ฝัง
- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 9 มิ.ย. 2024
- Support the Slant 3D Testing Lab Kickstarter:
kck.st/41nTOGm
In this episode of Layer by Layer, we give our outlook on what we think 2024 holds for the 3D printing industry, discuss why there aren't more 3d printed products, and Lionel Messi's new box. We also talk a bit about filament manufacturing and why Slant 3D got involved.
00:00 Impact of Interest Rates on 3D Printing Companies
05:00 There is Plenty of Demand for 3D Printing
09:04 Why Aren't There More 3D Printed Products?
12:10 Recession’s Create Cool Companies
14:13 Don't Get Comfortable
15:45 Lionel Messi Got a Box from Adidas
19:53 Next Batch of Tangled Filament
21:07 Testing Lab TH-cam Channel
22:17 A Note to Filament Manufacturers
32:24 Stop Being Scared of Competition
43:20 Desktop Printers vs Industrial Printers
46:00 Software Updates
About Slant 3D
Slant 3D is a mass production 3D printing farm. Our production 3D printing farms allow clients to manufacture their products quickly and at scale without the cost or limitations of tooling.
Get a quote today at www.slant3d.com/
Produced by Slant Media - วิทยาศาสตร์และเทคโนโลยี
I love how you just progressively lose your sanity throughout the video.
Yeah, I saw that too. At the end he was off the Rails in a good way.
I also can't believe that people only cared about the box lol.
It was a long week.
A lot of filament manufacturers argue that even their black PLA has additives, etc to enhance printability, reduce warping/stringing, or improve strength etc. Would be interesting to see you test various brands of black filament to really see if there is truly a difference.
Reason for the kickstarter
Love what you are doing and I'm going to reiterate the clear pla I bought from you is clearly better and more consistent than the material I've purchased from other suppliers. I'm looking forward to future purchases!
Thank you so much
agree. Once I got it adapted to the X1C, it's been great. Now a quest to get it as clear as I can get it.
Also - product custom design and materials standards seem to be issues that scare folks away from parts mfg.
We need a lean and/or agile product development framework to apply to future 3D print projects for us to use for client management.
Interest rates were super low in the times around 1999-2002, too. That wasn’t just the last 10-15 years. They certainly are higher now. More akin to late 70s/early 80s.
Amazon was profitable almost right away. If you look at their balance sheets you’ll see they broke even until 2010s because the recapitalized profits as you described. It’s not that they were losing money it’s that they played the long game.
And Amazon now owns big $$$ in realestate. They have fulfillment warehouses in prime locations all over the world sitting on big $ land. This will keep them even more stable as time goes on.
nice work man. i could not agree more with the substance of your comments. we need more folks like you to move manufacturing forward.
I do hope that you, or someone with the same idea will also come to this side of the pond and starts competing on pricing. €10 a spool for quality checked filament, even if it's just the basic colors would be good to have here in the Netherlands.
We had a local manufacturer doing €18 a kg/spool for PLA, PETG and ABS (in like 20 colors each), but now got bought up to remove competition. So, same filament, different sticker is now €29.99
I love that there's no PR officer to put a muzzle on you. This was a fun one.
Heaven forbid
I really appreciate the discussion surrounding "competition" among us... especially the analogy of the runners. I have been in retail sporting goods (shoes of all things) for 20+ years, and have a local competitor that had no interest in the specialized shoes I offered, until I offered them and created a market for them. They have for some time since used the methodology of the "stealing your shoes". They buy accounts with the same brands and then sell them at or below cost just to prevent my ability to get sales. I have approached them repeatedly with the offer to work together rather than against each other, but to no avail. I have determined to be the sharp edge of the sword, researching diligently how to offer things they can't or won't. I see great potential in the 3D print industry in our future. For me, at the moment, it is a part-time business that adds a little income, but more a way for me to grow outside my normal direction. Thanks.
Have you looked into laser engraving? It would probably take some work to figure out the implementation because of the shoe shape and modern materials may have issues. You could maybe swap a laser with a sharpie, airbrush, etc. You could find a way to 3D print on a shoe or print pieces that fit on a shoe.
These seem like a challenge but possibly doable with relatively low cost machines, some 3D printed parts , and the right settings. I could be wrong. I’m just speculating.
Love your honesty and straight forthness! You so right regarding the industry! Keep it going man :D
Really enjoyed your take on things and I appreciate that you took time to educate audience regarding the 3D printing industry.
