Stuff You Should Know - How 3D Printing Works

Episode Date: April 1, 2014

With 3D printing you can print not just pictures and words, but actual objects from files. And as costs come down, the list of things you can print expand: from food, to organs, to guns. Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.comSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

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Just a Skyline drive on the iHeart Radio app, Apple Podcast, or wherever you get your podcasts. On the podcast, HeyDude the 90s called, David Lacher and Christine Taylor, stars of the cult classic show HeyDude, bring you back to the days of slip dresses and choker necklaces. We're going to use HeyDude as our jumping off point, but we are going to unpack and dive back into the decade of the 90s. We lived it and now we're calling on all of our friends to come back and relive it. Listen to HeyDude the 90s called on the iHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

Welcome to Stuff You Should Know from HowStuffWorks.com. Hey and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark and this is kind of unusual. With me is Ben Bowlin. Say hi everybody, Ben. Hey everybody. Ben, you are here because well we have some pretty big news. Yep.

Well, because we can't really say exactly why, but Chuck was called away and is not going to be with us any longer, unfortunately. It's a very, very sad day for all of us here. You know, Chuck was part of this almost from the beginning, Ben. Yeah, Chuck started in July of 2008. Yes. Nice homework. Yeah, he did.

And, you know, I always said like that's when the fireworks happen, like everything just like that first Chuck episode, it was just amazing. So not to set you up for anything, obviously, but you know, there's some big shoes to fill and Chuck will be missed and I know you love him and everybody out there loves him, but we've got to keep going on, you know. Yeah. Chuck is doing what he has to do and it falls to us. I want to be respectful.

Well, yeah. A longtime fan, first time co-host. Well, hopefully that, you know, that will translate to this, you know, that you have an enthusiasm for not just the topics, but for stuff you should know in general, you know, like that'll, I'm sure people will appreciate that. I know this is a little odd, this is, it was quick, it was sudden, it was out of the blue, but hats off to you, man, for stepping in. Like you're braver soul than I am.

Yeah, I'll be honest with you, I'm a little scared. You're doing good. I think Aaron Cooper is going to think everybody else is going to do, but I think Aaron Cooper is the least of your worries. Probably the show has to go on, right? So well, with that, let's go on with the show. We're talking today about 3D printers. Are you pretty familiar with 3D printers?

Yep. So I am as well kind of, you know, mostly just from keeping up with like the big news stories, but the ins and outs, the details of a 3D printer, the machine itself, how it operates, I didn't really know a lot about until I read this article. Like were you familiar with the intricacies of it? Yes. Yeah. Um, didn't you guys have one in the video department?

I don't know if everybody knows this or not, but you originally started out, you were a video guy and then you made the leap over to editorial and now here you are on stuff you should know too, but wasn't there a 3D printer in the video department for a while? Yep. And you guys made some pretty good use of that, right? Uh, yeah, the 3D printer that we had is one of the early models, so it has some advantages. It can print some really cool stuff, but it has a pretty small, pretty small production capacity.

Right. It takes a while to get to it. It's cool. We only have one kind of plastic, so everything is a really bright green. Yes, I remember seeing that, that's a, it's the kind that gives you a headache. Yes. Yeah. And that is, that is probably the bulk of the cons when it gets to that, but I think

that 3D printing is a fantastic and exciting thing. And a lot of people don't know this, but not all 3D printing is created equally. There are a couple of different types. So what we were hoping to talk about in today's episode, right, is that 3D printing isn't just for, you know, cute little chess pieces or car parts, right? Right. You could do, um, you could do all sorts of things. As a matter of fact, mentioning news stories, we, we recently were talking off air in my

head. I was imagining that we were talking off air rather about, um, printing, uh, human tissue with a, with a 3D printer, some guys at Harvard, um, which is a college in the U.S. Josh. Huh? What? Wake up. Oh.

Wake up, dude. Oh. What do you do? Oh man. He got eye boogers. Yeah. Sorry about that. It's crazy.

It's so weird. Like I, I came in here, Jerry's all set up in your, asleep in your chair. I think she put something in my coffee to roof you knock out pills or something. Well, you looked like, I don't know, you were restless. Yeah. It was weird. I just had the worst dream. Like you had gone somewhere, some big place that no one knew or we weren't saying.

And Ben, from stuff they don't want you to know, yeah, Ben was like in your place and he was doing like a really good job. Whoa. You mean Ben, I left work and Ben took my job. Yeah. I mean, he was, he was giving your job. He was stepping up. Yeah.

Yeah. I mean, he was doing good. So was it like, it didn't look like a nightmare, I gotta say. I mean, it was, it was nightmarish and that, I didn't like what I was wearing, but Ben was doing great. So it was a dream of all dreams. It was a pretty pedestrian mundane dream. Yeah.

It was a, I guess it was like April Fool's dream of some sort. You know? Is that what this is? I guess because it was a dream today. Today is April Fool's Day. It all makes sense. Which would make it an April Fool's dream. Wow.

Man. All right. Well, you got a little drool on your lips still, but otherwise I'm ready to go with. I have to say it was nightmarish, I'll just fess up. The idea of doing stuff you should know without you is. You could have led with that. Yeah. Oh, I need to keep you in suspense.

