Sinaz20

Oh, hah-- I had intended to just answer the question here, yeah.

So, sorry I've been quiet.

I'd been going back and forth with Ponoko... the only 3D printing place that would print something weapon shaped. But no matter how much I thought I was optimizing it, I just couldn't get the price down. (The pricing I had been quoted before was so small because their uploader kept reverting the scale to miniature size.)

Anyway, yeah, i'm still working on this-- I'm just a little stuck at the moment.

Hand-feel prototype is printing via Ponoko currently. Should receive it sometime after Christmas unless some problem comes up.

Hit an interesting snag-- Shapeways specifically prohibits printing or even uploading any "weaponry look" models. I emailed them for clarification. They mentioned Federal penalties... but didn't go beyond that. I have asked for further clarification.

Other 3D printing services do not make this restriction, but I have emailed them just to be sure.

I also found a local "HackerSpace," and am considering joining, but the dues are so high, I might as well just buy a 3D printer myself... which I have also been researching.

All this... just to say: I am about to send off models to print the "hand-feel" prototype. I'm just trying to get the model down to bare minimal material by sort of punching it full of holes (using 123D Make to convert my rough shells into lattices of material.)

Ponoko.com is my current printer of choice because it gives me reasonable printing rates in sub-premium materials and don't seem to have any restrictions on what can be printed.

My questions were framed before knowing your intention with his design or resources.
If you wanted to make some sort of conversion kit that you could then sell to other people, it wouldn't make a lot of sense then for it to be 4-5x the price of a Maverick.

Look into the elite line remakes of the Raider & Longstrike if you want examples of what we call direct plunger systems, while still implemented in a compact manner, but as it seems your purpose is more a cosmetic rearrangement of bulk maverick parts rather than to 3D print a full/new/efficient war blaster, so I wouldn't worry about it; do whatever you want since its your own project anyways.

I will definitely look into custom internals in a future project. A private convo with Meaker made some good points about it. For now, though, I want to finish this project to prove all my methods. Once I'm sure I can do this from concept to production, then I'll really dig into internals.

As for the cost... I figure a lot of people own one or more Mavericks already. And personally for me, I like the concept of the Maverick, just not the sort of reject look of it. Nerf has a new revolver coming out, but it still has that weird forward-of-the-trigger cylinder design.

So maybe I'll make this project so anyone who cares to can beautify their Maverick (if they think it's kinda ugly) and then I'll make another revision that adapts the Strong Arm... or just make a completely custom version.

Thanks.

Since the quality and effort here is much better than your regular MS Paint concept thread, it won't be locked immediately. However, my confidence in this project actually seeing fruition is fairly low.

Ok... well... I guess I can't stop you from doing that.

What resources do you have for 3D printing and resin casting?
How are you factoring cost into desired production?

For 3D printing, I am currently receiving quotes from various 3rd party printers. There is also a group of friends/colleagues who have been talking about pooling resources to set up a MakerBot co-op. I am also investigating the cost effectiveness of purchasing a 3D printer myself, since I can imagine a lifetime of applications for it.

Resin casting is a simple cottage manufacturing process. I have silicone mold material and a couple different resins currently on hand, and a bunch of random lumber and odds and ends to build mold boxes. I'm not doing ABS injection or anything, but once I get a suitable prototype part and move onto the casting, I imagine there will be some experimentation.

As for factoring cost... at the moment, I'm not. I have money, time, and determination. If it costs me $2000 and I feel I got $2000 worth of personal satisfaction out of it, it will have all been worth while.

The last member with a successful 3D design thread had personal access to a 3D printer. The rest following mostly died through halfway. You seem to be relying on 3rd party services which seems very cost prohibitive to a hobby like this.

What is "cost prohibitive?" True, 3rd party printing is expensive. Current quotes that I'm seeing is about $35 $13* for a plaster plastic* print of half the shell at about 1/8" wall thickness. Comes to about $90 $35* for my hand-feel prototype. That's certainly well within my fun-budget.

*Sculpteo! Best quote so far!

Also @Meaker-- I changed the text color.

Thanks for the props for my blaster design, everyone. I hope it'll look 100x better after the beauty sculpt.