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Science

Sirveri

(4,517 posts)

5. Part of the price is the cost of the machine.

Reply to Jester Messiah (Reply #2)

Wed Nov 6, 2013, 12:36 PM

Nov 2013

How many hours you can run the machine is a serious consideration. Cost/Max Run Time = Cost/minute. Multiply that by the amount of time to run and it's not cheap. Our school has one of these as well, that model currently costs 15,000 dollars retail, though we bought it 5 years ago for twice the price. Higher priced models have better accuracy and lower scrap parts amounts. For something with interconnected moving parts, you need high accuracy or the device will bind up. There is also the price of the modeling software, which is typically solidworks which runs another 7k per workstation. Then there is the cost of the engineering to design the device.

Materials costs are nothing in comparison, it's all about shop time.

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Highlight:

Man Makes 3D Printed Prosthetic Hand For Son For Only $10 [View all] dipsydoodle Nov 2013 OP

Amazing. nt. polly7 Nov 2013 #1

Fabrication tech like this is gonna make a lot of people start to question... Jester Messiah Nov 2013 #2

I gather that most prosthetics are one off, hand made, precision craftmanship... mike_c Nov 2013 #4

Part of the price is the cost of the machine. Sirveri Nov 2013 #5

Fair point. Jester Messiah Nov 2013 #6

i love when technology is put to good use. hollysmom Nov 2013 #3