Awesome. Just pure Gabe ramping up for 45 minutes. Love it!
This "Slant Rant" was a nicely "boxed" gift, left over from the holidays. Many very valid points.
I was kind of expecting a 2023 reflection podcast, but looking down the road to where the 3d-printing industry needs head in 2024 and beyond is even more relevant. This will be a fun episode to look back on in 12, or 24 months.
Tuesday
Burn testing would be interesting; How different materials burn, as filament AND as a printed object with say 10% infill, how they ignite, how easy they ignite, at what temps they burn or ignite etc.
That is one of the stretch goals fo the campaign
THANK YOU for your push on this filament.
Thanks for the support
When is tangle filament going to ship to Canada ?
hey just wanna let you know that I love your podcast and how nice it is to see someone who actually understands how proper business works! keep it up.
thank you for watching
hey man i loved this video. What machine do you use to make your filament?
Great video, really interesting view point, really appreciate the insight 💪
Thanks for watching
About posting the video on tangled: your competitors can also post the video on their sites, and then it is even tested by an external party so it bears more weight (figuratively speaking) and thry have more to win.
Amazon commodity filament prices are closing in on $10/kg. It's possible to buy two 1 kg spools of PLA for $24. These are typically name brand Chinese suppliers. I'd like to see 3 kg spools (as Tangled is heading toward) to reduce the cost per kg while reducing the labor needed to change reels and reduce wasted filament on the end of a reel that isn't enough for the next part. Filament quality is also improving.
33:00 😂 I love the Rant 3D segments.
Thank you for sharing about the pain points and how you are trying to be part of the solution
I like your optimism and appreciate your desire to push the industry forward as a whole. I can understand your frustration regarding competitor engagement with testing their filament against your own and others. And I’m sure you also see that regardless of how honourable your intent is, this is a conflict of interest.
Love the Slant Rants ™ 😂
Trademark Pending
This was good and fun one :)
Thanks for stopping by
When will the Prototyping service of Slant 3D be available again? On the Website says it will be back on 2024, I was thinking on 1st of January.
Grow the pie! There are so many industries that need to grasp and understand this.
Very True
I got some of the wonk and love the clear and some black or grey mixed in...i want more wonk
Can you tell me about your subscription filament. I see the type of pla it is and is it that much better then say like Sunlu Elite PLA because you can get 3kg of that every month for about 40.
Great rant/video as per usual. My own personal views on why there hasn’t really been a breakthrough product on the market that was designed and printed for mass consumption specifically for 3D printing manufacturing is mostly due to the adoption of PLA as the de facto material. Other than printing prototypes and trinkets, PLA just isn’t a robust material and yet all the 3D printer manufacturers use it as their design standard material. My own personal view is that TPU is the most impressive 3D print material out there. Yes it suffers from slower speed printing (though I’ve been able to successfully and consistently print at 300mm/s 95A) but the end result is far superior to PLA. Layer lines are practically indistinguishable, bed adhesion is phenomenal and it has great material properties like impact resistance and UV resistance far better than PLA.
Yea. Tpu is pretty great. Tough to turn into filament though.
I enjoyed the rant as always.
I think Bambu are doing a great job, they have affordable printers with great software for most consumer to start out in 3D printing.
I'v been in 3D printing from the start and had several different printers my most expensive being the Ultimaker S3.
I now use the Bambu A1 as my go to printer. I am a hobbyist, I just make functional parts and odd toys for myself and people I know.
Speaking off anyone want an Ultimaker S3 lol
this was a fun one
Are there any plans for an EU-Warehouse for local shipping? I really want to buy some of the filament, but the shipping costs to Europe are not that great
One step at a time. Working on it
When it comes to filament the problem I have is I need a 65- 80D TPU and it seems all the specialty filaments are in Europe.
Been meaning to test out that Armadillo stuff, wonder how that would fare in a pressure test.
@@ronnetgrazer362 I may have to buy some. I really need something that will work in the AMS.
Kingroon has been offering filament at 8.5$ per 1kg spool shipped in batches of 10kg at a time.
Sure. We are trying to get to 1 spools 10$ (Not 10)
It'd be nice to characterize molecular weight distribution and presence of plasticizers and other additives.
