Trading off a laser for a heat gun gives us lower resolution but at much lower cost, and is typical of our approach to 3D fabrication.

Rather than using a high-power CO2 or YAG laser ($5k and up), we use hot air created with the help of a $10 heating element. Our process is very much like a low-cost version of Selective Laser Sintering, or Selective Laser Melting, which are commercial processes used for plastic and direct metal printing. At the end of the build, the bed is raised to its original position, disinterring the fabricated model, while unused media is reclaimed for use in building the next object. By repeating this process, a three-dimensional object is slowly built up. We then lower the bed by a small amount, add a thin flat layer of media to the top of the bed, and selectively fuse the media in the new layer, forming a two dimensional image that is also fused to any overlapping fused areas in the layer below. Using a narrow, directed, low-velocity beam of hot air, we selectively fuse together the print media, forming a two-dimensional image out of the fused grains. The printing process begins with a bed of a granular printing media that has a fairly low melting point. The general idea of our build processвЂ“ that of stacking solid two-dimensional printed layersвЂ“ is actually common to most solid freeform fabrication methods.В Our machine employs what we believe is a fairly novel low-cost technology to accomplish this: selective hot air sintering and melting (SHASAM). We are extremely pleased to be able to report that it has been a success: Our three dimensional fabricator is now fully operational and we have used it to print several large, low-resolution, objects out of pure sugar. Our design goals were (1) a low cost design leveraging recycled components (2) large printable volume emphasized over high resolution, and (3) ability to use low-cost printing media including granulated sugar. In February we gave a sneak preview of our project to construct a home-built three dimensional fabricator.

Abs tc-100 thermal printer driver