Use of Computer and Internet Access to help children teach themselves in India.

Here's some great work by Sugata Mitra from the past ten years. I worked with a certain Dr. J. Harriss at SFU on a large paper analyzing Mitra's "Minimally Invasive Education". His argument that Education technology should be introduced to the poorest and remote areas of the world is very true. Children can't teach themselves more difficult subjects, but where education is extremely low-quality, or non-existent, they can pick up quite a lot of the basic math, science and literacy skills.

In the context of 3D printing in the third world, this sort of work meshes quite nicely. If 3D printing released the barriers to manufacturing the developing world, then MIE would release the creativity of its teeming masses. For poorer people who have the ability to craft 3D models that may serve a business they are in (and often self-employed) or a problem they may have (a broken part), then the shackles of the West's monopoly on technical solutions is broken.

Of course, designing complex parts is not easy. But often its a simple fix to a complicated machine they may have invested in. With the advent of reliable scanning it becomes easy to scan a broken part and then print it off. All it requires is some essential familiarity with computers, forums to answer questions and some patience.

Anyways, read my piece goddamn it. There are pictures of cute slum-urchins on computers. They're making LOL-Cats.

Bringing 3D Printing to Bolivia

I'm currently in Cochabamba, Bolivia as a volunteer for the Solar energy company Energetica, writing reports on the social-economic impact of their work on communities. On the side, I am also designing a 2-axis "Solar Tracker" for some of their smaller >150W systems. But not just any simple Solar Tracker. This is going to be a 3D printed, Arduino-powered Solar Tracker. And hopefully my prototype will be the first of many prototypes designed, printed and sold in Bolivia, and the Grand-daddy of a cheap reliable Solar Tracker.

Here are a few screenshots of the Motor case and Pivot which I designed with Google Sketchup (fig.1) and then simulated the print with Pleasant 3D to double-check the print quality (fig.2)

My lifelong interests of the problems of poverty and development as well as engineering and design collide quite neatly in the field of 3D printing. In places where it is difficult to create complicated parts quickly and cheaply, 3D printing fills the void. In a country where demand for relatively expensive durable items is fickle, on-demand printing is more economically viable. In a country where resources are scarce and a simple part means something very important to be working, this is economically valuable.

To prove this point, designing and manufacturing a cheap reliable solar tracker seemed like a challenge that a Makerbot or other 3D printer could handle. Ideally, it would have to be less than 100 dollars, last more than 15 years, be weather-resistant and consume less power than it would conceivably 'create'. In addition, it would have to be easy to print, easy to build and easy to install.

There are multiple ways of orienting panels towards the sun: a sensor tracks the position of the sun, a table of sun positions for every day of the year, or a formula that uses the current time and location. Sensors are prone to fail and cannot deal with oddities like...a cloud going past. It can become confused. A table of sun positions is a big table...bigger than the memory bank of the average Arduino microcontroller. However, using a clock, loading the geographical location and programming a formula could be much more reliable in all circumstances. The only drawback is that the system has to be active at all times. However, simplicity and reliability are first and foremost in such a design.

Lucky for me (a useless coder at best), there are a few codes out there that can calculate the position of the sun. Mowcius has developed an excellent open-source code that does everything we will need.

However, there are a few electronic and engineering issues that are beyond calculation and need to be resolved.

Can a stepper motor hold a 16 Kg, 150W panel?
-After searching high and low for good (yet inexpensive) stepper motors that had a holding torque of more than 200mN*cm, I realized that simply balancing the panel with a counterweight would do the trick. But this is a theory, and not practice. (I'll scan a drawing of my design soon)

How weather resistant is ABS plastic?
-Apparently, not very.  After thinking about coating the plastic with a UV resistant paint, I realized that the entire system will probably be shaded by the panel! It remains to be seen what other problems would crop up after 15 years of sand, wind, indirect sunlight, dry-air, high altitude...etc. But the big problem can be mitigated.

Will the marginal increases in power generation cover the inevitable consumption by the tracker?
-According to our Wikipedia, 2-axis Solar Tracking Systems have an estimated 36% increase over fixed systems .... capturing almost 100% of direct and indirect light. (Grabs a napkin and pen) So, for a 150W system going from 74% to 100% is a mean increase of 54W. It is much more difficult to calculate energy output because of seasonal and daily changes in solar outputs. An Arduino Uno (5V) with a motor shield(5V), an RTC and 2 12V, 0.35amp Motors would consume ... 22V times ( 0.35(2) + 0.4 amps) = 24W ...

Decreasing these figures so we're not eating half the output increases (and probably the entirety of it in the morning and evening) is the next challenge. Preliminary research says its possible to sleep the Arduino or even turn it off (esp. since i have an RTC running in the background). The big question is the power consumption of the motors to hold the panel in position. In a perfect design, the motor would simply MOVE the panel and the structure would lock it until it needed to move it again. This is not important at the moment.

What about a once-in-a-decade Windstorm?

Again, that is a question for future prototypes. Keeping it simple and reliable is going to be a challenge!

Now that I've finished designing the 3D models, I need them printed. There are no Makerbotter's in Bolivia, so I'm hoping to crowdsource the printing until I can convince Energetica to buy a printer. If not this project is going to be stalled indefinitely.

JF

Un-uniform Form

MIT investigates 3D printing at the large scale.