All right. Well, I'm just going to go have Ben killed very quickly and then we can do it. He probably should because I mean, ask anybody who is hearing my dream like it was, he was good. He was warm. Yeah. He did do that a few times. All right.

So, well, here's the weird thing. In my dream, we were about to talk about 3D printing. What topic are we about to cover now? 3D printing. What? Yep. This is the craziest dream I've ever had in my life. All right.

Am I dreaming now? No, this is for real. Like, in fact, I have somewhere to be so I'd like to get on with it. Oh, okay. Well, let's do that then. Let's put you back to bed afterwards. You can dream about me being dead all you want. Yeah, because I still am kind of groggy.

All right. So, Chuck. Yeah. You ready to wrap? Yeah. About 3D printing? Yeah. It bugs me already that they call it printing.

Why? Because it's not printing. It's, you know, okay. I see where they get the name, but it's, to me, it's a little bit of a confusing thing. So you're an additive manufacturing guy? Yeah. Is that what you're into? Yeah.

Because that's the other term for it. I mean, there's a couple of other terms. There's an old-timey, like, stereolithography. That sounds old-timey. But additive manufacturing is the umbrella term for what 3D printing is. Or 3D layering. I like that. Yeah.

Which is a little more accurate than printing. Yeah. Although the reason that they call it printing, as we will see, is because it dovetails well with traditional two-dimensional inkjet printers. It uses a lot of the same form and function. Yeah. I get why they say it. Yeah.

So additive manufacturing, though, that's the key, is that it's not a computer numerical controlled machining, which is when you start with a block of something and the carve it down. This is actually starting from nothing and adding to it, which is really neat. It's the reverse of that. Yeah. Yeah. And with 3D printing, I'm just going to call it that.

I'm sorry. Yeah. That's what we're going to call it. Okay. Or 3DP if you want to be a Jack. What would be a Jack? You call it 3DP. Okay.

And he'd say it with a smile and his teeth we'd deem. He's got great breath. He does. It's pretty pleasant. Let's just get past this bent thing. I'm sorry about my drink, okay? It's okay. So anyway, with 3D printing, the whole basis of it is you print a three-dimensional object

or you manufacture a three-dimensional object layer by layer by layer by layer. Layers can be a micron up to a millimeter or so thick. And as each layer is deposited on top of the next, you have a 3D object that's built. I mean, that's the sum total of it. Everything from, I think, Ben even mentioned chess pieces to whatever you can think of, you can 3D print virtually, including guns and potentially one-day bodily organs and things like that. Yep.

I can see like an artificial heart being 3D printed. They're working on it. Yep. There's, I mean, like you say, anything you can come up with, somebody is trying to 3D print or already has. It's the latest and greatest. It is. And in fact, Chuck, a lot of people think it's going to be the next industrial revolution,

honestly. Oh, yeah. And there's a lot of reason to put some money behind that because if it does take off and it's becoming increasingly possible that it does is costs come down for materials and the actual printers themselves, the more and more barriers are coming down. And if it becomes widespread, man, so long manufacturing and transportation sectors as we know them. Yeah.

And say hello to custom everything. Yeah. Broke your spatula in your kitchen and it's like one in the morning and you're one of those weirdos who eats dinner at one in the morning. You get a broken spatula and you can't go to Bed Bath and Beyond or else you'd have to break in. And no, all you do is go to your office computer at home, say, hey, Amazon, I need a new spatula. It sends the designs to your 3D printer, print you out a new spatula, wait till it cools

down and then you go finish cooking spaghetti. Yeah. I think the trick is costs like with any kind of early technology like this. Like cost and size that's got to come down and it already is and you can buy these things for like 800 bucks now. You can get them for, I think there's, you can get unassembled ones for like 200. Really? You can get assembled for like three or four, 500.

Wow. Yeah. So, all right. So we should totally have one in the office. We do. Was that, was that real? What? Was what real?

Were you controlling my dream? I was. I knew it. I knew you were controlling my dream. Do we really have one? That's why I was wearing that outfit. Yeah. I'm dressed up as a little bogey.

Yeah. Didn't like it. Yeah. There is one somewhere. And it really works. Like we have used it. Yeah. Remember the, did you, have you not seen the little green like chess pieces that he was

talking about? No. No. Unless I saw them and didn't realize that. They're awful. Some awful neon green. But yeah, there, there is a, as far as I know, it's still here. Cool.

But what you're saying, like this is kind of early on in, in the, it's nascent. It's a nascent technology. Yeah. But going fast. Yes. And it's nascent really as far as entering people's homes are concerned. As far as industry is concerned, it's been around for decades now. As a matter of fact, the mid-80s was when additive manufacturing, the, the prototypical

3D manufacturing or 3D printing was really introduced to the industry sector and said, hey guys, you know, your prototyping process, well, prepare to cut it by like seven eighths. Yeah. And speed wise. Speed wise, materials wise, CO2 output wise in every way. It's called rapid prototyping and that, like you said in the 80s and early 90s is when they said you, you, you have some ideas for maybe a car part or something. Yeah.