Not sure if it was just because it was the wonk product but it was dirty(as in particles on the outside of the filament). My lot was mostly clear so it was easy to see black speckles everywhere. Runs fine for the little bit that was used, just added the extra step for cleaning on my end. I mention this here because there doesnt seem to be anywhere to leave reviews.
Honestly, as much as I love 3D printing, I am not sure it's ever realistically going to compete with the established big boys in regards to manufacturing at scale. Does it even need to? It does something REALLY well. It allows you to test out an idea, and bring it to market, on a shoestring budget. That, and niche small scale production, is where it shines. For example, I am developing a kinda complicated product. It has about 10 individual plastic parts of varying sizes, along with components I've purchased from elsewhere.
I can EASILY now make 25 of this product, using my 3D printer, and test the market, with basically zero money.
And then once I've tested the market, and if it makes sense, I can then invest more to get a few of the external parts injection moulded so they look nicer, are stronger, and are cheaper to make en mass. I would probably keep the small internal components 3d printed as they can be made in decent numbers on 3d printers quite easily and the cost of getting an injection mould made make no sense.
Or, the thing doesn't sell... And I'm not out £30k.
But without 3D printing, this would never have progressed from an idea in my head. That's where 3D printings value lies, imo.
Already doing it. That's our day job
I get the feeling you are a fan of Jon Stossel's take on bottle neckers ^_-
Anyway, it's probably already on your list, but just in case please don't forget to include Printed Solid's Jessi PLA in your testing.
One issue I am seeing in the small 3d printing market I'm in and the niche I try to operate in for sales (I'm looking to branch out due to some difficulty)
A lot of ppl just purely "don't have money".
But the weird paradigm I am finding is with the increasing availability of cheap 3d printers.
Someone will swear $30 is beyond too expensive for w 3d printed part, because it's not like it's metal or anything.
But what is not too expensive is $250 to go out and buy their own printer and filament l, try to recreate the item, fail, realize their in over their head and now they have a $250 paper weight.
I'm sure this phenomenon has a name, if anyone knows it I am curious what it is called.
Flashbacks of the film Seven... What's in the box?! :)
Please leave the link to the tangled store in every video description
That will become more regular once we have continuous production up and running again. We hate to send folks to an out of stock page. "Bear with us"
As a grumpy old man who has been 3D printing for just about 20 years, it's refreshing to hear someone screaming the same rant I would scream cared to listen ;)
Giggled so hard at 45:10 haha
This was interesting, especially the comments about PLA being a commodity. I've only recently dived into 3D printing and I'm a data-head, so I've been trying to research the different filaments. I see terms like PLA, PLA+, PLA Meta, etc. and don't know exactly what the difference is, and I've determined that I'm not alone in that. I've seen opinions ranging from "they are actually all the same" to "xxx filament changed my life" and I still don't know except to guess that the truth is somewhere in the middle. I backed the kickstarter in the hopes that you guys will answer these kinds of questions (and lots of other questions that I don't even know yet to ask).
Agreed that there are a number of varieties of PLA. Part of the problem of testing them is that they are formulated, as in additives to the PLA aside from color pigments, with different materials that provide different features.
The label on the varieties of PLA filament that I buy tend to be the house brand for MicroCenter, named Inland. This is rebranded from a couple of different companies in China. And I am looking to start buying Tangled filament on a subscription basis once I've reduced stock somewhat.
The 4 that I'm aware of in my local retailer (I'm admittedly a home user, not doing this at industrial scale) are PLA, PLA +, PLA Pro, and Tough PLA. PLA is pretty much unmodified PLA filament, with, or w/o color or light modifying characteristics like Silk PLA. PLA + is run about 10-15 degrees C higher for extruding, and has the option of a post processing step that gives it a higher glass temp (where ambient heat will cause the material to deform under it's own weight. PLA Pro I don't know much about. Tough PLA has additives that result in prints that have better shock resistance. I.e. if you print a 'Thwaker' from thingiverse in Tough PLA, it's less likely to suffer a catastrophic failure when used as s hammer, than regular PLA will. On the other hand, it's not going to be quite as capable of withstanding non-shock forces. It's probably not as good of a material for making a clamp or vice from. Note that I've fond that ToughPLA prints well at between 225 and 235 on my Ender3Pro, but does not print well at all on a K1 with the stock extruder. This intruduces the question of whether HyperPLA should be tested, or does it matter in an industrial setup, because the characteristic it's aiming for is a combination of what I'm seeing with ToughPLA for resiliance, along with the temperature flow characteristics needed for a printer running 300 mm/s during print. These again may involve different testing procedures.
