Turn a 3D Printer into a 2D drawing machine

Users including bam (LulzBot) and Caleb Kraft (Make: Magazine) have turned their 3D printers into 2D printers! By custom printing a rig for a ballpoint pen, a 3D printer can be set to plot a drawing uploaded as a design jpeg. This may seem like a silly use of a 3D printer, but it is also undeniably great to watch a drawing being made on a plotter. Check out the full article: http://3dprint.com/19828/3d-to-2d-draw/


Below is a tree being drawn via Bic pen attached to a 3D printer:
http://3dprint.com/wp-content/upload...10/2D-tree.jpg

Oh my ! Thank you Brian for this topic.
I have some otaku friend that love ink/pen drawing instead of printing.This will give them ideas! They will definitely that would make him happy.

That is definitely cool!

It looks like that machine has a problem when it comes to lifting the pen; that's not so good for drawing.

Andrew Werby
www.computersculpture.com

You could add a spring mechanism so you are guarenteed to have the optimal pressure for drawing, Further, the design did not implemented Z hopping. Some tweaking and this thing will be perfect.

Amazing!

Do you think this technology could be enhanced so that you could draw plans of things, such as houses? :rolleyes:

OME

Something a bit more practical would be to have a cutting tip instead of a pen and use it to cut vinyl for example, to make stickers and stencils.

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Originally Posted by Brian_Krassenstein

Users including bam (LulzBot) and Caleb Kraft (Make: Magazine) have turned their 3D printers into 2D printers! By custom printing a rig for a ballpoint pen, a 3D printer can be set to plot a drawing uploaded as a design jpeg. This may seem like a silly use of a 3D printer, but it is also undeniably great to watch a drawing being made on a plotter. Check out the full article: http://3dprint.com/19828/3d-to-2d-draw/


Below is a tree being drawn via Bic pen attached to a 3D printer:
http://3dprint.com/wp-content/upload...10/2D-tree.jpg

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Erm.. people have been putting pens in their delta machines for quite some time and printing SVG's with it in single layer prints, not rocket science mate :p

Hyrel 3D Printers have a built-in function to convert 2D .dxf files into gcode for the laser; it's the same process to move a pen around instead of a laser. We actually did some early motion control testing with sharpies.

Indeed, it looks cool when you think about it. Thanks for sharing the full article. A 3d printer used for 2d printing totally gives me new ideas.