Anybody hear of this - 3D printers for every FIRST team

[IndySam]

Aviation Week Article.

The challenge is to think beyond current materials and designs. To that end, Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL) in Tennessee is placing thousands of 3-D printers in U.S. schools to give future designers and engineers experience with the technology. Already the lab has helped local high schools in the First Robotics competition—including building the first all-additive robot. Beginning this year with 250 machines, the lab plans to place 3,000 printers next year, then 4,000 and finally 28,000 so every high school in First Robotics has one.

[Akash Rastogi]

Seems like the work of team 4265. I'll have to ask them and find out more details!

[techhelpbb]

If they gave away $500 printers to 28,000 schools that would be a very generous $14,000,000 donation. I wonder which printer they have in mind, how many extruders the printer has and what material it extrudes?

Plus with each year FIRST grows. So in 2 years will they be giving away 30,000 or more printers to emcompass the whole competition?

I looked around briefly and found not much as far as this goes stated elsewhere.
Hope it is accurate.

[Alan Anderson]

It's good to know that the rumor I heard last month was more than just a rumor.

[CENTURION]

Very exciting!

Though, as a team that is not associated with a particular high school, I wonder how that works out for us, and other teams in the same situation.

[dellagd]

And I just bought a 3D printer. My luck

[yash101]

Originally Posted by dellagd

And I just bought a 3D printer. My luck

Which one?

[TD78]

Originally Posted by CENTURION

Very exciting!

Though, as a team that is not associated with a particular high school, I wonder how that works out for us, and other teams in the same situation.

Ditto. My team is 4-H based. Any ideas for non-school based teams?

[chmorroni]

Well, our school is not a public school, so, sadly, we don't qualify.

[Kathysmith]

Originally Posted by Akash Rastogi

Seems like the work of team 4265. I'll have to ask them and find out more details!

That definitely sounds like them, We had the good fortune to work with them last year and it's obvious that they really care about what they're doing and put a lot of thought into it.

[safiq10]

Thank-you to all thouse who are apart of this 3D printers for EVERY team. This is just spectacular. It really means alot to all the teams for someone to give 3d printers to all of us espically some of the smaller teams who barely have the money to pay registration. So thank you!
My second comment is where can I sign up for one!

[runneals]

I came across this earlier today about Makerbot trying to make this happen! http://www.makerbot.com/blog/2013/11...as-classrooms/

[MrRiedemanJACC]

Thanks for the link to the Makerbot Academy!!!! I just applied, says 5 days for the application to get reviewed. I'm crossing my fingers because if I read it right, you only need approximately $100 for a Replicator 2, that isn't going to be a problem at all to find from local businesses!

Has anyone tried to get a hold of ORNL to find out more about the 3-D printing technology they are speaking of? I absolutely love this quote from the original article posted "Now the lab has developed a way to infuse reinforcing carbon fibers into the raw material to print parts that can carry loads." It reminds me of steel fiber reinforced concrete.

[sanddrag]

Originally Posted by MrRiedemanJACC

Thanks for the link to the Makerbot Academy!!!! I just applied, says 5 days for the application to get reviewed. I'm crossing my fingers because if I read it right, you only need approximately $100 for a Replicator 2, that isn't going to be a problem at all to find from local business.

It looks like right now only schools in Brooklyn, NY qualify for the "almost home" funding. Are you reading something I'm missing?

[pfreivald]

Originally Posted by sanddrag

It looks like right now only schools in Brooklyn, NY qualify for the "almost home" funding. Are you reading something I'm missing?

Right, it looks like anybody can apply for the project, but only the Brooklyn schools qualify for the extra moolah.