To test the properties of the different variations of PLA would very likely involve having to craft tests that show the characteristics the filament manufacturer is trying to target. For example a shock test may involve striking a print with a weight on a fixture that shows how much energy the swinging weight had after striking. Thomas Sanlander has done some of these types of tests, though I don't know if he's been doing any more of these tests in the past couple of years, and I haven't seen them since he re-branded his channel.
Testing the heat tolerance of tempered PLA+ is likely to require a fair amount of time to test different variables as well. As an example if you print at the bottom of the range on your print, then temper at the bottom of the recommended tempering range, in your oven, how long do you have to temper for different results than just leaving the print on the print bed a little longer. There is also the question of how accurate is the temperature you're printing, tempering, etc. at.
Additionally, there are other effects that some of these PLA additives may be generating, both good and bad. For example you may get better bed adhesion with some of them, or you may want to be doing air quality monitoring around your printers for things that may be out-gassed. These may, or may not, be of importance in a home use setup, vs. an industrial level print farm.
From some of the earlier videos from Slant 3D, I gather that a significant percentage of the prints that they do for things like the construction electrician community isn't using PLA, though I can't remember what material they do use. And from the sounds of things, the filament that they sell under the Tangled name is more like PLA+ than just PLA.
One 'tip' I've encountered is that if you want to print a variety of different filament types, and sometimes this even includes different filament colors, you may want to consider dedicating a printer to that material. In my experience, there are issues with switching between (say) PLA and PET-G. Part of this can be something as simple as being aware that printing the latter onto different materials can result in different adhesion characteristics. For example, some people have reported that it will bod to glass beds at such a level that it will rip pieces of glass off the bed when you try to remove it. Obviously this is going to make for an expensive replacement in some cases, but if you have built a setup using a G9 bed to print PET-G to, you may find that in some cases other materials (ASA or ABS for example) won't stick to the bed properly at all. And other people may be having no such problems at all.
The other side of this is to remember that what you may be willing to tolerate in one setting, may be absolutely different from what someone else is willing to tolerate in a different setting. I've noted that I'm printing as a hobby. If 10-25% of my prints fail, that's OK. That's not an acceptable failure rate for someone like Slant 3D. Having a print failure rate that high would potentially cause the same variety of issues as losing 25% on their profit margin.
36:07 Thank you. I don't know why people always got to be in toxic competition with each other (well I kind of do, but that's a topic for another video), the best way forward has always been working together with others.. these divisions are not only bad for companies, but bad for people in general... it's no wonder everything is in such shambles these days NotLikeThis
Why do you need a kick starter to finance a lab that is part and parcel of your business model? Also, to be fair, a quick comparison between your testing videos and CNC Kitchen shows that there are so many low-hanging-fruits in your productions that I don't see how you can ethically ask for kickstarter funding.
3D printing is no different than any other manufacturing method when it comes to sales and profitability... it all depends from the product you make... it's the product that gives value otherwise a roll of plastic is worth the same anywhere.
um no
@@rexxx927 great debate. get lost
Any chance youre hiring a millwright?
The most I'll spend on PLA is $17, but lately I'm paying $14-$15 for a kilo.
I think these podcasts eps should have more time between them (regarding the "SOMEONE DO SOMETHING NEWSWORTHY RANT")
Preach brother Preach!
Vertical integration is important especially if suppliers can't meet needs but quality, price, or whatever! Buying USA makes sense, but it must be comparable.
Lol, truth matters and yes we learn each episode, thanks!
Thanks for watching
Honestly you and Tesla and spacex are the only reason why I would move back to California I wish I could help more with your mission I agree with your statements if you ever would like me help definitely let me know it’s nice to see companies that move forward
Not in california
@@slant3d lol that’s even better where you guys located at
The box news generates demand for more FDM boxes. Seems good.
