would be restricted to very small pieces, but imagine rapid prototyping a headlight bucket - it would probably cost a fortune - heck, even just the headlight bezel would be about $1K (not including paying someone to generate the CAD). No one is going to have a "home brew" metal sintering station anytime soon in my opinion, at least that's what I've seen so far. I've had the chance to have some parts made on an EOS machine that was a million dollars... ha! It took DAYS to make the part, and it was thousands of dollars in cost.. it was for work, and the part came out fantastic..

Heh, I just watched a video of a guy who just printed something on youtube - 15 hours!! and the part fell over before it finished! 15 hours!!!

Personally, at the moment I think 3D printing really only serves the rapid prototyping industry. It's very expensive, slow, and still has many limitations. One day maybe, but it won't be anytime soon IMHO.

I've watched it grow from paper, to plastics, to steel today, all in the past six years or so. While we were once limited to cellulose based output smaller than a baseball, we could now easily fab the plastic parts for a headlight switch or new metal levers for turning on the wipers. We've already done a proof of concept handgun.

Maybe soon, we could get new wiper arms that take modern blades or battery covers. Perhaps in a little a 10 years, we could get new body panels or headlight shrouds...the possibilities are endless.

Who's to say that we won't be able to custom print an entire car in 25 years? Think back to all the things we thought were sci-fi 25 years ago (1990).

Thanks jvandyke. That's sort of what I envision happening over time, and as the community develops the drawings they'll wind up shared and available.

The real question becomes; what are "collector" cars "worth" if you can 'print' all of the replacement parts? Not just financially, but intrinsic value based on rarity? Aside from the VIN, are they 'rare' if you can 'print' one? (leaving aside all the government regulations that are sure to intrude)

I don't know about rarity and value, I don't really care to be honest. I just like the car so the cheaper the better. If your average joe can reproduce parts, so much the better, the whole car? That's a ways out I'd think. Maybe we'll have Star Trek Replicators soon, drive in, push a button, drive out two?
Anything that helps more people afford to keep things around longer is better for everyone I think. The purists can fight over and pay for originality. I'll take after market and running vs. OEM and inop any day.