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Found this in my box of desk trinkets, and thought to share.
From what I remember, my father was given this demo print at some tech show in mid-2000s. I am not sure of the material used for it. The surface is rough, dry, and porous, slightly discolored, but does not appear to be crumbly, flaky, or brittle even after 20 years. My friend suggests it might be made with powder sintering.
Binder jet printing is another posibility, both binder jet and sls have that rough surface.
I'm uncomfortable that random junk I might have on my desk like conference swag are now considered historical artifacts.
Definitely binder jet printing. You don't get that finish with SLS. Even from that time.
Sauce: I was there when it was all the rage
I still remember seeing 3D printers for the first time in a video, probably 20 years ago. It was sintered metal like this. It was a printer made for astronauts. They printed a crescent wrench and I was completely blown away. Little did I know that would consume my life as an adult...
Looks like SLS method and material would likely be PA 12
Does it spin smoothly? I assume that's supposed to be a ball bearing.
Relatively, the tolerances are low and surface is too rough for a true ball bearing like spin, but it does not bind or get stuck.
The printers back then were the size of refrigerators. I still have a whistle I had made from that time too.
Printers for businesses and complex materials still are. Look at the Prusa Pro SLX or Pro AFS (which, to be fair, is a scalable automated print farm).
When I was in high school, in a not very wealthy rural county, we had a stratasys printer in the engineering room somehow. I think I saw it work once, then a few years later I helped push it out onto the loading dock to be recycled because it was both broken and obsolete
Impressive