How would you like to, and you know what prototyping is, is when you build something to test out basically as a manufacturer, your prototype. But they said, how'd you like to, to work with that prototype tomorrow? Yeah. Instead of, you know, a month from now. Right. Manufactured. And then like coming up with the design, sending overseas, having the, the prototype

built, shipped back to you. Yeah. Finding out that it didn't quite fit, recalculating, sending it back like this was the prototyping process until like the rapid, rapid prototyping was introduced. Yeah. So like in many cases with technology, we have MIT to thank, Massachusetts Institute of Technology. They were definitely one of them, but it seems like there was a, a several different people

or companies or institutions that were coming up with this at about the same time. I think car companies had a lot of the early. They definitely bought a lot of the early ones for sure. So like in, in the, in the mid 80s, a guy named Charles Hull came up with this technique that's still in use today where you use a laser to turn some sort of, um, plastic-y dust, a polymer dust into something solid. It's called like alchemy for pretty much photo polymerization. And it was one of the earliest types of 3d printing.

And like I said, it's still in use today. And Hull went on to create a company called 3d systems that's still around today, one of the leaders in 3d printing. So he's loaded. Yeah. He's still the CTO of the company. Uh, well, I guess we should talk about the two main processes on direct and binder printing. Right.

Uh, direct printing is, uh, that's the one that looks and behaves most like your regular, like inkjet printer. When you see it moving along, it's the little metal bars that looks, you know, a lot like that. Right. Uh, it's got a little nozzle and it's gonna, instead of dispensing ink though, it dispenses either a plastic polymer or a waxy substance. Something that's heated up and melted, sprayed in a pattern that it's supposed to be onto

the surface and then it cools and harden. Yeah. And that's the key is it has to come out really hot and it has to cool really fast. And if you've seen these nozzles, it's like, you can think of it kind of like a hot glue gun. Um, that's sort of what the tip looks like, except much finer, obviously. And it'll even leave, like if you're printing like, uh, like a Yoda head, which people love to print on 3d printers.

And you have to come from the head to the ear that sticks out. There's a gap there. There will be even like little hot glue strings left behind and stuff you got to go and like clean up later. Right. Which is part of the process. Sure. Um, so that's, uh, that's direct 3d printing.

There's another type that's similar called binder 3d printing and it's called binder because you use a, uh, like your base substance is a powder polymer, something it's, but it's in powdered form and that's sprayed or laid down in the, uh, arrangement that it's supposed to be for that layer. And then a binder of like glue or some sort of, um, liquid that holds it in place and seals it together, um, is sprayed over it. Yeah. So it's two passes, powder pass and then the liquid pass, right.

And even though it's, there's two passes, it's actually faster, um, because you don't have all these different nozzles having to add all this different stuff. It's just like, there's your powder. There's your binder. Yeah. And you can use, that's where you can like use metals and ceramics and things like that. Right. It really opens up your world material wise.

Yep. And then there's multi jet modeling, which is pretty cool. That's when you have, uh, well, you have many of those jets. And if you've seen these things at work, it's like really cool. It's all operating at the same time, building something right in front of your eyes, moving like little robots, spraying plastic all over the place, pretty much, um, but in very precise places. Yeah.

Like you said, microns at times. And then there's another one we want to give a shout out to called fuels, fused deposition. I think yes. Fuel fuse. Wow. I'm really having trouble with this one. Fused deposition modeling, which is basically you're using like even smaller nozzles that are actually, they're not spraying, they're injecting things, right, which gives you an

incredibly intricate amount of detail or amount of intricate detail. So you get direct in binder and those are kind of common, right? They are. Yes. Very common. And then there's kind of subsets of those. There's basically, if we did this episode five years from now, we'd be like, here's how 3d printing works and it'd be one of these.

That's what I had a feeling that as time goes on, then some of these will fall away like definitely with any technology. They're all right now. They're competing to be basically the 3d printing technology that becomes the standard for all like inkjet. Yeah. Inkjet printers were invented in the sixties, but there was dot matrix, all these others and then it just became clear that inkjet printing was the way to go.

I think that's what's going on with 3d printing right now, whichever one is the most viable for the consumer is the one that'll usually went out. Exactly. You know, because that's the one that companies will put all their money into and then that's yeah, that's where all the breakthroughs will come from. And maybe on the manufacturing side, they might still have their own like super expensive ways of doing things, but if you want one at your house, they're going to have to like scale it down.

Exactly. So one of the, you've got binder printing, you've got direct 3d printing, and then you have different ways that these can be used. So for example, remember I mentioned Charles Hull and his photo polymerization. Yes. That's, you can use that for binding, right? So that's the laser one. Yeah.

You could use some sort of powder, right? And then you would use a UV laser to expose that powder and turn it into a solid, right? Just boo. Yeah. I think it makes that sound. Yeah. This is why people love that 3d printer. So you were using like a technically a 3d binder printing method, but you're using photo

polymerization as the technique to actually bind this stuff together, right? And then depending on your material, you might want to use a different kind of technique like selective laser centering is really good for metals. On the podcast, Hey Dude, the 90s called David Lasher and Christine Taylor, stars of the cult classic show, Hey Dude, bring you back to the days of slip dresses and choker necklaces. We're going to use Hey Dude as our jumping off point, but we are going to unpack and dive back into the decade of the 90s. We lived it and now we're calling on all of our friends to come back and relive it.

