D.I.Y. Selective Laser Sintering – Update
Update. Peter is still working on his SLS project. He is experimenting with a new fully laser-cuttable x/y stage. He is catching some flack for the ideas in some blog comment sections like hackaday. Obviously there is some refinement needed for accuracy, backlash, etc, but I applaud his efforts. I am sure some of his ideas will find their way into the final design and we will all benefit from it for this and other projects.
If he was just building a device for his own use, it would probably be easier and cheaper to use conventional materials, slides and gears, but he is clearing spending a lot of time to design something the budget conscious maker can afford.
Many people put similar questions to me on the design of the open source “self replicating” laser cutter. I have redesigned and rebuilt constantly to lower the costs, tools and skills required to build it. I swapped out very robust milled aluminum parts with laser cut Acrylic ones to prove they would work.
His most recent changes area aimed at removing the “shearing/binding issues” from the previous iteration. He is using Kapton tape (Polyimide-film) to reduce friction and using a four gear contact point.
[…] saw this while checking up on the progress of his selective laser sintering (SLS) project. Basically his idea was smaller power lasers might be able to cut through thicker material by […]