As was the case with 3D printers when they started to become a thing two decades ago and made my initial predictions, technology is there, the commercial and industrial capacity to capitalize the technology is not there. Only part I was wrong so far is how slow the technology is been adapted to household usage.
As a 3D printer haver - no guys, 3D printing is not there yet and is doubtful that it will be there soon. It is slower, less reliable and more expensive than casting. It only shines when you need small numbers, since you don't need to invest in a mold.
oh yeah, I've seen and discovered that too a couple years back. Spoiler: it's even more toxic than 3D print resin, and requires WAY MORE prep time for the manufacturer after "printing"... clearly not an industrial solution for anything else than prototyping. ^^' I also feel like 3D printing is creating slowly a culture of "entitlement" amongst wargamers, where nothing but 3D prints they bought .stl for (or pirated on telegram) is worth their money, and spending time to build a mini is worthless time, even gluing two parts together being "too much asking for the average Joe" (a real argument I've seen in the past week online ^^").
Just for my curiosity (because I don't exactly follow the 3-d printing crowd...) what is so toxic about 3d resin print and DLMS print? I know the printers - both resin and PLA - are smelly and should be kept in well-ventillated spaces (which is one of the reasons why I don't want one at home), and that reisins (whether 3d printed, or cast) produces very fine particles when filed / sanded, said particles being very bad for one's health. But beyond that? Merely to satisfy my curiosity :) Nb. I recall a conversation years ago where I mentioned a company offering to laser-cut some Infinity terrain for me out of a PVC sheet, and some folks pointing out I shouldn't do that, since laser-cutting PVC releases toxic gases (namely, chlorine). In that case, I was of the opinion that if the company in question was doing it for years on a daily basis, they have to have it sorted out as to make it in a safe manner.
Laser sintering is great. You can literally use sintering for space ship components. It is, sadly, prohibitively expensive (we're looking into 5-digit sums for a printer, and costs per item towering over the cost of traditional mold casting), requires industrial space, often additional tools and is a nasty occupational hazard. The particulates themselves are a health hazard just by being particulates you can breathe in. Then on top of that some of them are poisonous and/or carcinogenic. Then many workflows require additional heating in a furnace, which adds the fire hazard on top of everything said so far. If I didn't personally shot down the idea for a DMSL machine at work, I'd have also totally printed myself a miniature or two, for demonstration and learning of the process (and maybe for an HVT). But this technology is completely divorced from any viability for a mass produced product. Most 3D printing resins, on the other side, can be nasty allergens. The ABS printing resins are nasty mucous membrane irritants and their long term exposure effects are under debate.
Molds have to cool down after 1-2 uses ( at least that is how we did it at my old workplace ) so it is not like you can spam 500 of the same mini per hour. Also, casting is labour intensive process, unlike 3d printing. And also, you can produce same quality results with 150 euro 3d printer as you can with metal casting. And much better than the siocrap. Anyone who claims otherwise doesn't know how to use a 3d printer.
Sciencey Bit: The resins are in an unpolymerised state and so need reactive unstable photo-initiators as well as a variety of other solvents and organic solvents which can cause irritation, rashes, and allergies in some people, to work as intended. The heat generated during the process of polymerisation and the light also causes Volatile Organic Compounds (VOCs) which are not good for your health! (hence enclosure, filtering, airflow is crucial). If you are unlucking to get some resin on you most are not soluble in water and need alcohol to remove - everyone suggests isopropyl alcohol but methanol also works almost as good. I'm not an expert in DMLS but general when you have little bits of metal dust and cook them with a laser you're heating them which can vapourise and release fumes from the metal or any contaminants. I don't know if the DMLS is just pure metal powder or if there are binders or other compounds mixed in with it. Ranty Bit: As a 3d printer person who is getting a 'godless laser machine' soon it does wind me up when people are printing whole warhammer armies as if they are somehow being smart. Unless you take enough time to source good STLs, support and print properly, clean up toxic end product to render to an inert model and then clean, base, prime and paint it, generally speaking I find pre-done kits are better, safer, less toxic and produce a better result. If you are an experienced modeller you can clean up the results properly but often its not experienced modellers. That being said people are good at making do with what they have. My only (hypocritical?) exception was printing a 15 model meme warhammer army (Be'Lakor, 12 big knights, 2 demon cat things) because: i)it's a meme list and will get nerfed, ii) its for funsies, iii)the company is horrific to customers and just squatted 3 armies, at least 1 of which was majorly popular (imagine all MI+HI pan O just gone... that scale of nuke) so it was a bit of a screw you and iiii) finally to see the difference between printed 'army' on the table. My main use is for RPG minis and basing elements or terrain pieces like consoles, greebles and stuff like that. I Should you unexpectedly get some on your skin and you encounter sunlight/UV it will polymerise (IE turn to solid resin) on your skin releasing a lot of heat which can burn you and combined with the chemical irritation is not fun. Resin dust can be extremely fine and while hopefully inert at that stage it is still not food or body safe (so my plans to become a cyborg have to wait) a best case is that it presents a particle/dust hazard - wet sanding, ventilation and a mask are good ideas.
