Scotsman.com News - Latest News - Reprap Machines Would Turn Homes into Factories

Reprap Machines Would Turn Homes into Factories

By John von Radowitz, PA Science Correspondent

A revolutionary British development could one day change the face of manufacturing by turning every home into a factory.

Engineers are working on a machine capable of churning out a host of household items and gadgets, including kitchenware, cameras and even small musical instruments.

Not only would the machine make things out of plastic and metal, it would also fabricate its own component parts.

The “self-replicating rapid prototyper”, or RepRap, will be about the size of a refrigerator.

It could become a reality within four years – and the aim is to make it a universal feature of the home.

RepRap machines could in future render many forms of traditional manufacturing obsolete, according to project leader Dr Adrian Bowyer.

“Four hundred years ago almost every human being was employed in agriculture, and now it’s only a couple of per cent,” said Dr Bowyer, from the University of Bath’s Centre for Biomimetics. “I suspect the same thing is going to happen to manufacturing.”

Computer controlled machines already exist which mass-produce plastic components for industry, such as vehicle parts.

These conventional machines cost about £25,000. Dr Bowyer’s idea is initially to use these machines to make the component parts for his RepRap machine.

These machines can then be programmed to make further copies of themselves. People buying them would then be able to make more copies to sell on.

As the number of RepRap machines grows, their cost is expected to tumble to only a few hundred pounds or less.

Dr Bowyer plans to make the 3D designs and computer code needed for an existing machine to make one of his devices freely available on the internet.

He is not taking out a patent and will not charge a licence fee.

“The most interesting part of this is that we’re going to give it away,” he said.

“At the moment an industrial company consists of hundreds of people building and making things. If these machines take off, it will give individual people the chance to do this themselves. And we are talking about making a lot of our consumer goods.

“The effect this has on industry and society could be dramatic.”

Rapid prototype machines work by fusing together layers of plastic according to a blueprint fed into the computer.

Dr Bowyer’s machine would also be able to incorporate simple metal components and circuits out of an alloy that melts at low temperatures.

The machines could, for instance, make complete sets of coloured and decorated plastic plates, dishes and bowels.

The objects they produce would measure no more than 12 inches in length, width and height. But larger items could be made by simply clipping together smaller manufactured parts.

Glass items, complex parts such as microchips, and anything exposed to intense heat – such as a toaster – could not be directly assembled.

Components the machine is unable to make could easily be added. A basic digital camera could be made with the lens and computer chip bought separately and slotted in later.

Dr Bowyer said the devices would effectively be a form of Universal Constructor, the theoretical self-replicating machine first proposed by mathematician John von Neumann in the 1950s.

He and colleague Ed Sells have already built a simple demonstration robot with an electrical circuit using the technology.

They are now looking for funding for the next stages of development, leading to a programme for making the component parts of a RepRap machine in about four years.

Transforming the whole basis of manufacturing might take as long as 20 years, if it ever happened, said Dr Bowyer.

He admitted there was an anarchistic element to what he was doing.

“Employment will increase, because it’s not employment that creates wealth, it’s wealth that creates employment,” he said.