…When I first heard about the Shapeoko and saw the picture of the machine I fell in love. I first used a CNC milling machine in high school to make the car for a model roller coaster. That machine also sat on a desktop but cost closer to $50,000. This machine and Edward’s enthusiasm struck me as the right combination of everything that was good in the world. Edward is a purist. He had a clear vision for what the machine was and what it was not. He had a clear vision for who it was for and who it wasn’t for. The way he described it was “dead simple, no frills.” The first version of the Shapeoko I saw wasn’t the one above, it was this (below).
Shapeoko is an open source project that has a very passionate community of people that are eager to help newcomers and are very friendly. There are no n00bs on this forum, everyone has a seat at the table and we’re all working on the project together….
Every Thursday is #3dthursday here at Adafruit! The DIY 3D printing community has passion and dedication for making solid objects from digital models. Recently, we have noticed electronics projects integrated with 3D printed enclosures, brackets, and sculptures, so each Thursday we celebrate and highlight these bold pioneers!
Have you considered building a 3D project around an Arduino or other microcontroller? How about printing a bracket to mount your Raspberry Pi to the back of your HD monitor? And don’t forget the countless LED projects that are possible when you are modeling your projects in 3D!
The Adafruit Learning System has dozens of great tools to get you well on your way to creating incredible works of engineering, interactive art, and design with your 3D printer! If you’ve made a cool project that combines 3D printing and electronics, be sure to let us know, and we’ll feature it here!