3D Printed Patents

Darrel Barnette’s main focus for where he wants to take his company, Digital to Definitive, is towards the realm of producing the products he’s been mentally developing and cataloging over the last several decades.

Among the products he’s used his Gigabot to design: bracketing for a hydraulic two-wheel drive motorcycle, an adapter for hunters to mount devices to a firearm, and a horseshoe-shaped part that helped make his skeet thrower a lot easier to set up.

He also has noticed that beginning to physically prototype a rough idea he’s had in his mind can often allow him to hone in on what exactly makes his product unique and therefore patent-worthy.

And while Darrel has noted before that contract 3D printing work currently takes up about 75% of his time, the ultimate goal is to move the business more towards working on his own products.

As he puts it, his vision is that he “can just open up the door to my shop and there’s my whole factory.”

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Morgan Hamel

Blog Post Author

3D Printing for the Government

Darrel Barnette understands that it may seem strange that the US government is paying other people to do their 3D printing.

But what they understand, he says, is that even an entity as large as them is not exempt from the 3D printing learning curve. “It takes a lot more than just having a 3D printer to produce a 3D printed part,” he explains. “The government realizes that, and they don’t have the time to stop what they’re already doing to learn something new.”

It’s in their best interest at the moment to dedicate their time and human resources to other projects and instead pay outside entities to do their 3D printing work for them. And this is where businesses like Darrel’s come in.

Digital to Definitive’s 3-pronged business model relies heavily on this 3D printing government contract work at the moment – about 75% of Darrel’s time is consumed by it, since he worked so hard with a Bid Protest Attorney in order to win the contract. In the future, he’d like to flip this ratio so that most of his time is spent working on his own projects, but he understands that he needs to, as he puts it, “walk before he runs.” It’s this work that will ultimately allow him to make the transition to focusing most of his time on his own 3D printed products.

Come get a glimpse into the first pillar of the business Darrel has built from the ground up: 3D printing for the government.

Morgan Hamel

Blog Post Author

Digital to Definitive: The Genesis

This is the first video in a series about Digital to Definitive, a company started by Texas-based Gigabot owner Darrel Barnette.

Darrel Barnette was one of the first Kickstarter backers of the original Gigabot four years ago – his bot’s serial number is GB2-028.

He got his Gigabot with no prior 3D printing experience – he had a background in aerospace engineering and a desire to use to use the blossoming technology to create product ideas he had been holding onto in his head.

It took him assembling his bot and starting to use it before he thought of the idea to make a business out of it. Two forces combined to plant the idea in his head.

One, his job at the time had him traveling a lot, which he wasn’t a fan of; and two, he began to see the power of the technology for himself. “Having the 3D printer and the capability of being able to make my own parts for the first time…was just enticing to me,” he explains.

Darrel began to realize that a business opportunity lay in the new Kickstarter product he had gotten for himself.

Entrepreneurs, inventors, tinkerers, dreamers – take note. Darrel’s got a story you’re going to want to hear.

Morgan Hamel

Blog Post Author

From Rubble to Rebirth: #NEWPALMYRA

From Rubble to Rebirth

In addition to the tremendous human suffering and loss in Syria, there is another component to the war which has taken an entirely different toll on the country and its psyche: the destruction of its cultural heritage.

Part of ISIS’s path of destruction has been on the ancient cities’ architecture themselves – they are decimating not only the human population but also their history and culture.

The city of Palmyra is one such example.

Palmyra, a UNESCO World Heritage Site, was once a Silk Road oasis that stood as one of the best-preserved ruins of antiquity before it was targeted by the violent extremist group. UNESCO Director-General Irina Bokova referenced Palmyra as an example of ISIS seeking to “destroy both human lives and historical monuments in order to deprive the Syrian people of its past and its future.”

But from the destruction and rubble came a glimmer of good. This is where the story of #NEWPALMYRA begins.

Forward-thinking Bassel Khartabil, the Creative Commons Syria leader, open source software developer, educator, and free culture advocate, began 3D modeling the endangered ruins of Palmyra back in 2005. In 2012 he was unlawfully imprisoned by the Syrian government for his work, and in 2015 was sentenced to death by the Assad regime. His current whereabouts are unknown.

After his arrest, his friends, family, and community rallied around his vision to create #NEWPALMYRA, a non-profit organization with the goal of “freeing Syrian culture digitally, providing agency and advancement for the Syrian people through cultural heritage and digital preservation.”

Creative Commons – a non-profit “devoted to expanding the range of creative works available for others to build upon legally and to share” – hatched a plan to debut #NEWPALMYRA “in the flesh” at their 2017 Summit in Toronto.