It's a podcast packed with interviews, co-stars, friends and non-stop references to the best decade ever. Do you remember going to blockbuster? Do you remember Nintendo 64? Do you remember getting frosted tips? Was that a cereal? No, it was hair. Do you remember AOL instant messenger and the dial-up sound like poltergeist?

So leave a code on your best friend's beeper because you'll want to be there when the nostalgia starts flowing. Each episode will rival the feeling of taking out the cartridge from your Game Boy, blowing on it and popping it back in as we take you back to the 90s. Listen to Hey Dude, the 90s called on the iHeart radio app, Apple podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Attention Bachelor Nation, he's back, the man who hosted some of America's most dramatic TV moments returns with a brand new Tell All podcast.

The most dramatic podcast ever with Chris Harrison. It's gonna be difficult at times, it'll be funny, we'll push the envelope, but I promise you this, we have a lot to talk about. For two decades, Chris Harrison saw it all, and now he's sharing the things he can't unsee. I'm looking forward to getting this off my shoulders and repairing this, moving forward and letting everybody hear from me. What does Chris Harrison have to say now?

You're gonna want to find out. I have not spoken publicly for two years about this, and I have a lot of thoughts. I think about this every day, truly every day of my life, I think about this and what I want to say. Listen to the most dramatic podcast ever with Chris Harrison on the iHeart radio app, Apple podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Yeah, and that's a laser as well, and it melts, actually melts this plastic powder and then solidifies it after that.

Or it can melt metal powder, so if you're creating something that normally would have to be like die cast or machined or something like that, you're creating a structure that's just as sturdy, but here's the big, this is one of the reasons why 3D printing could lead to a revolution in manufacturing. When you are creating something using a 3D printer, you are able to, you're creating a cross section of it, layer by layer, but it's just as sturdy as something solid. Yeah, like the insides of these, it's neither hollow nor solid, it's got like a lattice support system.

Right, if that's what it calls for, right? So you can do honeycomb, you can do lattice, you can subtract a lot of what has to be in something that's die cast just because the human hand or the machines we have aren't capable of making something so intricate. So you have a lot of waste in manufacturing, there's a lot of extra metal in a widget that doesn't have to be there. With 3D printing, you use just the amount of material you need and you can make the thing as lightweight as its structural soundness can call for.

Yeah, so like if you want to make a die cast Civil War soldier that's six inches tall, it can be hollow and use 80% less material. If you want detail in his laces, you use a 3D printer for that. If you want just clumpy Homer Simpson shoes, you can make a die cast. But to use it even more to the point real world example, if you are making airplane parts and you are making a hinge and the hinge using die cast techniques is blocky and clunky and the one with 3D printing is like lattice, like you said. The lattice one is going to be more lightweight.

If you have 1,000 hinges on a plane, all that extra weight adds up in the die cast one. It's not there with the 3D printed one, which means the plane weighs less, which means it uses less fuel, which means it puts out less CO2. Or could carry more even. Right, exactly. And it's possibly even more sound structurally because this thing has been so intricately created. Yeah.

And it's really almost endless to applications for this in the future. Oh yeah. You know? Spatulas to airplane hinges. This is Simpson Civil War figures. Right. Well, I guess we should talk a little bit about the process because this is where it, and you should look at a video if you haven't yet of a 3D printer in action.

It's pretty neat. It is, but also it's very tough to describe. Yeah. And it's just so much easier to just see it. Yeah. There's a good TED talk from I think 2011. I can't remember the woman's name, but she does a good job of just step by step here. The basis of 3D printing and here's some, you know, video footage that you're just like,

oh, okay, I totally get it now. So here's us clumsily attempting to explain it. Well, they all use a similar approach. Step one is CAD, computer aided design. This is what you have to start with. It's a software that, you know, it's the same as when you do like 3D graphics for a motion picture. What you're doing is just creating a three-dimensional structure on your computer screen that's basically

your blueprint for what you're going to end up making. It's CAD software. It's like the same stuff that architects or engineers use because not only can you design it in three dimensions, you can also test its soundness. You can model it. Yeah. Like a big warning light goes on. The bridge you've modeled isn't going to hold cars.

Number two, and this is some, you know, kind of technical geeky stuff, but it's all part of the process. You have to convert that to something called the STL format, standard tessellation language, and that's basically just a file format developed in the 80s that allows the machine to read the CAD software. Right. It translates it from the CAD language to the printer's language. It's just a very geeky step in the process.

Right. And that STL format, that was a Charles Hole invention, too. Oh, yeah? See, I wonder if eliminating some of these steps at some point is going to be the deal. So where you can like draw something on your computer and plug it in to your 3D printer. Yeah. I think that's kind of already there, but you just have to have CAD and then you can probably in CAD, I would imagine, just export to STL format, you know, like changing a Word document

to a PDF or something like that. I think it's that simple. So it's not that big of a deal. Yeah. And then you're going to transfer all that to your machine, and there is a computer that is attached to your 3D printer, obviously, and so now it has the blueprint. It is converted to the proper language, and it's ready to go. Then you press the green button, and you sit back and pour yourself a scotch, and you watch

the magic happen. Yeah. Or you go to bed and you wake up the next day and you're like, wow, that didn't turn out how it was supposed to. Yeah. It does take a while. It can, at least. So there's a tumbler called Epic 3D Printing Fail.