Can you talk about the tarmo5?
th-cam.com/video/r2UDc4A8huY/w-d-xo.htmlsi=RUg9qremrDvPpFQw
3d printed rc car. Axels, chassis etc are 3d printed
36:30 "Don't try to be anti-competitive" STRATASYS! 😀
Unsustainable
Interest rates impact a lot more than just a business's cost of capital. The reason that interest rates are adjusted to control inflation is because they are a nearly direct knob on consumer spending, especially for big ticket items like cars and houses, and therefore the economy as a whole. High interest rates means consumers spend less in general, and that reduces growth rates. Growth rates and consumer spending are the thing that companies care a lot about, so those being reduced are a big deal even if the cost of capital itself *for that business* isn't. It also means less equity investment (as bonds appear more attractive with much less risk) and banks being more stingy with business loan requirements (as higher interest rates increase the risk of default).
I manage a construction materials testing lab and would love to help if possible.
Thank you
We all want to know what’s in the frickin box 😅
I’ve been sharing the kickstarter with other 3d printers as well as donating. I want to see the data be available. The data is really lacking and there seems to be a large amount of overstated properties and capabilities on some filaments.
Glad to hear adult words. Collaboration is the way forward.
Mass production:
Funny how you emphasize that. Just one of the paper machines in the plant I worked in made thirty MILES of paper twenty five feet wide every HOUR. We made the kind of paper you find used in pharmaceutical products boxed in.
Yes I said thirty miles every hour.
Why do you think patents are not moats? What do you consider to be the top best moats a business can have?
Operations and culture are the biggest moats. Patents are basically useless for starting businesses
It's obvious that you're trying to be collaborative.. Alternatively you could just buy a roll of "competitor" filament at retail, test it and publish the results a la "Project Farm". You don't need their permission or money. Good video, thanks!
That is is true and we will be doing that. But they had the opprotunity to be more involved in the process and put their best foot forward and they have passed on it
@@slant3d It's short-sighted on their part. All sorts of industries have collaborative "joint working groups" that help to develop and ensure market standards and conformance and if they end up not sitting at the table that can eventually become detrimental for them.
I'm starting a company to bring 3d printing products to more people. I wonder if slant3d would be willing to partner for filament subscriptions and adding that large manufacturing option to the platform. While you're customers are designers, my customer's will be their customers, making more business for you.
I've been desperate for that testing to hit the goal. I haven't made any money in a few years, ive spent but not mare. I just got my business up and going, ive made a couple of sales, if it were 2 months from now I'd be in on the Kickstarter but it will be dead by then. So please don't consider it dead as you gain more ground here on TH-cam.
There is absolutely no way those $14 a spool Chinese PLA is made from Ingeo/Natureworks. Also, cost of doing business in the US is also extremely costly compared to China. But if ur willing we start filament manufacturing co. in Mexico 🥳
your competitors will magically be able to offer $10/kg filament shortly. Keep up the fight and don't sell out when they offer.
~15usd + shipping is kinda competitive but when i look to eryone especially petg with ~11usd/kg with free shipping its a different story. keep up you will prob get there but until now as you said the cheapest gets the deal because its a commodity - only thing eryone filament is not that much known in general
36:50 ??? what berry bush? huh
Your take on 3d Printing doing great during recession is interesting. Have to say there is the other possibility that it is doing really bad because no one is spending money on luxury items. Like things from etsy. Not saying your take is bad but that is not the only possibility.
Do you by any chance like Joey b toonz?
♥
Any filliment manufacturer not willing to let you test them, will make consumers wonder why they dont want them to be tested.
As a mold designer and a lover of 3d printing, I appreciate your optimism. Sure 25k parts can be printed in a manageable timeframe but I'll say it again, if you need a million parts in 6-12 months you'll need a mold or two. Regardless of cost, getting a quality product to market as fast as possible is the most important goal. The faster you can do this the better. You do that with a robust mold that runs 30-120 second cycle times. Adidas took 200 hours to print a box. Utilizing 3D printed metal inserts for un-drillable conforming cooling water circuits so faster and better quality parts can be achieved is where something I don't see talked about enough. Also, if things go some-what as you predict, pellet extruders melting polymers right above the hot end will be the thing for the production space not filament. Melting pellets to make the filament just to re-melt that filament to print with sounds counterintuitive to lowering the price of printing. Making cheaper things isn't always better either. Some people like nice things.
I see some serious problems with your logic.
One, how many products even sell a million units? At that scale you are almost certainly talking about a component as opposed to an entire product. As was previously stated, a box is not a product and you rarely make even remotely small quantities of boxes.