And this is where re:3D joined the story.

When our team heard about the possibility of helping out on such a project, we jumped at the opportunity. Mike Battaglia, Usability Engineer and Community Support Manager at re:3D, explained, “I had read about the destruction of Palmyra and was very inspired by Bassel Khartabil’s efforts. Helping preserve this landmark cost him his freedom; when I heard re:3D was supporting the project with a large-scale print I was excited at the thought of us helping continue where he left off.”

The Pylon Printing Process

The piece that Creative Commons decided to bring to life for the Summit was the impressive Tetrapylon, one of four massive quad-column structures which mark the route of a road or central place in the city. These large structures were destroyed by ISIS in January of this year, as reported by The New York Times.

Creative Commons was looking for a machine capable of producing a version of one Tetrapylon which did testament to its immense real-life scale, which is how Gigabot entered the equation. We reconstructed a scaled-down Tetrapylon standing seven and a half feet tall and weighing in at over 200 pounds (90+ kg).

Using digital 3D models of the Tetrapylon provided by the #NEWPALMYRA team, Mike created printable files from the models. As he explained, “3D printing requires error-free ‘watertight’ models to create clean prints.” To accomplish this, he “ran the columns through several repair algorithms until they were good to go, redesigned the base to be better fit for 3D printing, and chopped up the model into smaller pieces that would fit [Gigabot’s] build volume.”

We broke the Tetrapylon into 25 separate pieces, clocking in around 800 hours of print time total. The biggest challenge for re:3D – as many of our bot owners can likely relate to – was working with this massive number of print hours. “The parts were so large that the print time estimates were through the roof,” said Jeric Bautista, Product Engineer at re:3D. Mike added, “This was the largest print that re:3D has taken on to date.”

As for the sheer size of the print, Mike remarked that, “The fact that we had to design in safety measures because of the weight of the object was new to me. If one of those columns were pushed out, whoever was standing next to it could have had a very bad day.” For safety purposes, Mike designed channels into the print to run rods down each column, locked into place with 4×4 wooden blocks.

Coupled with the challenge of the overall size of the object was the detail variation within the print. While some parts of the structure are large and uniform – like the columns – other parts are so fine to the point that dual extrusion printing was required. The print resolution throughout the Tetrapylon ranges between ultra-detailed 200 microns and very large layers of 600 microns.

Jeric explained, “The completion of this project hinged on our R&D efforts to enable high-flow printing on Gigabot that drastically reduced printing times, as well as reliable dual extrusion printing to create highly detailed parts.”

Steve Johnson, lead Machinist and Programmer at re:3D, was in charge of creating a new hot end for the job. He explained his task of manufacturing one with a “longer heating area that would allow us to extrude faster because of the size of the print and the short time frame we had to complete it in.” He designed and machined four hot ends to be used for the project.

The tackling and subsequent success of this challenge reverberated throughout our engineering team.

Gigabot owners will be happy to hear Jeric’s take on things. “I want to go bigger and faster,” he said. “Going back to R&D – we were able to multiply our material output 5-10x for this project, but of course we won’t stop there.” He added, “I’d like to see how our ‘big printing’ R&D initiatives will put us in an even better place to tackle projects at larger scales.”

Crossing these technical challenges was one aspect of what made this project so rewarding. “Not only did we jump over multiple technical hurdles to get the printing done, but it was awesome to see everything literally come together before our eyes,” Jeric said. “And that was just on the 3D printing side, which was the last piece of an already long-running initiative.”

Lasting Impact

The initiative was over a decade in the making and required the cooperation of many different parties, making the success even sweeter. Working in conjunction with #NEWPALMYRA and Creative Commons on this project was an incredible honor for us.

“My favorite part of this project was how collaborative it was,” Jeric commented. “It required folks contributing from so many different spheres to make it all come together at Creative Commons Global Summit.” He went on, “There’s also something to be said about the power of open information and distributed manufacturing to preserve history and culture.”

The final reveal in Toronto was a culmination of countless hours of work by multiple different parties – the print’s completion hinged on a truly collaborative effort.

“It was so moving to see the New Palmyra unveiling at CC Summit and seeing everyone’s reactions, knowing the weight of what the project meant to all of them,” said Jeric. “It really brought things full circle, and was a great example of what is possible with open source projects.”

Of his experience, Mike said, “I was honored to have the opportunity to contribute to this project! I think this is one of the first of hopefully many preservation efforts for other cultural landmarks.”

The #NEWPALMYRA undertaking sets the stage – and the bar – for similar projects. As Mike remarked, “Museums like the MET and Smithsonian have already recognized the value of preserving their own collections of cultural artifacts via 3D scanning and 3D printing. Now let’s continue the same in large-scale.”

