{"id":617,"date":"2010-10-19T01:01:37","date_gmt":"2010-10-19T01:01:37","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.shapeways.com\/blog\/archives\/617-3d-printing-with-lego-not-3d-printed-lego.html"},"modified":"2014-07-03T16:59:25","modified_gmt":"2014-07-03T16:59:25","slug":"3d-printing-with-lego-not-3d-printed-lego","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.shapeways.com\/blog\/3d-printing-with-lego-not-3d-printed-lego","title":{"rendered":"3D Printing With Lego, Not 3D Printed Lego"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Will Gorman of <a target=\"_blank\" href=\"http:\/\/battlebricks.com\/makerlegobot\/\">BattleBricks <\/a>has built himself the <a target=\"_blank\" href=\"http:\/\/battlebricks.com\/makerlegobot\/\">MakerLegoBot<\/a>, constructed of Lego bricks it constructs with Lego bricks&#8230;..<\/p>\n<p><object width=\"480\" height=\"385\"><param value=\"http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/v\/4YZeX8ti7Io?fs=1&amp;hl=en_US\" name=\"movie\"><param value=\"true\" name=\"allowFullScreen\"><param value=\"always\" name=\"allowscriptaccess\"><embed width=\"480\" height=\"385\" allowfullscreen=\"true\" allowscriptaccess=\"always\" type=\"application\/x-shockwave-flash\" src=\"http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/v\/4YZeX8ti7Io?fs=1&amp;hl=en_US\"><\/embed><\/object><\/p>\n<p>The <a target=\"_blank\" href=\"http:\/\/battlebricks.com\/makerlegobot\/\">MakerLegoBot<\/a> uses 3 Lego Mindstorms NXT Bricks, along with 9 NXT motors, and is inspired by the&nbsp; by the MakerBot and RepRap teams. A Java Application that runs on the PC takes an .ldr<a href=\"http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/MLCAD\" target=\"_blank\"> MLCad<\/a> file, determines a set of print instructions, and then sends the instructions via USB over to the MakerLegoBot for printing. The current design works with 1&#215;2, 2&#215;2, 3&#215;2, 4&#215;2, and 8&#215;2 Lego bricks. Once a brick is grabbed, the next brick in line falls into place. Once a brick is retrieved, the printer head rotates vertically and moves to the exact location where the brick should be placed. The printer then places the brick, and uses an axle based release mechanism to leave the Lego in place. Immediately after placing the Lego, the bottom of the printer head applies pressure to the brick to ensure its proper placement. Once each layer has completed printing, the printer rotates up a single brick height. It can print objects that are up to 12 bricks tall.<\/p>\n<p>the MakerLegoBot, a Lego Mindstorms NXT 3D Printer will be appearing at <a href=\"http:\/\/www.legoworld.nl\/english\" target=\"_blank\">LegoWorld<\/a> October 22nd through October 26th, 2010 in Zwolle, The Netherlands. Of course if you cannot wait till then you can always follow the 447 step by step (brick by brick) <a href=\"http:\/\/battlebricks.com\/models\/makerlegobot\/\" target=\"_blank\">instructions to make your own<\/a>&#8230;<\/p>\n<\/p>\n<\/p>\n<p><a target=\"_blank\" href=\"http:\/\/hackaday.com\/2010\/10\/18\/3d-printing-with-lego\/\">Thanks to Hack a Day<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Will Gorman of BattleBricks has built himself the MakerLegoBot, constructed of Lego bricks it constructs with Lego bricks&#8230;.. The MakerLegoBot&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":12,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[481,478],"tags":[485,484,482,477],"class_list":["post-617","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-shapeways","category-community","tag-9-gadget-lab","tag-8-gadgets","tag-6-inspiration","tag-1-whats-hot"],"thumbnail":false,"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO Premium plugin v23.9 (Yoast SEO v23.9) - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>3D Printing With Lego, Not 3D Printed Lego - Shapeways Blog<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Will Gorman of BattleBricks has built himself the MakerLegoBot, constructed of Lego bricks it constructs with Lego bricks.....The MakerLegoBot uses 3 Lego\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/prodshapeblog.wpenginepowered.com\/3d-printing-with-lego-not-3d-printed-lego\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Duann\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"1 minute\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/prodshapeblog.wpenginepowered.com\/3d-printing-with-lego-not-3d-printed-lego#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/prodshapeblog.wpenginepowered.com\/3d-printing-with-lego-not-3d-printed-lego\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"Duann\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/prodshapeblog.wpenginepowered.com\/#\/schema\/person\/848d6ff12be3ccf4dc1dcd672000dc28\"},\"headline\":\"3D Printing With Lego, Not 3D Printed Lego\",\"datePublished\":\"2010-10-19T01:01:37+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2014-07-03T16:59:25+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/prodshapeblog.wpenginepowered.com\/3d-printing-with-lego-not-3d-printed-lego\"},\"wordCount\":244,\"commentCount\":2,\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/prodshapeblog.wpenginepowered.com\/#organization\"},\"keywords\":[\"Gadget Lab\",\"Gadgets\",\"Inspiration\",\"What's Hot\"],\"articleSection\":[\"Shapeways\",\"The Community\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"CommentAction\",\"name\":\"Comment\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/prodshapeblog.wpenginepowered.com\/3d-printing-with-lego-not-3d-printed-lego#respond\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/prodshapeblog.wpenginepowered.com\/3d-printing-with-lego-not-3d-printed-lego\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/prodshapeblog.wpenginepowered.com\/3d-printing-with-lego-not-3d-printed-lego\",\"name\":\"3D Printing With Lego, Not 3D Printed Lego - 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