Two, please, set a deadline for 6-12 months from now to have a million parts made and you have no part modeled. Good luck. Assuming you manage to not have serious problems that results in you not needing a new mold, getting the mold made and setup within that timeframe and making the parts is going to be a challenge... Unless the parts are incredibly small. Sure, injection molding can be better if you use typical timeframes needed for injection molding. But if you need the product done in less time, you are out of luck.
Three, having the component that converts the pellets on the gantry into a bead is a non-starter. Any design you are going to end up with is going to add a lot of mass which will dramatically slow down the machine. More likely you would see a small device that converts pellets into a constrained filament that is then fed to the nozzle. There are serious tradeoffs with doing that, most of which decrease quality of the end result. Additionally, pushing molten plastic through a tube that needs to flex sounds like a nightmare, especially since you would need to make sure the plastic doesn't solidify. (Unless you have an additional heater, though at that point you are back to the same problem, re-melting the filament to print.)
@@SirSpence99 I see some serious problems with your logic .
One, the answer is a lot actually so molds aren't going anywhere soon ( I may be biased but please trust me when I say I fear AI taking my job as a designer well before no one wants to buy molds). I design/ build molds and for example we made 3 molds for the same recycling bin ( funny enough its plastic a box with no hinges nor lid lol) because they needed a million parts a year. Then 6 molds for the same company that made the the yellow amazon warehouse tote. amazon wanted 2 million units in one year and that's what it took to get the end customer their product. You can't print that and I cant see any time in the near to distance future where it makes sense to. Those are only a few recent examples of the simple bullshit tools that if designed right will run 20+ years. Now I'd love to see over molded , excuse me, 'over-printed' glass panels with hard shot as a support substrate and soft shots as a gasket all in one part. I say this because Mercedes has a reverse injected 2 shot rotary tool that does just that. I won't even get into the stacked gear operated molds that are 2-3 molds stacked on top of one another. We just hade one that spit out at least 16 sun visors every 2 minutes.
Two, logistics is an issue in every industry but you forget we do this for a living so don't fret. You mention no part modeled and I have no idea why that has anything to do with this. You couldn't print the part without the model either. So this point is irrelevant in my eyes. I'm talking millions of parts. Models for which will be ready by the time the tool gets kicked off to the design team for a block out report so tooling data can be discussed. You just better have final approved data before you go ham on printing ( wait until you deal with customers and data revisions lol ie. get final data approval signed off asap and documented to cover your ass doesn't mean they wont change something but that is now chargeable) Mean while you could be printing along and what was "final" data provided by the customer changes and all your prints are no good. I just have to update my design since no files are issued nor steel cut. We double check part revision at final meetings and customer approves to cut the steal. I'm afraid you don't understand how long it would take to get that amount of parts of that size in that timeframe using 3D printing. Not happening anytime soon.
Three, see you don't get it and are complicating it. What did say about tubes bro? You are thinking the printers you know or may have seen. Its more like replace the spindle on a CNC with with a hopper for pellets that drop to a melt zone as a freed screw extrudes my ooey gooies goodness through my nozzle as I print 150-300 IPM. If we want big fast parts that retain structural integrity as an molded part does we're gonna need more than anything that is currently available, being working on, or even thought of. Non Planular Printing and hybrid ( additive/subtractive) printing of plastics is a great asset to the molding industry. Prototyping and 3d printed metal mold components open alot of doors for us designers.
Don't misconstrue my position as "hating". I just don't think 3D printing will ever replace molds. It has just as much use in manufacturing as printing does. These technologies are only meant to work together not have one beat out the other...
@@5265060
Wow, just wow. You really are convincing me you can't understand context at all.
First, I explicitly stated that both boxes and components were off the table. Your three examples, two were boxes, one was a component. So you didn't even get close to countering my point or Slant's points.
Two, your entire chain here is completely irrelevant and further goes to my point that if you pick and choose your timeframe based upon the needs of injection molding, it gets an advantage... Which is frankly, stupid and makes me question your understanding of logistics. Every manufacturing method has strengths and weaknesses, startup time and adaptability are two massive weaknesses of injection molding and two massive strengths of 3d printing. The shorter the timeframe, the better 3d printing does, the longer, injection molding. If you were being honest, you would acknowledge that for the vast, vast majority of products, most of which sell well under 1 million units and are only relevant for a year (if not just a season) the weaknesses of injection molding is massive and the strengths aren't that great.
