3d printing and our hobby

I was watching a doco on Netflix the other day called print the legend and it seems the hype about this technology being available to general consumers is huge.

I tend to agree with it and think it will change manufacturing as we know it. But what does it mean for our hobby????

There's the obvious ones like printing replacement plastic and metal parts without having to get a group buy together to justify the costs.

But what about electrical components???

Surely this is not out of the question. I mean they are already printing non functional body parts and food.

What do people think. Will all of our arcade machines eventually be reoroduced on a small scale for us hobbyists??

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Seems electronic parts are not out of the question....

Taken from an article on line.

The advancement of materials for 3D printing is essential to its future. Take graphene for example?a highly conductive nanomaterial?which when introduced to thermoplastics used in 3D printing, adds electrical conductivity to the final product. This is a major step forward because graphene enables us to make a number of applications through 3D printing, including capacitive touch sensors and circuitry.

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The technology that is available today to hobbyists is nowhere near good enough for "general use" parts. They are certainly not strong enough as it is. Even for prototyping we stopped using 3d parts as they are just too frustrating - you can't screw to them or use them in any practical way OTHER THAN looking at them only - they will just break.

People selling parts made with a 3D printer for pinball use are going to be in for a nasty surprise IMO.

I am guessing this will improve drastically and quickly with time but today it just doesn't cut it.

When better quality materials and machines (and software) is available at MUCH lower prices this will likely change.

The stories you are reading about replacement bones etc are using machines that are worth millions of dollars and are very experimental.

I dont think we will be able to print such things with home printers as home 3d printers are essentially computer controlled hotglue guns.

but certainly those industry 3d printers who use vastly different techniques to that of home 3d printers will pop out some amazing things in the future using different mediums.

But i do think even in current state they are handy for our hobby as you outlined above on the obvious things, i think once they work out better plastics to use for home printing which i would say they will then it will become even more useful and get over a few of those problems Homepin has outlined