NASA Emails a Wrench to Space to be 3D Printed

[Brian_Krassenstein]

Made in Space is making headlines again. This time, they've sent a file to space to be printed. While the 3D printer on the International Space Station had already created 20 objects since November, the 21st print job was different: it was the first object created that was designed on Earth and sent up to orbit for production. The "emailed" CAD file -- sent from Made in Space to NASA to their Huntsville Operations Support Center to the ISS -- was successfully produced, and ISS Commander Barry "Butch" Wilmore was able to have a new ratcheted socket wrench in hand. See more details on this impressive information transfer in the full article: http://3dprint.com/32269/made-in-space-emails-wrench/ ‎


Below is a photo (credit NASA) of the wrench that has been 3D printed on the ISS:

[Brian_Krassenstein]

Update:

From the moment when Barry "Butch" Wilmore was overhead saying he needed a ratchet handle for a job he was doing on the International Space Station, 3D printing came to the rescue. A file of the first working tool transmitted off the Earth for manufacture was sent to Commander Wilmore, and after a little time spent in printing in the Microgravity Science Glovebox, out came a fully-functional ratchet handle and a socket to fit. It was a historic moment, and it like presages a time when a wide variety of necessary parts and tools will be 3D printed in space to save launch resources and space. You can read the whole story here: http://3dprint.com/33556/3d-print-your-own-nasa-wrench/


Below is a look at the rendering of the wrench:

[curious aardvark]

I've just printed this.



Tried to take a pic of the ratchet mechanism as it was printing. Tricky but got it - sort of lol



I'd like to know what settings and filament type they used in space. I just ran it off quick at 0.2mm and 10% infill.
The ratchet is quite stiff but works perfectly. I presume they'd print it more or less solid.
This one took an hour and a 11 minutes.

. "In less than a week, the ratchet was designed, approved by safety and other NASA reviewers, and the file was sent to space where the printer made the wrench in four hours.”

here's the nasa page link - but typically, no actual details.
http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/st.../#.VK7TtcnAo28

And i'm going to give it to my mate who's space mad.

[Mjolinor]

Gese I can't believe they are still on Imperial units.

I wonder if it is designed to slip at that torque?

[curious aardvark]

dunno thought that, but not breaking this one to find out lol
Plus it would have been calibrated to the material and settings they used.

But it's pretty cool that this is the first complex tool in space that was made in space.

I'm not counting improvised hammers :-)

If they used nylon then that little lever holding the ratchet in place, could be made to buckle under a given pressure simply by adjusting it's thickness.

[Mjolinor]

Where did you find the files?

Is it printed in one piece?

[Feign]

Looks like it's printed in one piece. I think the Made In Space printer is going beyond the experimental phase faster than the NASA guys expected.

It would be interesting to see how the plastics react to the vacuum and radiation outside, if the tools made from it could be reliably used during a space walk. And if the plastics break down over time in the radiation, then all the better, as a lost tool would no longer be a potential hazard to future missions.

On second thought, direct exposure to sunlight in space would melt the surface of a PLA part in a matter of seconds... So no.

[curious aardvark]

yeah it prints in one piece. The link to the file is in the original article brian posted.
here you go :-)
http://nasa3d.arc.nasa.gov/detail/wrench-mis

[Mjolinor]

Cheers for that. I am crap at finding stuff. I must print it once I finish messing with the laser cutters.