Arduino Enters 3D Printing with the Materia 101

It gets easier to convince the general public that 3D printing is for real when companies with names they recognize get into the game. Additive manufacturing (AM) systems on the shelves at Home Depot and Staples help spread the word, as does the introduction of systems from the likes of Dremel.

The latest company to enter the market is Arduino, a company mainly known for its open-source, single-board microcontroller. Arduino’s new 3D printer is named (and get ready for the Final Fantasy jokes to fly) the Materia 101, and it will officially launch at Maker Faire Rome. Arduino received help in developing the new AM system from Sharebot.

The Materia 101 has been designed to be about as affordable as any desktop system can hope to be, with prices of €600 ($800) for a kit or €700 ($1,000) for a fully assembled system. While $1,000 may not seem cheap, ask any number of Kickstarter companies how realistic it is to produce a working 3D printer for less than that amount (hint: not very).

Arduino’s system is a fused deposition modeling (FDM) clone that looks a fair amount like a few of the older MakerBot models. It doesn’t appear to require its own proprietary material cartridge, which may help users save a few bucks down the road. PLA is the only supported material thus far, but the company has been testing its system with Cristal Flex, PLA thermosense, and thermoplastic polyuretane as well.

Tech specs are as follows:

• Printing area: 140 x 100 x 100 mm +/- 5mm (5.5 x 3.9 x 3.9 in.)
• X and Y theoretical resolution position: 0.06 mm (60µ)
• Z resolution: 0.0025 mm
• Extrusion diameter: 0.35 mm
• Filament diameter: 1.75 mm

Obviously that isn’t the largest build area around, nor does the system launch with a laundry list of supported materials. What Arduino has going for it is the hacker/maker community, and its open-source ethos. With the maker community in search of new heroes to support, the Materia 101 will no doubt find its way to a number of home workshops and maker spaces.

Below you’ll find a video about Arduino.

Source: Arduino