Of course there is. You should check it out. It's like, these things go wrong, like when they go wrong, they really go wrong. Yeah. And it's fun to go to YouTube and see some of the people that are doing this at home, and it's a process to learn how to do it right. Right. You're probably not going to get a great result right out of the gate.

Yeah. And if you could, it's just pure luck. Yeah. You're going to waste a lot of consumables. Sure. And start easy and work your way up, would be my advice. Sure. But you do have to set up your machine, which means, just like you would with your printer,

you've got to make sure it's full of whatever polymer or binder you're going to use. There is generally, generally the ink jets aren't, they move left and right, and you're going to have a base underneath that moves it up and down. Right. They exist the inkjet, the printer jets or whatever. Yeah. They move left and right, like you say, up forward and backward. Yeah.

And then yeah, the platform goes up and down to add that third dimension, right? So apparently with the platforms, they nickel and dime you. Oh yeah. Because they're not reusable, what? Or if they are reusable, they're, I think because they're heated, they're supposed to say heated. So I think they, yeah, if you look at like a package for a 3D printer, you buy like replacement trays.

I didn't know that. Yeah. How much are they? They're not that much, but still it's like a, it's like another expense. Just to print your spatula. Yeah. You end up paying like a hundred dollars for your stupid spatula. So like I said, you're going to let the machine do its thing, and then afterward you're going

to take it out. You might want to check on it occasionally to make sure your Yoda isn't all cock-eyed. Did you think that was hilarious? So step six, removal. Remove your 3D printed object from the machine. Yeah. Don't try to put the pot of spaghetti on your machine and use the spatula like that. Actually take the spatula out of the machine.

That does seem like an unnecessary step. And that's even apparently from a book. What? Additive manufacturing technologies, colon rapid prototyping to direct digital manufacturing. Step six, removal. Well I think maybe they include a removal because they do indicate that just to be careful and you might need to wear gloves and stuff like that. Yeah, because apparently, don't forget what you're doing is you're spraying or your machine

is spraying hot melted plastic in an enclosed location in an enclosed room probably. So yeah, there's a lot of toxic chemicals involved. You may want to wear gloves, you may want to wear like a respirator, whatever, a Yoda mask that you made with your printer earlier. And then afterward, like I said, you may need to clean it up. There may be little hairs, there may need to be things you need to brush off some powder and then dude, you're ready. Well some of them use supports that are water soluble too, so like these things like that

keep Yoda's ears up. You can just drop the whole thing in water after it cures and then the supports will go away because they dissolve in water. Like they never happen. All right, so we need to talk about some of the applications now and in the future right after this message. On the podcast, HeyDude the 90s called David Lasher and Christine Taylor, stars of the cult classic show HeyDude, bring you back to the days of slip dresses and choker necklaces.

We're going to use HeyDude as our jumping off point, but we are going to unpack and dive back into the decade of the 90s. We lived it and now we're calling on all of our friends to come back and relive it. It's a podcast packed with interviews, co-stars, friends and non-stop references to the best decade ever. Do you remember going to Blockbuster? Do you remember Nintendo 64? Do you remember getting frosted tips?

Was that a cereal? No, it was hair. Do you remember AOL Instant Messenger and the dial-up sound like poltergeist? Don't leave a code on your best friend's beeper, because you'll want to be there when the nostalgia starts flowing. Each episode will rival the feeling of taking out the cartridge from your Game Boy, blowing on it and popping it back in as we take you back to the 90s. Listen to HeyDude the 90s called on the iHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts or wherever you

get your podcasts. Attention Bachelor Nation, he's back, the man who hosted some of America's most dramatic TV moments returns with a brand new Tell All podcast, the most dramatic podcast ever with Chris Harrison. It's gonna be difficult at times, it'll be funny, we'll push the envelope, but I promise you this, we have a lot to talk about. For two decades, Chris Harrison saw it all, and now he's sharing the things he can't unsee.

I'm looking forward to getting this off my shoulders and repairing this, moving forward and letting everybody care for me. What does Chris Harrison have to say now? You're gonna want to find out. I have not spoken publicly for two years about this, and I have a lot of thoughts. I think about this every day, truly every day of my life, I think about this and what I want to say. Listen to the most dramatic podcast ever with Chris Harrison on the iHeart Radio app, Apple

Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts. All right, so the future, the present and the future of 3D printing, its applications are really, really piling up like daily, it seems like. Yeah, Yoda figurines. That's right. One reason is, the article points out is because, well, there's a couple of fronts going on. You have industrial manufacturing and you have artists, I guess there's three, and then you have just your regular dope at home that just has like 800 bucks laying around.

Industrial manufacturing is obviously gonna speed things up like plane wings and artificial limbs and I saw a really cool, did you see the 3D printed cast? No. It was like, you know, it wasn't solid, it was like a honeycomb, so bye bye to the days of like. Have any ants? I'd be able to itch your arm or whatever. You can't sign those though.

Yeah, that's a good point. You can't really sign the fiberglass ones anyway though. Oh really? Well, back in the old days, you know, it was just plaster, those were the, that was the heyday of cast signing. And then when they went to, not fiberglass, what is it they used? I don't even know. I haven't broken them.

