Rapid Prototyping

Rapid-Prototyping of Rapid-Prototyping Machines

Fostering the spread of inexpensive, sustainable manufacturing processes and equipment empowers individuals and societies to create products which solve their particular challenges. We intend to advance that idea to its next logical step, offering not just the means of production, but also the mechanisms by which this empowerment can propagate and evolve. By creating rapid-prototyping machines ...

Rapid Prototyping of Rapid Prototyping Machines

Rapid prototyping tools empower individuals to create almost anything. Unfortunately, these tools are still far too expensive for personal ownership. The do-it-yourself community has responded with a slew of home-made rapid prototyping machines, but development times are slow because of the complexity of the necessary control system and the need to design the mechanical elements from scratch. T...

Rapid Prototyping - Rapid Tooling - Rapid Manufacturing

Functionally Graded Rapid Prototyping

Functionally Graded Rapid Prototyping (FGRP) is a novel design approach and technological framework enabling the controlled spatial variation of material properties through continuous gradients in functional components. Such variations are traditionally achieved as discrete delineations in physical behavior by fabricating multiple parts comprised of different materials, and assembling them only...

Rapid Prototyping for Robotics

The design of robotic mechanisms is a complex process involving geometric, kinematic, dynamic, tolerance and stress analyses. In the design of a real system, the construction of a physical prototype is often considered. Indeed, a physical prototype helps the designer to identify the fundamental characteristics and the potential pitfalls of the proposed architecture. However, the design and fabr...