Money Quote -

".. input data about physical stresses on a structure, as well as design constraints such as size, overall shape, and the need to let in light into certain areas of a building. Based on this information, the software applies algorithms to specify how the material properties need to change throughout a structure. 

A load-bearing wall could be printed in elaborate patterns that correspond to the stresses it will experience from the load it supports from wind or earthquakes, for instance. 

In non-load bearing areas, it could also be possible to print concrete that's so porous that light can penetrate, or to mix the concrete gradually with transparent materials."

 Top marks to Neri Oxman for using ideas that Nature has developed and replicating it to produce more sustainable and structurally efficient buildings. I've been thinking along the same lines as she has - a polymer extruding head attached to a Dshape or other could go a long way to increasing the tensile strength...honeycomb patterns, voronoi structures or the like could be incorporated easily. 

Re: The Original MIT article - they cite Behrokh Khoshnevis' printer, the Contour Printer....and not the Dshape.... Never a fan of his design compared to the Dshape - the potential to create freeform architecture is limited by its 'additive' design....Khoshnevis's feet are firmly encased in concrete and construction....nothing artistic can be created. I think next blog post Ill do a nice 'pros n cons' of the two.

Free time with the Thing-o-matic

Spent about 6 hours with the Makerbot Thing-o-matic today....its a shared item at the Vancouver Hackerspace i frequent.

Fixed the heated platform - its important that the object being printed is kept at a certain temperature to prevent warping.

Printed the final part for a 3d scanner. Scanning will be happening soon I hope!

Printed a hand-hook

Printed parts for a elliptic gear system.

Printed my very own creation - a simple wheel.

And I dressed up the Makerbot ... I call him, Baron von Makerbot :)

Dshape printed design wins Gold

Alright, a gardening medal from the Royal Horticultural Society in the UK. But damn, it looks nice! Same design was used in a public works project in Milan in April 2010. Goes to show of what the limitless possibilities here.

3D printing and the 3rd World

As costs go down and the variety of printable materials go up, the number of users of 3D printing will increase. What does this mean for the Global South? Large stocks of semi-literate people, high inequalities, poor infrastructure characterize swaths of countries in Africa, Asia and South America. If the railroad brought together India, and the power-loom made China king of textile exports, what of 3D printing?   

 

3D printing is not heavily dependent on major investors – its cost is decreasing rapidly. It does depend on computer literate operators and a steady source of electricity. It seems likely that the means of production will become increasingly decentralized. Small informal groups of 3D printers within urban centers will be much more common.

But what will they be making? In countries with fewer opportunities to make major reinvestment, retrofitting durable and capital goods rather than replacing them will become easier. In the case of a taxicab, replacing specialized parts will be a matter of 3D scanning (this technology has become increasingly cheap….I made one with a camera, a simple laser and a computer -  $60), formatting on a computer and printing it. With good internet access, it might be possible to print off all the parts of a car.

This is just the inner futurist speaking – and nothing ages faster than predictions of the future. But the declining costs are a reality. 10 years ago, a quality 3D printer cost more than $50,000 dollars. Today, a desktop Makerbot costs $1,300 to make the equivalent quality. This has facilitated a boom in Do-It-Yourself printing in the Western world. Already in Germany DIY 3D metal printers have been made. The RepRap project was started in 2005 to create a printer that can print off its own parts to replicate itself.

During preceding decades the 1960s, 70s and 80s, many developing countries pursued Import Substitution Industrialization by raising tariffs on western products to protect their own small government-funded industries and markets. During the past 30 years, these tariffs were dropped and developing countries were forced to cut back on state-led industrialization. With the advent of 3D printing, it seems highly likely that industrialization will become highly decentralized and highly informal. 3D printing is likely to take-off within the Megacities of the Global South.  Profitability will be depend on high demand for parts for consumer, durable and capital goods, quality infrastructure like electricity and the internet and a large work force of computer-literate designers and operators. No longer will state be able to direct industrial policy – its role may be that of a facilitator, and not a director of economic policy. For large conglomerates like the Tatas and the Mistubishis, their role is that of research and development rather than mass production. It is still far more cheaper and reliable to mass produce products.

Voronoi Cell Structure

3D printing can produce structures which are inherently impossible to produce with current technologies (hand sculpting, molding and casting). That's its main advantage. The question is, how do we take advantage of these properties to its full extent?

Enter Voronoi cells. These are statistical diagrams that are used in meteorology and physics, but also produce 2D and 3D structures that closely mimic nature. Compare multi-cellular seacreatures like Radiolaria and Voronoi cell diagrams below.

It gets better. Some recent Grad work by Eva Friedrich has used voronoi cells to find optimal structure formats to resist deformation of force on a simpler structure. To quoteth:

"It appears that a strength of the Voronoi diagram lies in the potential to produce interesting and unexpected structures which exhibit statically efficient system behaviour. Certain topologies which have emerged during the optimisation process apparently allow for ‘synergy’ effects of coordinated interactions of tear and pressure forces."

The take-away is pretty simple. It is possible to retune conventional structures and make them more organic and well as stronger. Along with 3D printing, it is possible to realize them in unheard manners.

There is a catch of course - the results can be ugly.

"....optimised structures generated with this technique, although performing better than the original structure, look irregular and random, with considerable distortion of the geometry of the structure."

If you look at the top left corner there's a picture of the first printed building by the Dshape - the Radiolaria. Now we have a mathematical way of recreating straight lines and mimicking nature without stealing all the blueprints - true inspiration!