[HH] 3D printing vs. desktop CNC

[Tom Metro]

Greg London wrote:
> Well, currently, production built CNC mills cost many-thousands of dollars
> price range. Here's one that sells for around $6k.
> 
> The spool-based 3D printers sell in the $1k to $2k range.

I thought we were comparing against $500 mills with CNC conversion kits
applied?


> But why buy a subtractive CNC Mill that can only handle plastic...

I was thinking wood and aluminum as well.


> if you can get a printer that prints plastic for less money?
> The one and only advantage of CNC milling is material strength.

There is a wealth of materials that fall between the hardness of steel
and the soft thermoplastics that you can currently 3D print.

Teflon, Nylon, Lexan, fiber reinforced composite materials, soft metals.


> A printer can always out-print any mill because you can print
> stuff that is impossible to mill.

True, you can print objects with blind voids, but you can also mill
multiple parts and join them for the same end result. In any case, this
is more of a corner case than a main stream problem/advantage for one
technology versus the other.


> I thought he was joking. Last I knew (admitedly this was years ago),
> lasers that could mill steel were insanely priced custom jobs.

I think he was serious, but as I replied to him, I also was unaware of
there being affordable lasers that were powerful enough to cut.


>> ...assembling objects at the atomic or molecular level.
> 
> Well, hell, if we can print at the molecular level,
> you're talking a technological singularity of the
> likes we may never have seen before.
> 
> Just because we can DO it doesn't mean it will ever become
> cheap enough for everyone to have one on their desk.

Sure, but reading the technological tea leaves, I'd say there is a fair
chance we'll see machines that can molecularly assembly objects in our
lifetimes. Probably with significant material restrictions, just as we
see with 3D printing today.

"You can build anything you want with this machine, as long as it can be
made from carbon molecules." :-)

 -Tom