Society General Meeting

Talk:  3D printing – ready for close up

Adrian Johnstone

A new breed of low cost, high precision 3D printers has become available over the last three years including filament extrusion printers capable of 5 thou layer heights and resin printers accurate to 2 thou, at prices in the £200-£350 pound level.  In his talk Adrian will outline the core 3D printing technologies (both commercial and hobbyist), explain how these new hobbyist printers have achieved these higher levels of accuracy and repeatability, and discuss commercial services that provide cheap-ish access to professional grade printing.  He will also talk about the CAD software learning curve which for many people presents a formidable obstacle to using these tools. In response to this problem, G1MRA has launched an initiative to create and publish 3D models of railway items that can be scaled intelligently and printed without needing to use CAD design software.  He will show examples of prints made using different technologies, including railway wagons which rival the quality of commercial items but  only cost a few pounds to make.

Adrian is a member of  SMEE and a founding member of the Computer Conservation Society.  He works with museums and academics in the History of Science on computing history. He is also Chair of the G1MRA Surrey Local Area Group, and runs a ‘virtual’ G1MRA group called the Gauge One 3D Circle, which exists to share expertise in all forms of CAD/CAM as applied to Gauge 1 modelling, and aims to create a series of freely available high quality parameterised 3D models of Gauge 1 items.