Finally, if you are printing at 300 IPM, unless you are printing with a massive nozzle > 1mm, your print speed is going to be slower than a 100 dollar printer. Doing some quick math: 61 cubic inches a second divided by (10 cubic mm a second to cubic inches a second) means that in order to print, using standard size nozzles (0.4 mm, any bigger and you start rapidly losing quality) it takes just shy of 28 hours to extrude 1kg of filament. Lets say that for the sake of simplicity, 1kg of filament costs you 20 USD and pellets end up being around 5USD. Assuming the price difference between the pellet printer and the non pellet one is 600 dollars (lol, 30x that is more realistic) It would take, with no maintenance, (600/15*28) 46.7 days of constant printing before you would make that difference up. From experience, increasing nozzle size, each .1mm increase adds 10% flow rate resulting in *roughly* a 2x flow rate at 1mm compared to .4mm.
Basically, compared to the most garbage off the shelf printer you can get, it will take months of constant printing before you break even in the absolute best case scenario. That completely disregards maintenance. (A hopper would almost certainly require significantly more maintenance than a filament printer.)
So no, "dropping a hopper on a mill to get 150-300 IPM" is not remotely viable in manufacturing.
Interesting that you bring up 3d printed molds that without significant effort have a very limited run-time making them (usually, and certainly not cost efficiently) not able to do a million parts before wearing out.
37:30 filament manufacturers are not your competitors. 3d printing mass manufacturer and upcoming 3d printing farms are your competitors.
Simon Sinek wrote a book about companies and what kind of game they are playing, infinite or finite. Many companies don't know what game they are playing. Slant 3D is playing the infinite game where the ball goes back and forth with no clear winner but the game continues anyway. That is a valuable piece of information. For anybody wondering about the infinite game, here is a link to Simon's video: th-cam.com/video/tye525dkfi8/w-d-xo.html
Thank you so much
Please Polymaker do not sell. I finally found the best matte PLA.
The 3D printing industry thinks of TPU as flexible, and it is, so the goal is always consistently extruding lower durometer filament and making a 3D printer extruder that can reliably print it. TPU has other benefits that are being ignored. It's very chemical, abrasion and UV resistant, has excellent interlayer strength and very high impact resistance. We need some much higher durometer TPU that's easier and faster to print for solid non-flexible objects.
Engineers have a tendency to be mildly arrogant. Especially when it comes to people minimizing the work they do or the effort they put into their work. It's good to slap back every once in a while.
8:22 eggs in one basket for sure
I think the 3d printing community also needs to step up their game as well... Buy local and support home grown businesses. Why? Faster shipping, better support, and sometimes even better quality. Same thing goes for printers. I get that the X1 Carbon is the bee's knee's but labour, parts and equipment are significantly cheaper in China hence the low price for what you paid for. It's great for consumers but not good for local businesses or businesses outside of China. I also owned a company in China and the costs of running businesses in china is so much less than in other countries as well. Salaries were lower, capex/opex expenditure were lower, taxes were lower etc. It was awesome... That's why companies shouldn't try to compete on price.
It's a little oversimplification for necessity sake due to the very audience, but the public traded printing world really is getting tamped on by so many factors. Everything from inflationary spikes, to sanctions, too many of these companies states that they are primarily based out of increasing tax rates and burdens. It really is the worst declining climate to start a business in low margin atmospheres. You really need to start with margins higher than 25% in order to survive right now.
Over the last two years I have made a conscious decision to never pay more than $13 a kilo for black / white PLA or ABS. I've bought cheap without issue and I will not spend 20-30 a kilo just because its made locally. I will spend that for multi extruded colors, duals and tris. I'll spend more for CF and GF too but It's been two long years since I've bought American. That bugs me but It's not my loss, local manufactures are the ones losing a customer.
Can't compete against what is essentially slave labor in China and government subsidized factories (subsidies significantly comprised of the repayment of bond money America used to blow up Iraq in ~2003, not a very good ROI to be honest). The only thing we care about at the marketplace is the price-tag, for good reasons... and there are a lot of implications we can't be bothered to think about.
It sounds as if Tangled is trying to collaborate in the filament industry that is forced to compete but would prefer to be a cartel.