Titanium. Limb, no, it's not titanium. Steel. It's more like the fabric bandage that ends up hardening you, you can't write on it. Okay. Can't do anything with it. No one asked me to sign their cast anyway, so I don't, I don't keep up with the cast. Does anyone even do that anymore?

Or is that a totally antiquated thing? I'm sure they do. Yeah. Um, no, I didn't see the cast to answer your question. Okay, but that's, that's industrial manufacturing. They're tackling like the big things like organs and car parts and plane parts. And that's actually the second sea change that additive manufacturing has created for the industrial sector, because first of all, they revolutionized prototyping.

And then these 3D printers got so good that they're like, well, we can actually produce the actual thing, like not just the prototype or the model anymore, we can produce the actual end result. Yeah. So that's the second revolution and it's, it's very much here now. Like, hey, you're a surgeon and Josh was in a horrible accident and his face was disfigured and you want to put them back together, we can print out your old lovely face and show that surgeon.

Show it under the skin. Yeah. Just roll it up. Yeah. We can't do that, obviously. But it just serves as the model for the surgeon though, instead of looking at it on a computer screen. Right.

Um, and there's a, there's apparently MRIs or FMRIs are going to be pretty much delivering the CAD file to a 3D printer pretty soon to create. Oh yeah. Yeah. To create stuff that you need. All you do is just get an MRI scan and then bam, here's your implant. Apparently it's all the rage and dental implants. Yeah.

You know, I got my fake tooth, which took a long time to manufacture. Cause they weren't using 3D printers. No, but they could whip out a tooth for me tomorrow. 10 seconds. Um, artists are way into it. Um, if you've been to a, an art show in the past couple of years, you've probably seen some sort of, uh, 3D printed, um, object. Yeah.

Um, which I feel like at this point, a lot of the art that's being 3D printed, it's more like it's made by a 3D printer. Sure. It's the big thing. Yeah. Yeah. It's not, wow, it's really amazing. And it was made by 3D.

It's more like this is made by a 3D printer. Yeah. But for me, I'd still, I guess it's impressive, but I'd still rather see a sculpture by hand. Oh yeah. Something that's 3D printed, you know. Yeah. Sure. I mean, that seems to be a lot more difficult.

Call me old school. Um, there's also like a lot of, that's kind of doves, dovetails in with art is, um, you know, you can buy a piece of art now that someone sculpted using CAD. Yeah. And print it out at your house and then you have a piece by that artist is kind of changing art as well. That's true. There's also a, uh, that's also kind of being revolutionized in commerce as well.

So like, um, I guess going back to the medical thing, there's a company called bespoke prosthetics where they can kind of measure your stuff and create a model for it and then print out your prosthetic that's super tailored or, you know, going back to that spatula example, you know, you can ultimately have some design sent to your 3D printer and then you print out your specialist. So that's the design for the design that only has to be designed once. And then it's on, it's on the person who is buying it, it's up to you to manufacture it.

Right. So that kind of takes a lot of the costs away too. It's really just, you don't even have to build that first one. You just come up with a good design and you can sell the design over and over again without ever actually manufacturing anything. Right. Or if you just think of some cool little thing you want built, um, maybe your own prototype of something you can, you don't even have to buy all this stuff.

There are companies now that will make your little prototype for you. Yeah. Which is, I think far more prevalent these days. Like if you do order something off the internet, they'll, um, they'll, they send the file to a company that actually prints it out for you and does a professional job. Yeah. Unless you want it yourself. That's pretty cool.

And then you send it to your home. For like the home inventory, you know? Yeah. And they want to try out their new widget that they just made. Speaking of home inventors, we would be very remiss. It's not in this article, but there is a, another, yet another revolution. If you haven't gotten the idea that 3D printing is revolutionary, just rewind this and start over.

Yeah. Um, the, there's a 3D printer called a rep rap, which is a, it's a DIY from scratch, 3D printer that you build. You build, you can get the parts that just, just about anywhere, um, for a couple of hundred bucks and you put it together and you download the open source software. All this is free. All open source. Yeah.

Um, and the first thing the printer does is it prints out the remaining parts that it needs. Shut up. Swear to God. Wow. It's in its second incarnation now. Second generation rep rap is called the Mendel, Dr. Gregor Mendel. Of course.

Um, and once you have this thing up and running, there's like a whole world of open source, um, 3D printing projects that you can download and print. You can upload your own stuff. And the great part about it is since it's open source, if somebody's like, this would be so much better if we just replace this lattice structure with a honeycomb structure here and then all of a sudden now it's indestructible and then bam, that thing just got improved for everybody to come. Yeah.

This sounds like something that's like early internet stuff that at some point, some government being will squash. Well, yeah. Well, I mean, all this free trading of great ideas and things. Exactly. And one of the things is the people who are open source fanatics are like, dude, you want to solve poverty, right? You want to solve like, um, poor health care in these areas, like give the, give a town

a 3D printer or two or teach them how to, how to set up a Mendel. And then they can print out their lab parts. They can print out replacement parts. They can print out whatever. And all of a sudden they can take care of themselves and give, deliver good health care. And there's not, they're not relying on, you know, aid or donors or whatever. Yeah. They're, they're handling it themselves because now they're not off of the supply line.

