Talk:3D printing/Archive 8

Semi-protected edit request on 24 November 2022
AFTER this paragraph: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/3D_printing#Social_change

As 3D printers became more accessible to consumers, online social platforms have developed to support the community.[217] This includes websites that allow users to access information such as how to build a 3D printer, as well as social forums that discuss how to improve 3D print quality and discuss 3D printing news, as well as social media websites that are dedicated to share 3D models.[218][219][220] RepRap is a wiki based website that was created to hold all information on 3d printing, and has developed into a community that aims to bring 3D printing to everyone. Furthermore, there are other sites such as Pinshape, Thingiverse and MyMiniFactory, which were created initially to allow users to post 3D files for anyone to print, allowing for decreased transaction cost of sharing 3D files. These websites have allowed greater social interaction between users, creating communities dedicated to 3D printing.

TO ADD:

These communities are unique and proved to have a positive impact on the industry. No matter if the market goes up or down, communities keep promoting 3D printing by taking part in events, such as charity live streams and fundraising events, or participating in 3D print design competitions (1). In the past few years, as of the end of 2022, around 500 desktop 3D printing-related competitions have been held.

Sources: 1 - https://3dwithus.com/3d-printing-competitions (List of 3D Print Design Competitions) Max Funkner (talk) 16:27, 24 November 2022 (UTC)
 * Red information icon with gradient background.svg Not done: please provide reliable sources that support the change you want to be made. These sources do not appear. to be reliable, as they are.from a blog and a community-type site. Please see WP:Reliable Sources for the type of sources needed. Thanks. BilCat (talk) 23:30, 24 November 2022 (UTC)
 * The list of 3D print design competitions is popular, maintained frequently, and works as a tool for both participants and organizers. The part of the table is already archived, but still available and can be useful to study in the historical perspective.
 * Source: https://3dwithus.com/tables-archive#Archive%20-%203D%20Printing%20Competitions%202016-2019 Max Funkner (talk) 00:39, 25 November 2022 (UTC)
 * https://3dwithus.com/tables-archive Max Funkner (talk) 02:01, 25 November 2022 (UTC)
 * Wikipedia isn't a link directory, per WP:NOT and WP:EL this link should not be added. MrOllie (talk) 02:15, 25 November 2022 (UTC)
 * Please feel free not to add the link but please add the suggested addition about the communities. Max Funkner (talk) 11:14, 25 November 2022 (UTC)

Add benefits
Information could be added regarding the relevance of additive manufacturing the benefits it has over traditional manufacturing methods such as subtractive manufacturing (milling, lathe, etc.). This information is important when figuring out how to best manufacture a product. TheAdditiveMan (talk) 18:19, 14 February 2023 (UTC)

Educational Assignment (University of Minnesota CSCI 5125)
To the 3D Printing Wikipedia community,

Hello, we are a group of students from the University of Minnesota (Raine124, DannyG72, and Cdavidson710), who are currently working on a school project which requires us to edit a Wikipedia Page and interact with the other contributors. Between the 3 of us, we have experience working with Additive Manufacturing in school and our spare time, so we decided that we would like to edit the 3D printing page. We have been researching recent advancements in 3D printing (as there are few references from 2021 onward), as well as the benefits of 3D printing (a topic which we saw listed on this talk page), and we were hoping to make some additions to this article in the following weeks. One particular topic we would like to add is “Cryogenic 3D Printing”. Aside from these ideas, are there any other topics which the community would like to see added, or updated on this page? DannyG72 (talk) 19:29, 25 March 2023 (UTC)

Remove intrusive and useless animation image
The image showing the time lapse is intrusive and may cause problems for people who are seizure-prone like those with epilepsy. It does not add significantly to the page and should be removed or made into a still image.

-- Topic was created by: 2603:7081:B40:C900:151B:D7A0:5D5D:D105 on 05:01, 13 December 2021‎), but was not signed.