For most people, if you calculate labor involved, 3D printing is not worth it, unless you enjoy the process, or are interested in a specific part for a conversion, which usually you can just add on your plate when printing something else anyways. Of course, the calculation changes, if you are printing something to replace a 700 euro miniature or something like that, but if you are printing your run of the mill toy soldiers...
First, thank you gentlemen for satisfying my curiosity on the topic :) I've seen a material or two about DMLS-printed spare parts for humans. As in, custom-making half of a ribcage, inc. a breastbone, for some unfortunate fella who needed a replacement. So apparently DMLS'ed parts can be made safe enough to have actual medical use. In this case they made the bones out of titanium (which, I've been told, works very well for implants, and supposedly can even accept bone matrix with time). Your plans may be closer to fulfillment than you think :) But that's just a bit of trivia from me :)
This is where I stand on them. I'm not interested in adopting a 3D printing hobby just so that I can enjoy my tabletop miniature hobby. I barely have time for minis alone, let alone time to fight with a 3D printer.
Can the sintering method be used to produce a die or mold for production of plastic injection miniatures? from my understanding of the process the mold cutting is the prohibitive part of the process so if that part were more available to a smaller manufacturer like CB for example the cost of producing new minis would be reduced.
Yes, DMLS can do implants. Sintering can be used to produce molds for plastic injection, yes. There are various approaches. I'm sure CB is extremely well aware of them and if some of those methods work for them, they have considered it.
One other game I play (Bushido) has in the past been all metal with the actual casting outsourced but the last few years they have been experimenting with other materials. Cast resin, Siocast, and the latest one is 3D printing. I haven't gotten any of their 3d printed ones yet but I have heard good things about them. So yes 3d printing for commercial miniatures games are already here.
Eh there is some detail lost and it is very brittle. Can be very tough on long spears a s swords. I do like the ease of assembly and light weight though. I would say 3d printing for real is some time off. Bushido can do it...well because they don't sell much and allows them to almost print on demand. You get to any kind of real volume and they will need to find an alternative approach.
Several companies have tried 3D printing and outside of niche low volume production, it is not worth it.
Lets use some literature arguments! Why not? There is a story written by Hans Christian Andersen. "The Steadfast tin soldier" (Den standhaftige tinsoldat) Not "The Steadfast 3D-printed soldier" because for now steadfast is not about 3Dprinting. Ha!
Absolutely, to do it properly - preparing, supporting, cost of machine, resin and cleanup materials, the time to print a model (28/32mm RPG minis are fine as they're about 2" tall tops) and the actual cleanup, curing and then model tidyup (sanding nubs filling bits etc) it's totally not worth it unless you're doing an overpriced GW model but then getting a suitable STL is difficult due to IP. I can print a plate of 40 or so humanoid 28/32mm models for D&D or Cyberpunk and it takes maybe 3 hours tops, but then I need to leave it to drain, clean up, wash in alcohols, wash the alcohol off in water, cure them under UV (stops 'burning' and gets into gaps). But there's always the odd one that looses a leg, or a blade snaps or something. That's also assuming pre-supported, if you have to support stuff it can add anywhere from 10mins to hours depending on the model. That's pretty epic, does it need a coating or further processing? I guess being metal you can sterilise the bejesus out of it with steam and uv before installing them into people. Closest cybernetic I have is a glucose monitor embedded in... but soon I will be a Shang Ji!!
Depends. For dental purposes you absolutely need coating. For some other implants, you may need surface polishing, additional refinements, removal of defects etc, but skip coatings. And yes, you can have them sterilized as much as you wish and then some.
So cool! Operation Shang Ji when? lol Also on the original topic, I'm a bit wary of siocast as I've heard a lot of negatives but not sure if that's QC, unfamiliarity with the material or people not following instructions.
It is getting better, had some bad reputation at the start, as far as I know CB is developing their own mixture now to have the results they want. I personally know some models come with different coloured parts and each colour has different properties.