One can’t help but see the impact this project will have on future cultural preservation efforts from both intended destruction and natural degradation over time.

“My hope is that cultural heritage sites are preserved with 3D scanning as quickly as possible,” said Mike. “Having a digital back-up may even help to deter ISIS’ demolition in the future, since the symbolic value is lessened once a backup exists. We can even preserve the feeling of being at these sites with VR, and I hope this happens as well.”

As Jeric put it – “Full scale New Palmyra exhibits, anyone?”

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Sources:

http://www.newpalmyra.org/

https://creativecommons.org/2017/04/28/new-palmyra/

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/jan/20/isis-destroys-tetrapylon-monument-palmyra-syria

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/sep/01/satellite-images-reveal-isis-destruction-of-palmyras-temple-of-bel

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/01/20/world/middleeast/palmyra-syria-isis-amphitheater.html?_r=0

Morgan Hamel

Blog Post Author

The Syracuse University Makerspace Final Post

Syracuse University got their first Gigabot in 2014 for their new Makerspace, poised to fill the position of “large-scale 3D printer.”

Since then, they’ve found uses for their Gigabot’s build platform size across the board, from “mass-manufacturing”-type jobs filling the bed with many smaller pieces for groups of students, to large-scale prints that have pushed the multi-day mark, like the infamous “backside print” for a visiting UK-based artist.

Their Gigabot has filled a valuable spot among 30-some-odd other 3D printers — all desktop-sized — as their largest 3D printer, allowing them to keep up with the Makerspace’s heavy demand for prints, big and small.

And there’s more exciting news afoot at Syracuse since our visit last fall: more Gigabots.

Their “workhorse” of the Makerspace now has company. In December, Syracuse got a second, new-generation Gigabot to add to the Makerspace’s lineup, and within the last couple of weeks, they placed an order for a third bot for a different department on campus.
3D printing is changing the way a lot of industries do business — for education it means enabling students to create things that they may not be able to make otherwise. As John put it, “You can have that idea in the morning and have it in your hand by the afternoon. That’s something that didn’t exist.”

Morgan Hamel

Blog Post Author

Why 3D Printing is Such a Game-Changer for Syracuse University

In this final installment of the Syracuse University ITS Makerspace video series, John nails down exactly what makes 3D printing so powerful.

This is a technology that enables.

From businesses to schools, established corporations to garage entrepreneurs, 3D printing allows a mere idea to become something physical. A hazy vision becomes a tangible item that can be held, touched, poked, prodded, and ultimately, sent back to the drawing board and printed again.

All this without ever having to contract out to a third party to tool up a prototype. The entire design and iteration process can be done in-house, affordably and rapidly.

John encompasses the entire spectrum in one – he’s the at-home handyman and tinkerer, while at the same time an educator managing a university makerspace that serves a student body of around 20,000. He sees the potential for this technology through both of these lenses, making his point of view a particularly interesting one.

And from his point of view, 3D printing is a game-changer.

Morgan Hamel

Blog Post Author

Making a Syracuse University Economics Class Accessible Using Gigabot

Working in the 3D printing industry, one can become accustomed to consistently being surprised and impressed by new use cases of the technology. But every so often an application of Gigabot comes around that truly stands out, both as a demonstration of the power of the technology to do good as well as testament to a user thinking out of the box.

This particular story from Syracuse University does just that.

Watch Part 3 of their story to see this creative, inspirational use of their Gigabot to aid a student.

Morgan Hamel

Blog Post Author

Creative Commons Repost — Sharing a lost city: An innovative collaboration with re:3D and the New Palmyra project

The following is a repost of the Creative Commons blog post about our collaboration with them on the New Palmyra project. Article originally published on April 28, 2017 by Jennie Rose Halperin. Original article: https://creativecommons.org/2017/04/28/new-palmyra/

Sharing a lost city: An innovative collaboration with re:3D and the New Palmyra project

Together with re:3D, an Austin-based 3D printing company, and the #NEWPALMYRA project, a community platform dedicated to the virtual remodeling and creative use of architecture from the ancient Syrian city of Palmyra, Creative Commons has produced a 200 pound, 7.5 feet tall 3D rendering of one of the Palmyra Tetrapylons.

Together with re:3d, an Austin-based 3D printing company, and the #NEWPALMYRA project, a community platform dedicated to the virtual remodeling and creative use of architecture from the ancient Syrian city of Palmyra, Creative Commons has produced a 200 pound, 7.5 feet tall 3D rendering of one of the Palmyra Tetrapylons. This rendering will be on display at the Creative Commons Global Summit in Toronto, CA from April 28-30, bringing the commons to life through the work of its community.