DannyG72 (talk) 19:52, 27 March 2023 (UTC)


 * I agree, the timelapse is jarring and should be removed, or slowed down. Perhaps a 4x slowdown could be used to showcase the timelapse more effectively? DannyG72 (talk) 19:53, 27 March 2023 (UTC)

Clean up Applications Section
The "Applications of 3D printing" section of the article is very long and poorly formatted, making it difficult to read. I would like to move the images around in the section and shorten several of the descriptions in this section. Is there any important content in this section that I should be aware of and not remove? Cdavidson710 (talk) 18:21, 30 March 2023 (UTC)

Advantages of 3D Printing
This concept has changed the way that people design products and the overall approach to the design process. There are many advantages of additive manufacturing. These advantages include producing prototypes and rapidly decreasing overall production time, less waste, little to no limitation for design geometry, easier portability, decreasing startup cost, reduction in inventory, and supporting lattice structures. In almost all cases there are fewer, or shorter, steps involved when starting with the design of the product all the way to the post-processing involved. This results in a shorter time to design, prototype, and produce a product. The geometry one can create when 3D printing is much less limited than that of one using subtractive manufacturing. With stretches being made to produce a 3D printing machine capable of 5-axis printing, almost anything can be designed, prototyped, and manufactured within a reasonable amount of time. This is also advancing the field of medicine with lattice structures for soft tissue and bone growth recovery. This is beneficial to those who need a custom product but cannot afford the subtractive manufacturing machining cost, or the geometry cannot be done with a subtractive manufacturing machine. To create a custom product, one does not need to be on the company premises. The only items required for design and prototyping are a computer, a 3D printer, and access to electricity. Additive manufacturing can be used in many ways to help reduce the time spent producing a product by simplifying many processes. This results in cutting down on operational costs spent on tooling and manual labor hours. There is a gradually decreasing startup cost of 3D printing. This is due to new innovations in technology that, in return, allow more organizations to invest in this technology. Companies or workshops that adopt this type of manufacturing can decrease production time, reduce waste, design more complicated geometry, and have the availability of making this anywhere they have access to the required materials. TheAdditiveMan (talk) 22:44, 14 February 2023 (UTC)


 * Hello TheAdditiveMan,
 * I like the Advantages of 3D Printing section you added. I agree with you that it was needed. This week I am thinking of expanding on your ideas, and perhaps create subsections of benefits in a couple different areas/industries.
 * Raine124 (talk) 03:46, 27 March 2023 (UTC)
 * We cannot base such a section on unreliable sources and vendor's marketing materials, see WP:RS. MrOllie (talk) 12:47, 29 March 2023 (UTC)
 * You are right. I still believe that a benefits sections would be useful to have. So, I will rewrite the section using reliable sources. Raine124 (talk) 15:34, 29 March 2023 (UTC)
 * Thanks for your work on the article, @Raine124. I have a few comments:
 * If you are using a reference to support a whole paragraph, it should go at the end of the paragraph. Can you check which sources are supporting the latter half of the second and third paragraphs that you added, and make sure that they are cited correctly?
 * You wrote Furthermore, the capabilities of 3D printing have extended beyond traditional manufacturing, with applications in renewable energy systems, which I find rather unclear and doesn't tell the reader much. What does extended beyond mean in this context?  Traditional manufacturing also has applications in renewable energy systems, after all.  As written that sentence comes across more as marketing than factual information. If you're writing just about batteries, then perhaps you could expand it into a sub-section in the "Applications" section instead.
 * If you can, it would be good to be more specific. For example, what sort of unique properties of 3d-printed components are particularly useful for microwave engineers?
 * Best wishes, Wham2001 (talk) 19:47, 1 April 2023 (UTC)

Request edit on 6 June 2023

 * Needed Citation Regarding Slicer Software:
 * For More Authority To The Contents Of The Article Making It Easier For Everbody To Understand:
 * References supporting the possible change (format using the "cite" button) :

Legaldon (talk) 01:09, 11 June 2023 (UTC)


 * Red information icon with gradient background.svg Not done for now: it's not clear what changes you want to be made. Please mention the specific changes in a "change X to Y" format. Actualcpscm (talk) 08:32, 11 June 2023 (UTC)

Add wikibook to sister projects
It might be beneficial to add 3D_Printing under sister projects or you grant me permissions to do so. --Ferramanis (talk) 19:27, 23 August 2023 (UTC)

Some sections asking to be shortened?
Question: Some of the sections say they can be shortened or summarized. Would some of the sections be most benefitted from combining sub-sections, or just generally shortening the overall section without any formatting changes? It seems like some of these topics are in depth enough to have their own sub articles devoted to them, and some of them even do, but not all of them, so would it be helpful to potentially create new sub articles about some of these topics all together? I'm pretty interested in some of these topics so I think it'd be interesting to do some research to try and grow the information available about some of these topics on Wikipedia, while not making massive changes to this particular article AndrewPpohl (talk) 22:33, 22 September 2023 (UTC)