They're totally tapped in just because they have an internet connection and a 3D printer. Well, and you sent me an article about a gentleman who is working on 3D printing food. Yeah. And, um, don't think of it as like, I'm going to go print a hamburger. You have to kind of change your conception of what food is, but it's essentially going to be a mix of, you know, water and proteins and oils and whatever makes up the components of the food. And then you print it out as a little cube or a little four leaf clover and eat it.

Yeah. I don't know about, I mean, it's way early in the stages, but he's talking about solving world hunger with 3D printing. Yeah. And he totally could because if you have the macro nutrients, right? Like you have a protein cartridge, a carbohydrate cartridge, a fat cartridge, and you're using binder printing. So you're just putting them together and adding water or something like that.

Yeah. Like instant food. Right. So his, his first proof of concept I think was chocolate, but the one he's working on now is pizza, which is perfect because it's in layers anyway. So remember the, the platform that goes up and down is heated often. The guy who created that, he used that characteristic to bake the dough as it's, the pizza's being built.

Unbelievable. So you've got the carb layer and then the tomato layer and then a protein layer. And the proteins come from like insects or whatever, which as you're eating it, if it tastes right, you don't care where it comes from. No, of course not. Unless you pay attention to that kind of thing. Right. But yeah, he could very easily, like that could totally revolutionize food.

And as we get closer to things like being able to 3D print living tissue, which apparently we're at right there, but the problem that everybody keeps running up against is blood vessels, generating blood vessels, just, just beyond our technology right now. Once we start being able to do that, then you will be able to print a nice juicy hamburger and your home. Some of the, some of the downsides of 3D printing is as of now, and, and I think a lot of this stuff, like with anything in technology is going to get better. We're going to refine it and make it more environmentally friendly.

But right now, they burn a lot of energy about 50 to 100 times more electrical energy than injection molding for something that's, you know, similar in size. So that's no good 100 times more electricity is traditional casting or machining. So right now they're recommending it, it's, it's not up to like large scale manufacturing or anything like that. Right. Like assembly line stuff. No.

Right. Just cause it's just burning too much is wasting too much. The emissions aren't very healthy. Obviously, if you have one of these in your home, like you said, you're in enclosed space, you're burning plastic. There's going to be some emissions giving off, given off from that in your house. Right. And if, you know, I don't know what kind of, they probably have venting systems already,

don't they? I don't know if you, in an industrial one, I'm sure they say you should probably put this in a vented room. But no, if you're just a dude with a maker bot on your desktop, it's in your, it's in your room. Yeah. Your rooms as vented as it normally is, I would guess, plastics is something we're trying to get away from as a planet and plastic filament is kind of the main game right now.

Yeah. For now, I mean, like as, as metals and ceramics are more and more introduced, I think, you know, plastics will kind of fall away or they could. Yeah. But yeah, for sure, like all 3d printers use plastics right now. Yeah. You know, this one I'd never considered. I thought it was pretty interesting is the piracy licensing deals of like, if you want

to go make your own hobbit figurine, instead of paying, what's the dude's name, Peter Jackson, his cut, or George Lucas, his cut, you can make your own little Star Wars figures. Yeah. Or print a bunch of them and go sell them in the subway. Exactly. The little kids who don't know any different, who ride the subway. Yeah. Or set up on your own, your own online shop or whatever, you know.

Yeah. And then you can make the argument like, yeah, that's, I mean, that's a problem and, but that's something that would have to be dealt with just like everyone lived with the piracy from music and movies and all that. Yeah. Like those industries haven't collapsed. It's true. People are still making music.

People are still making movies. People will still make figurines. Yeah. That's a good point. And then the whole gun thing is definitely a touchy issue. Yeah. This guy, Cody Wilson, 26 years old, a couple of years ago. Yeah.

And that was like within the last two years, I think made his own 3D printed gun that shot a bullet. Yeah. And they have now even another company has manufactured a metal gun. Yeah. That shoots bullets. Yep. And that means if you can sell that software, then people could just skirt gun laws and

print a gun at home. Yes. And apparently they already are. I guess Cody Wilson put it up in the justice department, took it down, but not before it was already downloaded 100,000 times at least. And that's the magic number. That means it's out there forever. Yeah.

And apparently the Congress has already got laws regarding this as far as having guns that are not made of metal, like IE1 that you could sneak onto a plane. Yes. But there's a small loophole in that some of these gun plans have like the tiniest little piece of metal that may be not picked up by a metal detector, but it is still technically metal. Right. So it's.

The liberator does have that. Is that what it's called? Piece. Yeah. Wow. It does have that piece, a metal piece, but apparently if you have the plans, you can very easily go in and X that part out and you have an all plastic gun. Right.

Apparently the Israeli television group printed out their own version of it and wanted to see how far they could get with one and basically we're standing right next to Benjamin Netanyahu with this plastic gun on them. They were able to smuggle it all the way into parliament on the news. Man. So I mean, yeah, it's a plastic gun that you could take through a metal detector, which is a great thing to unleash on the world. And this guy's a.

What about the bullets? I don't know. Yeah. I don't understand why it wouldn't be picked up or whatever, but. Or maybe they could make plastic bullets. Yeah, but. No. You're just shooting somebody with plastic bullets.