Wait, so my investments in all those NFTs is a liability??!! #stonks
There's no real excuse for US filament to be more expensive. US has dominated PLA production for decades (and so has amortized the equipment the most), and grows a full third of the world's corn (while having just 1/20th the world population). (We also produce the most natural gas--almost a quarter of the world's total--and oil. Natural gas is used as in energy input to making PLA.) So our raw material cost should be lowest, certainly lower than China which is a net importer of corn and especially natural gas while the US is a big net exporter of both. US also seems to be good at converting raw hydrocarbon energy into refined fuels, as most of our petroleum based exports are things like gasoline. (The US does a similar thing with food, often exporting meat instead of just the raw inputs for meat production like corn.) Actually, unlike assembled products like 3D printers which may have high labor costs, the US should be able to dominate commodity filament production, especially for domestic use where shipping costs (and import/export associated costs) could be significant. No excuse for US manufacturers not dominating commodity filament production in the US. Maybe we're just not hungry enough?
Coopetition FTW.
"Made in America" is not regressive or lazy.
Its about consideration of a community and people that at some level matter to you.
28:00 US labor is more expensive than shipping costs to/from China. 😆
Incorrect
It seems like the US would have a big advantage over China in feedstocks. Aren't they a byproduct of fracking?
As a Canadian, I generally see "Made in the USA" as synonymous with "three times more expensive for 90% as good." I know the US is a big enough market by itself to keep a lot of filament makers occupied, but I'm hardly unique in my opinion about "American made" products. So if anyone is leaning on "Made in the USA" as a reason to buy *their* product, they really ought to spend some time investigating how that plays in the rest of the world.
(For clarity: I generally see "Made in Canada" as "probably only 90% as good but I'm supporting local business and won't have to pay import charges, so good enough." So *get* wht "MAde in the USA" is valuable *for Americans*. I'm just saying it's not all that valuable in the ROW.)
Oh, and I guess it's a good thing the host here didn't go into art criticism. :D :D Thank you for a massive laugh.
As for your notes on Amazon: I get what you're saying about Amazon being hungry and planning for the long-term. But it's really hard for me to overlook the way Amazon is now exploiting its position across several chokepoints to crush not only the quality of physical goods, but the viability of creative/artistic work as a living. My definition of evil is "actively chosing to harm others in pursuit of your goals" and I just can't see Amazon as anything but a massive force for evil. So I hope 3D printing - which on the hobby end is very much facilitating creative work - doesn't take too many lessons from Amazon.
Finally, I just want to say I love the editorialising on business practices. I minored in Economics when I finished my History degree, and your stories really help me take that academic knowledge and transform it into what happens in the actual world.
stop saying Um so much lol, just say what you want to say. Good video, Thanks for the info!
As much as I like the videos where you complain for a while (I know, it’s been a long week), I feel like I prefer your videos where you discuss design optimization on different models. Maybe you could do episodes where you take a popular model off of Printables/BambuWorld/Thingiverse and just point out the good and bad of the design/printability? Those seem more interesting and less annoying (no offense)
Here's a saying for you. A rising tide floats all boats.
The idea of buying 'Made in the USA' works best, (in my view) when what is being bought is comparably better in the qualities you need, and any price discrepancy is effectively negligible. If it were an option, I'd rather buy filament from a company that has a century or more of history in chemistry, especially with respect to thermoplastics. But we're not seeing a lot of filament in the US that's being made by companies operated out of Germany. Instead we get inexpensive stuff from China that's using raw materials from the US... Ah well.
With all due respect, you should change your opinion. The reason some europe pla maker can ship it to the US, and still make a profit is because their product is actually better. As you know the printer just moves filament by the mm, so if the filament diameter is incorrect, so is the 3dprinter's output. Its is a mathematical assumption, of the 3dprinter, that the filament is perfect diameter, and perfect density. People who know, pay.
Whats is in the BOX???
Honestly 200h print time for the Adidas box is the worst advertising for 3D printing industry possible. Sounds like a 2k$ or 20k$ end price product for public, which is not the point of 3D prints, that yourself point out all the time: 1. impossible geometry finally possible and 2. lower cost on supply/storage chain by producing the perfect number. While everyone wants the 3D printing industry to feel the gaps of needs in the production market. I think I don't understand print farms as printing in quantities, but in opposition by printing a huge amount of different configurations (I have in mind the entire lego catalogue that can be printed on the very same machine)
"by printing a huge amount of different configurations" - that's one of the greatest strengths of 3D printing IMO. You can have countless SKUs and variations and since they're all made with the same machines, there's no worry about storing a bunch of molds.
Sad European noise where no print farm have competitive price nor etsy integration.