Allforge "exactly what your family needs"

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Blizz
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Allforge "exactly what your family needs"

Post by Blizz »

So Allforge is about to launch its Kickstarter project.
It's a 3D molding system that is - if you believe their youtube clip - super easy and everything that comes out is perfect.
Don't see the use of this myself, how many times am I mass making something... hardly ever.

Wanted tot shared the video with you all:

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jonnybischof
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Re: Allforge "exactly what your family needs"

Post by jonnybischof »

Lol that video...

So how does the average housewife draw her chocolates in CAD? (oh, and massive chocolate bricks aren't pralines yet. I know, I'm Swiss).
How does a 3D printed mold withstand the force and heat of injection molding?

The frame is made from aluminum? LOL. That's gonna last at least for 100 molds. Maybe more.

I wanna see how they make a standard ABS part with this using plastic molds. 3DHubs? Yeah sure, good luck. Maybe shapeways with ceramic or steel molds. But that size? It will cost a fortune.

That thing will fail, utterly...
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Re: Allforge "exactly what your family needs"

Post by LePaul »

I couldn't stand it after 45 seconds....what in the world...?
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Re: Allforge "exactly what your family needs"

Post by Dim3nsioneer »

No words, just: :lol:

@LePaul: What, you missed the extremely funny end!?! :-o
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Re: Allforge "exactly what your family needs"

Post by nilrog »

This was "injected" into my Facebook stream almost a week ago. It sounded so weird that I skipped posting about it :lol:
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Re: Allforge "exactly what your family needs"

Post by Meduza »

Yeah, i really do not get the whole family take on it, i was actually quite interested in this for a while, since a "cheap" simple to use injection molder would be fantastic to have in our makerspace, but now when they have published the videos and stuff i am really sceptical and will probably not even bring this up as a suggestion...
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Re: Allforge "exactly what your family needs"

Post by PeggyB »

https://community.allforge.com/t/allfor ... osting/467

all the answers you desperately wanted to know....

molds are 3d printed, by yourself or through 3Dhubs (and delivered the same day...ha,ha)
silicone or aluminum..

I don't like all these fake videos that looks a magician is at work: and voila, there magically appears an object..
Bad, not realistic examples. Why would you spontaneously injection mold a one time birthday candle that very much looks like a candle that you can by for a few cents around the corner....
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Re: Allforge "exactly what your family needs"

Post by danilius »

I think the video was appalling, but I plumped for one myself. I have various products that I cannot afford to produce the usual way, that I currently use RTV resins for. If this thing actually works, it will make a big difference to a small operation like my own.

I was thinking of building something like this myself but realised just how much work was involved so gave up the ghost very quickly :-)
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Re: Allforge "exactly what your family needs"

Post by Izzy »

As danilius, has taken a leap of faith it will be interesting what you think of it when you use it, please keep us informed, and berhaps a better video.
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Re: Allforge "exactly what your family needs"

Post by Blizz »

In the entire time I've had my 3D printer (almost 2 years now) I've had to serial-produce exactly once. So I can't see any use for it in my case.
That being said, I am curious about peoples experiences with it, so as Izzy said, please keep us informed.
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Re: Allforge "exactly what your family needs"

Post by Blizz »

Guess a lot of people don't agree with our assessments:

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Re: Allforge "exactly what your family needs"

Post by Titus »

This is just like the mobile phone printer :P
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Re: Allforge "exactly what your family needs"

Post by danilius »

There is a considerable difference here between the Allforge and the mobile phone printer. The mobile phone thing has many open questions that they have failed to address. With the Allforge, I spoke to the CEO myself and asked him various questions regarding the machine, but most importantly was how much manufacturing and delivery experience the team has. This is the big difference: these guys (Allforge) have the full product lifecycle experience for many products, some in the high-tech industry.

Allforge are not breaking any new ground, they have just find ways to economise on plastic injection machinery and automate the process using low-cost technology, much like 3D printing. I used 3D printers 25 years ago, and the difference between my Ultimaker and those i used then are minimal in terms of what they produce. In fact, compared to what I saw then, the Ultimaker is way higher quality and much faster.

You might find using aluminium is a bit naff, but this is what PocketNC have done as well, and it works well for them. I have seen quite a lot done with beefy aluminium parts, and there is a good reason for that. Aluminium is way cheaper than steel, and far cheaper to machine. Sure, the equivalent part has t be much heavier.

In the year and a half I have owned my UM2, I have upgraded the extruder, the hot end, even the clip holding the bowden tube, all using community-sourced designs. I'm hoping this will happen with the Allforge as well.

In my case, even as I type, I'm printing a run of 30 parts which will used in an industrial setting. It's a part of a series of prototypes, which the client will want to ramp up to low production once we have dialled in all the variables. Now, I could buy two UM2s for the price of an Allforge, but each part takes four hours to print. The amount of failures are pretty low, but in the last batch of four, some supports came away (3 out of around 50). These supports are hand built in Blender, and have worked 100% until now, and as it happens the failure did not affect the print. They are designed to allow a degree of failure. But if they had failed to a greater degree, then a four hour print would have gone into the bin.

If I can create a mould, however, I would lose perhaps 5 minutes for every failure. Manufacturing will be down to roughly 3 hours. Sure, the mould might fail before then, requiring a fresh mould to be printed. Well, I can keep printing moulds while the Allforge is working. In fact, only a small part of the mould has to be printed every time.

So, will this suit everyone? Of course not, it's a very niche market product. Will it work? I can't see any reason why not. Can the Allforge team deliver? What I see so far says they can, but who knows until they actually do.

Bear in mind that when I bought my UM2, I was expecting dual-extrusion a few months later. That's what they told me and many other people. They failed to deliver, and they have not even made good on their failure and annoyed many buyers in the process, me included. I don't think it affected their sales in the slightest. Allforge are not selling a product on the premise that it will have some major new feature six months down the line.

I am of course perfectly well aware that this is a huge gamble. There is no guarantee that they can deliver what they claim. They understood this and allowed me to pay by credit card, so I can withdraw my purchase within 180 days if I change my mind. Also, being in the UK means that my credit card company has the same liability as Allforge does (section 75 of the Consumer Credit Act), and hence if Allforge fails for some reason, my card issuer will have to cough up the moolah, just as they had to do when I bought a car with a dodgy gearbox. So I'm not completely insane.

Ultimately, someone has to take a gamble on these things. I am one of those weirdos. One day if it ever arrives I will post my ponderings, musings and deep cogitation over here.
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Re: Allforge "exactly what your family needs"

Post by reibuehl »

My understanding was that the "3D printed" molds are more or less the laser-sintered types of metal 3D prints that Shapeways and others offer and not the FDM 3D prints that we all do on our UMs... is this not correct since you plan to print molds yourself?
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Re: Allforge "exactly what your family needs"

Post by danilius »

Well from the research I have done it seems possible to inject plastics into higher-temperature plastics, such as PLA into ABS or PETG. There are several small injection moulding machines on the market (all manual or semi-automatic) and they seem to promote this sort of thing. It is possible to make moulds from all kinds of castable materials, including plaster (gulp!). I'm waiting to see what the beta-testers come up with in practice. For longer runs, one can get moulds printed in aluminium or steel. I have had steel components printed and they were pricey, but very hard (took a lot of effort to sand, for example). Aluminium would be marginally cheaper, and far easier to finish. Of course it would not last anywhere near as long as steel.

There is a lot to be seen yet, since some of my parts would require moulds with pull-outs, and that's a whole world of fun in and of itself!
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