Indigogo Fabtotum Update #6 - 2/16/14
https://ci5.googleusercontent.com/pr...png?1392504729
Dear backers,
We are getting closer to the Beta milestone.
To celebrate with you this achievement we proudly present you: the FABtotum Personal Fabricator - Beta Design.
The Beta represents the closest the prototyping will get to the final version. We have been working in the dark lately, this is going to change soon, as we are locking the specs of the FABtotum Personal Fabricator and we start feeling confident in sharing the improvements we made during these months.
Keep in mind that as usual nothing is final until we say otherwise,especially in small details and appearance.
https://ci4.googleusercontent.com/pr...jpg?1392504814
That being said, as you can see, the overall appearance is pretty much the same as in the Alpha version.(we'll show you the bare-bone prototype soon!)
From a functional point of view The triangular window is bigger, and the front panel is mounted on brackets and hinges to slide and lock out of the way when needed. Opening the panel during runtime halts the machine.
Those "boxes" on both sides of the working plane are like structural pockets, made to insulate completely the electronics (on the left) and the filament spool (on the right). Electronics and Spool are easily accessible by removing a panel on both sides.
Beside the shafts and the mechanical parts, The top frame, lower frame and panels are either aluminum or composite panels with similar mechanical characteristics.
https://ci3.googleusercontent.com/pr...png?1392504906
So what's next?
There hasn't really been a point in the last 5 months where we slowed down, while never giving up to design compromises. We made it through the main challenges during the design phase, increased the team size and dealt with such a complex design process.
The next big challenge is building a solid supply chain. With our bill of materials complete, we expect March to be the turning point in terms of manufacturing and supply chain, where everything has to come together.
https://ci5.googleusercontent.com/pr...jpg?1392506512Community updates:Due to many requests, starting from next week we'll be testing 1.75mm filaments with the current setup. Good thing is this experiment is not a big deal in terms of changes to the design. In fact, if we see benefits we'll gladly switch to 1.75mm entirely. If not, never mind! in both cases it's win-win for everyone!
Also, to keep our backers up-to-date we changed the frequency of updates to have two each month instead of one. One update is going to be the Indiegogo campaign update (just like this) the other will be a tech posts on the blog 15 days later.
the FABteam
