Tech Talk / By Martha Knight

So far only one reader has bought a 3D printer and made me aware of having done so. But the fact that one has told me about this makes me think there may be more who didn’t see a need to contact me about it. And then, there must be at least a few people who don’t read my columns, yet have an awareness of innovations in printer/manufacturing/art/crafting technology. I have to read about their 3D printing adventures online or in tech mags.

Recently I had a conversation about 3D printing that gave me pause. This dude is a photographer. Several minutes into our conversation I realized that his idea of 3D printing was a method of printing photos or illustrations that would be viewed in 3D, something like holograms, but now possible to make easily in the home or office with a nice 3D printer. Nope, different technology altogether. Not but what it would be interesting.

For the year or two I have been going on about 3D printers, in this space, I have acknowledged that I can’t have one until the prices come down. And there are some drawbacks as to the costs of operation, and the size constraints, and the skills required to operate some models. But that appears to be changing.

I suppose I have hinted that the technology has the potential of being massively disruptive. There is a growing awareness of that, the more so as 3D printing has evolved, and become much more affordable, and has enough users and vendors to have its very own CES, or Consumer Electronics Show, Inside 3D Printing, held a week or so ago in New York City.

Disruptive, you say? Just making little models of things? Well, at that level, maybe not. But with the enhanced capabilities and quickening adoption of 3D printing there is increasing concern about legalities, and infringement, and intellectual property, and pirating, and counterfeit goods.

New technologies often do bring with them such difficulties. John Naughton has written a book about relatively recent disruption, “From Gutenberg to Zuckerberg: Disruptive Innovation in the Age of the Internet.” I have read some excerpts and reviews, not the book, but the title is a puzzler. Likely Naughton is not placing Gutenberg in the internet age, but indicating that current technological disruption is quite different from that unleashed by the invention of movable type printing.

Gunpowder. Bronze. Steel. Steam power. The compass. Telegraphy. Wireless transmission. Photography. Xerography. Sound transmission and sound recording and reproduction. You could add your disruptive inventions and finish this column for me.

In many instances the negative component of disruption does include snitching the work of others without paying for it—and better (or worse) ways of doing that. I remember when there was a computer user group called APPLE, and it was not about the innovations of Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak. The acronym was for Atari Pirates Pilfering Lots of Everything. Man, the programs, especially games, that got copied, initially onto tape, then onto 5.25-inch floppies!

Obviously pirating anything devalues the real thing and discourages the creative process. Would any of us write without getting paid? Probably, some. Would our best literature and music be written without copyrights and royalties? Probably not.

But now it is possible to make actual things, objects, by printing them! Adds a whole nother dimension to intellectual property theft. What if a great sculptor creates a bust of a notable, or an equestrian statue of, um, Eddie Arcaro, or my favorite brother-in-law does an intricate chip carving of an eagle in flight, and I scan and print the works in 3D? Okay if the sculptor or carver gives me permission or has a deal with me for making so many numbered copies. Otherwise, no-kay.

So long as 3D printing was priced out of the reach of people like me, the problem might not be prevalent. But now some 3D printers are selling for $500 or less.

There’s the daVinci, by XYZSystems, for $499. As a single-nozzle printer, it can make objects of just one color. It can make objects measuring up to about eight inches in every dimension. It would work well in science classrooms, or for hobbyists making decorative items.

MakerBot and 3D Systems are other vendors with models aimed at the consumer market. Solidoodle is another single-nozzle printer making slightly smaller objects.

3D printing, also called additive manufacturing, is accomplished by discharging a filament, typically but not always plastic, through a small aperture, layer after layer, like winding yarn into a ball. There has been industrial use for decades. If you want to do this on a slightly larger scale, there’s the X Objects Up Plus, now selling for $1,500, down from $4,000 when it was introduced.

Once used mostly for prototyping, 3D printing now can produce parts used in a variety of products, from home appliances to cars. One home user replaces dishwasher parts when they break. Using the appropriate filament material, manufacturers or repair centers or virtual machine shops can produce engine parts and other heavy-duty components.

The drafting and design software companies are issuing versions capable of outputting 3D designs to 3D printers. Computer-aided design (CAD) and computer-aided manufacturing (CAM) have entered a new era.

While the low-end model prices are sinking, and the others are falling in proportion, buyers need to realize that the operating costs are high. A kilogram of filament plastic costs around $50. That might print 350 chess pieces.

Printers will keep scaling up, more manufacturers will enter the field, prices will keep coming down, and before you know it these printers will be selling on eBay, and so will the stuff we can make with them. It will be fun to watch.

Meanwhile, I still want a big plotter for printing fabrics. Photos on canvas, reproductions of masterpieces, banners and pennants, wall cloth… Think of the political campaign uses! Would that be disruptive, or what?