RepRap, and Sanguino
For those of you not already in the know RepRap stands for (self) REPlicatingRAPid (prototyper) in other words a 3d printer that can be built from spares printed on another RepRap, bits you buy from a hardware store and order from somewhere like RS, check out the link to their site, they explain it better than I’ll ever be able to. The upshot of this is it’s an open source project that has the potential to bring rapid 3d printing to the masses, making a lot easier to design and build your own gadgets, bringing micro-scale mass production to the masses. Which for a gadget addict like me is awesome, not only do you get to build an awesome machine in itself, but that machine will then build custom components for further gadgets! Getting away from the fact that this is a brilliant thing in itself, I truly believe that this could revolutionise the way we manufacture things, not just in the western world but in the third world too.
Anyway, enough of my lefty/liberal rantings and on to the purpose of this post. The RepRap now has it’s own dedicated motherboard, recently they switched to using a couple of Arduinos to interface the printer with the computer, now they have a dedicated Sanguino (Sanguino is basically an arduino board on steroids) that has space on board for an SD card slot making it possible for the printer to drive itself, thereby lowering the cost of ownership, and the minimum power requirements to run the the thing. Say you had a communal village PC in some remote place that people could use to design their widgets on, you can then take your widget design back to your house on an sd card, plug it into your RepRap, set it printing and a few hours later … Hey Presto, new plumbing fittings, or whatever.