This large-scale rendering is one of the four quad-column pylons, or gateways, that would have marked a central place in the city. Palmyra is a desert oasis, a UNESCO world heritage site, and is considered one of the most important global archaeological sites. Since 2015, large sections of Palmyra have been destroyed by ISIL and many of its precious artifacts lost or sold on the global market.

In January 2017, it was confirmed by satellite imagery published in the New York Times that Palmyra’s ongoing destruction by ISIS continues – including this section of the Tetrapylon.

The #NEWPALMYRA project was begun in 2005 by CC Syria leader Bassel Khartabil, a Palestinian-Syrian open source software developer, educator, and free culture advocate. Working with the publisher Al-Aous and a team of artists in Damascus, Khartabil began remodeling the endangered ruins of Palmyra in 3D until 2012, when he was unlawfully imprisoned by the Syrian government. Much of this work was never published, though Bassel was committed to its free dissemination and use. In 2015, Khartabil was sentenced to death by the Assad regime. His whereabouts remain unknown.

A nonprofit founded by Bassel’s family, friends, and community, #NEWPALMYRA is freeing Syrian culture digitally, providing agency and advancement for the Syrian people through cultural heritage and digital preservation. Khartabil’s visionary work ignited a community that stands for transparency, openness, and free culture and continues to grow via the remix, reuse, and sharing of his foundational work.

In the words of Ryan Merkley, Creative Commons CEO, “Creative Commons wanted to bring the commons to life for its 2017 Summit in Toronto. CC brought Austin-based re:3D together with the #NEWPALMYRA project team. The Gigabot, re:3D’s spectacular printer, renders massive models at commercial quality. Together, we produced a huge replica of one of the models of Palmyra: the Tetrapylon.”

re:3D began with a digital 3D model of Palmyra provided by the #NEWPALMYRA team and transformed the digital into the physical using their Gigabot printer, which uses a rope-like filament resembling hot glue to precisely build the model layer by layer. Each layer is between .2-.6 mm thick, depending on layer of detail. The entire structure was assembled from 25 separate pieces with an internal wooden frame for support. It weighs 91kg and took about 800 hours to print.

As an in-kind sponsor of our Global Summit, re:3D Inc. participated in the project pro-bono, including the development, design, printing, and shipping of the final model to Toronto, Canada. re:3D is a full service socially focused additive manufacturing company based in Houston, Texas USA.

Creative Commons would like to thank re:3D and #NEWPALMYRA for their collaboration on the project and commitment to the global commons. Follow us on social media for pictures of the display on our Twitter,Facebook, and Instagram.

Ryan Merkley presenting at CC Summit, Photo by Jennie Rose Halperin, CC BY

Syracuse University 3D Printing Projects

The Syracuse University Makerspace has quite a few 3D printers on hand – from super small wood-frame models, to a shelving tower of Makerbots, to their Gigabot (which, spoiler alert, now has a partner as of this year).

While they got Gigabot for the build volume – it was larger than anything else out there in their price range –what they realized is that its large bed could be beneficial for more than just really big prints. It can also function as a mini factory, cranking out dozens of smaller prints at a time. So while they have pushed their bot to long hours – John talks about one unusual print request they got from a visiting artist – they have also managed their heavy print workload in part thanks to being able to pack the bed full of smaller prints.

Watch the second video in the Syracuse series to hear about some notable projects that Syracuse University’s Gigabot has been a part of.

Morgan Hamel

Blog Post Author

From Music to Making: The Syracuse University Makerspace Story

On May 4, 1985, a live music venue in Upstate New York called the Jabberwocky closed its doors for the last time. From 1969 to 1985, big names like James Brown and Talking Heads traveled through and played shows for packed crowds made up of mostly students from Syracuse University.

But the space wasn’t done for good. In 2014, the doors of the old Jabberwocky opened again, not as a club but as a makerspace. (The space also served as a computer lab in between its time as a music venue and now). The Syracuse Information Technology and Services (ITS) Makerspace is home to a host of machinery, from CNC to commercial-grade embroidery, and of course 3D printing. From music to making, the creative energy in the room is strong.

One person who has bridged the gap between the two worlds is John Mangicaro, a musician who once played on the stage of the Jabberwocky and now runs the makerspace as the Instructional Technology Senior Engineer.

In the first video in this multi-part story series, John takes us through the different services and machinery that the makerspace offers and recounts the story of one student who used the equipment to get a business idea off the ground.

Morgan Hamel

Blog Post Author