Yeah. Jerk. Yeah. They already make those and they sell them at Toys R Us. Yeah. I read this Guardian article and it was like, you know, this kid is a, he's very much like Ross Ulbricht. He was a libertarian slash anarchist kind of.

Yeah. And he was like, well, it's not my responsibility. I just, you know, I unleash this on the world. Who cares? Right. You can't, you can't govern this kind of thing. The internet's supposed to be free and it's like, man, that is a, that is a can of worms that I don't think exists in black and white.

Yeah. Or who's responsible legally for some of this stuff one day, like the manufacturer of the software or, you know. But even beyond legally, who's responsible morally? Yeah. You know. Sure. You are my friend.

Not me. Not you, but the individual. Oh, okay. You're not going to print a gun. No. I'll just print out a little figurines of Ben. Man, that dream. You got anything else right now?

I got nothing else. I think it's a good overview. Yeah. It is. We'll revisit in five years and talk about which one won out. Yeah. This article is hilariously out of date. The lowest, the lowest price it quotes is, was like 20 grand or something, $14,900.

Yeah. It doesn't even mention the rep rap. The rep rap, it's the big deal. Okay. So, if you want to learn more about 3D printing, you should go read this hilariously out of date article on House of Forks, which, by the way, is being updated. Sure. You put in an update request.

So, it should be nice and fancy soon. Yes. And since I said search bar, I think I did. It's time for listener mail. I'm going to call this wild parrots. Remember when we talked about the wild parrots? Confirmed. Hey, guys, really enjoyed hanging out with you during the tattoo podcast.

By the way, it is called a tattoo machine. Yeah. Not a tattoo gun. Apparently, they don't like that. They don't like that. And we heard about it. Tattoo people are, they tattoo people, burning man people. And who else?

It seems like there's been one more subset of people that you wouldn't think would just be so angry. Does it seem to come to mind? Yeah. I can't think of anybody, any other group that's responded en masse so angrily. Yeah. Burning man in tattoos. So when Josh heard that parrots like to hang together when free, I wanted to burst into

the podcast room and tell you about the wild parrots of San Francisco, my hometown. I'm not going to get into it except to say that over the course of my life, the parrots were sort of a living legend that one would occasionally get the privilege of spotting now and then. However, about three years ago, I moved in with my aunt in the little San Francisco suburb of Brisbane. And apparently the famous flock of parrots were also making their home there since it was warmer and less windy than most of San Francisco.

They were often hanging out right outside my bedroom window, which is pretty amusing, but also somewhat annoying, especially since my first son was just a little guy and they are loud. I can vouch for that. Yeah. They're super loud. I'm sending you the link to watch the documentary from 2003, the wild parrots of Telegraph Hill. So she's recommended that we watch that.

Anyway. Did we get that documentary yet? No, I think it's, yeah, it was just a link. It's online. Oh, gosh. Yeah. So keep it up. Seriously.

If you stop making podcasts, I'd be one majorly bummed mama. Chow Bellows, Amy, thanks, Amy and San Francisco. Yeah. Via Italy. Yeah. That was weird. That was good. I didn't doubt you.

I want to say. Oh, no, I didn't think so. Okay. That would just be such a bizarre thing to make up. Yeah, sure. But yeah, thanks, Amy, for supporting Chuck. Chuck loves to be supported and proven right. Don't we all?

Yeah. If you want to hang out with us, we've got a bunch of ways you can. You can hang out with us on Pinterest, look for SYSK podcast on Pinterest, Twitter and Instagram. Yeah. We've got a couple of new social platforms. Yeah. Instagram and Pinterest and it's pretty cool.

I'm excited. Yeah. These are just everything's different, man. Like you very rarely see one thing is that's on everything. Yeah. Yeah. It's like all, if you keep up with us on like Pinterest, Instagram, Twitter and Facebook, you're going to get a bunch of different awesome information.

Yeah. It's pretty neat. Cool stuff. So thanks for that. Yeah. And then like I said, Facebook, facebook.com. You should know. And you can always send us an email to stuffpodcast at discovery.com.

And hang out with us at our home on the web, stuffyoushouldknow.com. I'm Munga Shatikular and it turns out astrology is way more widespread than any of us want to believe. We find in major league baseball, international banks, K-pop groups, even the White House. But just when I thought I had a handle on this subject, something completely unbelievable happened to me and my whole view on astrology changed. Whether you're a skeptic or a believer, give me a few minutes because I think your ideas are about to change too.

Listen to Skyline Drive on the iHeart Radio app, Apple Podcast, or wherever you get your podcasts. Hey guys, it's Cheekies from Cheekies and Chill Podcast and I want to tell you about a really exciting episode. We're going to be talking to Nancy Rodriguez from Netflix's Love is Blind Season 3. Looking back at your experience, were there any red flags that you think you missed? What I saw as a weakness of his, I wanted to embrace. The way I thought of it was, whatever love I have from you is extra for me.

Like I already love myself enough. Do I need you to validate me as a partner? Yes. Is it required for me to feel good about myself? No. I'm going to talk to Cheekies and Chill on the iHeart Radio app, Apple Podcast, or wherever you get your podcasts.